ASSESSING THE LEVEL OF TECHNOLOGY INTEGRATION OF TITLE I TEACHERS IN A LARGE URBAN SCHOOL DISTRICT

By law, Title I schools employ teachers who are both competent in their subject knowledge and State certified. In addition, Title I teachers receive ongoing professional development in technology integration and are equipped with the latest innovative resources to integrate technology in the classroom. The aim is higher academic achievement and the effective use of technology in the classroom. The investment to implement technology in this large urban school district to improve student achievement has continued to increase. In order to infuse current and emerging technology throughout the curriculum, this school district needs to know where teachers have, and have not, integrated technology. Yet the level of how technology is integrated in Title I schools is unknown. This study used the Digital-Age Survey Levels of Teaching Innovation (LoTi) to assess 508 Title I teachers’ technology integration levels using three major initiatives purchased by Title I— the iPads program, the Chromebook initiative, and the interactive whiteboards program. The study used a quantitative approach. Descriptive statistics, regression analysis, and statistical correlations were used to examine the relationship between the level of technology integration and the following dependent variables: personal computer use (PCU), current instructional practices (CIP), and levels of teaching innovation (LoTi). With this information, budgetary decisions and professional development can be tailored to the meet the technology implementation needs of this district. The result of this study determined a significant relationship between the level of teaching innovation, personal computer use, and current instructional practices with teachers who teach with iPad, Chromebook, and/or interactive whiteboard. There was an increase in LoTi, PCU, and CIP scores with increasing years of experience of Title I teachers. There was also a significant relationship between teachers with 20 years or more teaching experience and their LoTi score.

DISSOLVED AND GASEOUS FLUXES OF CARBON AND NITROGEN FROM URBAN WATERSHEDS OF THE CHESAPEAKE BAY

Carbon and nitrogen loading to streams and rivers contributes to eutrophication as well as greenhouse gas (GHG) production in streams, rivers and estuaries. My dissertation consists of three research chapters, which examine interactions and potential trade-offs between water quality and greenhouse gas production in urban streams of the Chesapeake Bay watershed. My first research project focused on drivers of carbon export and quality in an urbanized river. I found that watershed carbon sources (soils and leaves) contributed more than in-stream production to overall carbon export, but that periods of high in-stream productivity were important over seasonal and daily timescales. My second research chapter examined the influence of urban storm-water and sanitary infrastructure on dissolved and gaseous carbon and nitrogen concentrations in headwater streams. Gases (CO2, CH4, and N2O) were consistently super-saturated throughout the course of a year. N2O concentrations in streams draining septic systems were within the high range of previously published values. Total dissolved nitrogen concentration was positively correlated with CO2 and N2O and negatively correlated with CH4. My third research chapter examined a long-term (15-year) record of GHG emissions from soils in rural forests, urban forest, and urban lawns in Baltimore, MD. CO2, CH4, and N2O emissions showed positive correlations with temperature at each site. Lawns were a net source of CH4 + N2O, whereas forests were net sinks. Gross CO2 fluxes were also highest in lawns, in part due to elevated growing-season temperatures. While land cover influences GHG emissions from soils, the overall role of land cover on this flux is very small (< 0.5%) compared with gases released from anthropogenic sources, according to a recent GHG budget of the Baltimore metropolitan area, where this study took place.

Economic Development of Urban Areas

In this dissertation I study the development of urban areas. At the aggregate level I investigate how they may be affected by climate change policies and by being designated the seat of governmental power. At the household level I study with coauthors how microfinance could improve the health of urban residents. In Chapter 1, I investigate how local employment may be affected by electricity price increases, which is a likely consequence of climate change policies. I outline how previous studies that find large, negative effects may be biased. To overcome these biases I develop a novel estimation strategy that blends border-pair regressions with the synthetic control methodology. I show the conditions for consistent estimation. Using this estimator, I find no effect of contemporaneous price changes on employment. Consistent with the longer time-frame for manufacturing decisions, I do find evidence for negative effects from perceived permanent price shocks. These estimates are much smaller than previous research has found. National capital cities are often substantially larger than other cities in their countries. In Chapter 2, I investigate whether there is a causal effect from being a capital by studying the 1960 relocation of the Brazilian capital from Rio de Janeiro to Brasília. Using a synthetic controls strategy I find that losing the capital had no significant effects on Rio de Janeiro in terms of population, employment, or gross domestic product (GDP). I find that Brasília experienced large and significant increases in population, employment, and GDP. I find evidence of large spillovers from the public to the private sector. Chapter 3 investigates how microfinance could increase the uptake of costly health goods. We study the effect of time payments (micro-loans or micro-savings) on willingness-to-pay (WTP) for a water filter among households in the slums of Dhaka, Bangladesh. We find that time payments significantly increase WTP: compared to a lump-sum up-front purchase, median WTP increases 83% with a six-month loan and 115% with a 12-month loan. We find that households are quite patient with respect to consumption of health inputs. We find evidence for the presence of credit and savings constraints.

Photochemistry and transport of tropospheric ozone and its precursors in urban and remote environments

Tropospheric ozone (O3) adversely affects human health, reduces crop yields, and contributes to climate forcing. To limit these effects, the processes controlling O3 abundance as well as that of its precursor molecules must be fully characterized. Here, I examine three facets of O3 production, both in heavily polluted and remote environments. First, using in situ observations from the DISCOVER-AQ field campaign in the Baltimore/Washington region, I evaluate the emissions of the O3 precursors CO and NOx (NOx = NO + NO2) in the National Emissions Inventory (NEI). I find that CO/NOx emissions ratios derived from observations are 21% higher than those predicted by the NEI. Comparisons to output from the CMAQ model suggest that CO in the NEI is accurate within 15 ± 11%, while NOx emissions are overestimated by 51-70%, likely due to errors in mobile sources. These results imply that ambient ozone concentrations will respond more efficiently to NOx controls than current models suggest. I then investigate the source of high O3 and low H2O structures in the Tropical Western Pacific (TWP). A combination of in situ observations, satellite data, and models show that the high O3 results from photochemical production in biomass burning plumes from fires in tropical Southeast Asia and Central Africa; the low relative humidity results from large-scale descent in the tropics. Because these structures have frequently been attributed to mid-latitude pollution, biomass burning in the tropics likely contributes more to the radiative forcing of climate than previously believed. Finally, I evaluate the processes controlling formaldehyde (HCHO) in the TWP. Convective transport of near surface HCHO leads to a 33% increase in upper tropospheric HCHO mixing ratios; convection also likely increases upper tropospheric CH3OOH to ~230 pptv, enough to maintain background HCHO at ~75 pptv. The long-range transport of polluted air, with NO four times the convectively controlled background, intensifies the conversion of HO2 to OH, increasing OH by a factor of 1.4. Comparisons between the global chemistry model CAM-Chem and observations show that consistent underestimates of HCHO by CAM-Chem throughout the troposphere result from underestimates in both NO and acetaldehyde.

Changes in the community structure of urban and rural forest patches in Baltimore from 1998 to 2015

Urban forests are often highly fragmented with many exotic species. Altered disturbance regimes and environmental pollutants influence urban forest vegetation. One of the best ways to understand the impacts of land-use on forest composition is through long-term research. In 1998, the Baltimore Ecosystem Study established eight forest plots to investigate the impacts of urbanization on natural ecosystems. Four plots were located in urban forest patches and four were located in rural forests. In 2015, I revisited these plots to measure abundances and quantify change in forest composition, diversity, and structure. Sapling, shrub, and seedling abundance were reduced in the rural plots. Alpha diversity and turnover was lower in the rural plots. Beta diversity was reduced in the rural plots. The structure of the urban plots was mostly unchanged, except for a highly reduced sapling layer. Beta diversity in the urban plots was consistent across surveys due to high species turnover.