School of Public Health

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The collections in this community comprise faculty research works, as well as graduate theses and dissertations.

Note: Prior to July 1, 2007, the School of Public Health was named the College of Health & Human Performance.

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    Learning How to Navigate U.S. Society with Young Children: Experiences of Immigrant Mothers Utilizing Early Childhood Care and Education
    (2011) Vesely, Colleen Kirkwood; Roy, Kevin M; Family Studies; Digital Repository at the University of Maryland; University of Maryland (College Park, Md.)
    Nearly one in four children in the United States are children of immigrants (Fortuny, Hernandez, & Chaudry, 2010), and these children are the fastest growing segment of children in the country (U.S. Census, 2000 as cited in Matthews & Ewen, 2006b). Given this growth, grounded in Berry's (1997) acculturation framework and ecocultural theory (Weisner, 1997) , this study investigated the lived experiences of immigrant mothers with young children as these mothers adjusted to being parents in the U.S. An ethnographic approach was utilized to explore the experiences of 41 immigrant mothers living in Washington, DC and Virginia who were engaged with the ECCE system. Consequently, in-depth interviews as well as observations were conducted with immigrant mothers living in northern Virginia and Washington, DC, hailing from both Latin America (n= 22) and Africa (n=19). Data were analyzed using a modified grounded theory approach in which three waves of coding were conducted: open coding, axial coding, and selective coding. The findings from this study indicate that mothers' immigration stories, including, their reasons for coming to a new host society, their journey and finally, adjustment to life in the new country, shaped their expectations of parenting in the U.S. Mothers' in this study negotiated parenting ideas and practices from the U.S. and their home countries to create a new social framework for parenting in the U.S. that was distinct from parenting in their COOs and the U.S. Finally, a process model emerged from the data reflecting these immigrant mothers' navigation of the ECCE system. It illustrated that mothers drew upon a variety of social, organizational, and geographic connections to find ECCE, sometimes faced obstacles to securing ECCE, and ultimately were able to develop important social capital as a result of utilizing ECCE. The findings from this study will provide practitioners, policy makers, and researchers with a greater understanding of how immigrant families with young children adjust to life in the U.S., experience parenting, and how they navigate the U.S. ECCE system. This knowledge will contribute to creating the most effective programs, policies, and studies to support immigrant families.
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    Investigating the Global Productivity Effects of Highly Skilled Labor Migration: How Immigrant Athletes Impact Olympic Medal Counts
    (2011) Horowitz, Jonathan Joseph; McDaniel, Stephen R; Kinesiology; Digital Repository at the University of Maryland; University of Maryland (College Park, Md.)
    Labor migration is a defining attribute of today's global economy, as more people live outside their country of birth than ever before and workers have more opportunities beyond their local borders (GCIM, 2005). This has motivated scholars to better understand the mobility of human capital and its various effects. While data are available to track aggregate migration patterns between countries, it is much more difficult to determine its association with such metrics as gains or losses in productivity for specific sectors of industry (Asis & Piper, 2008). Athletes are among the few groups of workers (along with information technology specialists, senior academics, health professionals and teachers) who can seek employment on a global market level while most people have fewer opportunities based on national markets (GCIM, 2005). Moreover, given the availability of records and clear metrics of productivity, the sports entertainment industry provides a unique opportunity to investigate the movement of a highly skilled labor force (Kahn, 2000). Therefore, the current study will investigate 21st century labor migration patterns and their relationship to productivity in the context of arguably the largest, oldest and most global example of sports business, the Summer Olympics. The scholarly and practical implications and future directions for research will be discussed.