Abstracts

The Inca Empire of the Peruvian Andes once stood as an impressive example of traditional civilization, remarked by European witnesses to having postured itself technologically and intellectually far ahead of its time. The rapid fall of the empire to Spanish inquisition in 1532 with the execution of Atahuallpa after a short century of imperial rule presents an inquiry of key factors that led to the collapse. This paper serves as an evaluation of 16th century Inca leaders and their initial response to Spanish inquisition in the Andes as prompted by the organization of their society, the effects of a devastating epidemic, as well as political division concerning the legitimacy of the emperor.

Obesity (measured in BMI) and its comorbidities are prevalent issues that affect individuals as well as surrounding communities. While there are predicated causes and predispositions for obesity, those with lower incomes tend to have higher obesity rates (Ahmad et al., 2018). Using an epidemiological approach, this study evaluated the income, obesity rates, and the rates of obesity related illness of each county within the state of Tennessee to determine if obesity is a social determent influenced by income. The data selected indicates significant correlations between income and many of obesity’s comorbidities. The data also showed a difference in obesity and its comorbidities rates when comparing rural to urban areas. The obesity epidemic is an issue that is caused by many factors and requires continued study to combat the issue of obesity.

This paper seeks to put in conversation the broader fields of biblical and literary studies as well as the more specific periods of medieval and contemporary studies in each field by proposing a theory of biblical exegesis informed by both medieval figural interpretation and contemporary rhetorical criticism, which makes use of in-depth literary analysis of biblical texts by using tools from literary critical theory. While scholars have moved away from the strict historical critical theory of the 20th century, the influence of modernity remains in much of mainline biblical scholarship, which, while having made much progress in the area of literary analysis of the Bible, does not hold the Bible to contain literal revelation or historical particularity, as the medieval exegetes did and as figural interpretation requires. Thus, this paper will defend medieval figural interpretation as a valuable means of exegesis, especially when employed in conjunction with finely tuned literary analysis of the text. Figural interpretation not only provides a key interpretive lens through which we may read the Bible and the relationship therein between the Old and New Testaments but also a key lens through which we may read genuine correspondence between the Bible and the lives of those who read it and believe it. This paper will demonstrate this theory through the figure of Rachel weeping in Genesis (Gen 30-35), who prefigures the weeping of the poetic figure of Rachel that Jeremiah hears in the exile (Jer 31:15-22), which further prefigures the weeping of the mothers in the nativity story in Matthew (Matt 2:17-18). When explicated literally and interpreted figuratively, all three texts can become the figures that transfigure our lives and draw us into the tears of God across all generations.

Liberty rights are rights that refer to the liberty possessed by a person in regards to their autonomy and individuality. Liberty rights are typically grounded in the 14th Amendment of the U.S. Constitution. In the case of parental rights, liberty rights refer to the liberty of parents to raise their children with little to no government interference. However, parental liberty can and does result in harm done to children because the threshold for maltreatment of children that warrants government intervention is too high. In other words, the state is very limited in its capacity to intervene in abusive situations due to the extensiveness of parental liberty. Parental liberty particularly results in harm to the child when a parent or guardian either does not know what is good for the child, or refuses to do what is good. It is for this reason that the Supreme Court must enable States to return to what is known as the best-interest of the child standard concerning matters of child custody.

Music education across America has been federally supported in public school systems since 1963 for the benefit of students (K12academics.com, July 6, 2020). Increased academic achievements are researched synonymously in music students, but there is a lack of research into the social and emotional development benefiting students specifically in public high school band. This study is a self-assessment of participating local Tennessee public high school band students in order to help researchers determine if there are social and emotional health benefits gained by students participating in school band class. A total of 81 high school band students completed a self-reporting survey that evaluated their experiences in high school band. Students filled out a 16 question survey, which entailed Likert-scale questions and 5 open-ended questions. Results indicate that most students reported experiencing social and emotional development during their time in band by developing close friends, increased self-confidence, and a variety of other experiences expressed by students.

Lithium-Ion batteries have the tendency to explode without warning. Lithium can plate into the anode chaotically and thus build spiky solids called dendrites. These dendrites have the potential to pierce the cell membrane and cause a short circuit. Due to our inability to see the electrochemical behavior within the cell, we must discuss other methods of experimentation to develop this technology's performance and safety. The relevant data has been gathered from experiments on an equivalent circuit model at Oak Ridge National Labs. Due to the analysis being conducted on a model of a Lithium battery, promoting the realism of the system behavior is of utmost importance. The intended goal of this project was to computationally implement noise into the circuit model data in order to provide a more realistic model for future work.

While scholarship of presidential leadership is seemingly extensive, defining the success of presidential leadership is not as simple as one may assume. Developing public policy is among one of the most important actions a president may take to secure a legacy of success. However, presidents often take different approaches to map out their policy visions and guide the country down the path they imagine. Scholars noticed the phenomenon of increased presidential communication with the public among 20th century presidents. This phenomenon, known as the rhetorical presidency, transformed presidential communication with the public. Most presidents suggest that the rhetorical ability to persuade public opinion is vital to accomplish their goals. However, scholars remain skeptical of the overall effectiveness of presidential persuasion of the public. Some hold the opinion that rhetoric does not persuade the public, but presidents still utilize rhetoric as a way to signal bureaucratic action. I suggest that while presidents do not always persuade a change in public opinion, their rhetoric targets the bureaucracy in an attempt to signal policy implementation that complies with the presidential administration’s policy agenda.

The United States Constitution and subsequent development of America’s political landscape owes much to Baron de Montesquieu. Indeed, Montesquieu is one of the most frequently discussed figures amongst early American statesmen, with modern scholars often claiming him as the single most influential man responsible for shaping founding-era documents. Montesquieu’s comments in his Spirit of the Laws concerning political tyranny in England, to furnish just one example, explicitly informed James Madison’s significant understanding of checks and balances as necessary to the American republic (see Federalist 47). The influence of the Frenchman, however, is not as clear cut as it is often presented or appears from a casual reader’s glance. Montesquieu was certainly cited by those in favor of the new Constitution to argue for its ratification, but also by those claiming him as a representative for their anti-federalist sentiments. These conflicting citations confound the simple attribution of Montesquieu as a friend of the United States Constitution. My project here will explore this concept.

This study investigated the factors that influence college completion for first-generation college students in Fentress County, TN, a county in Central Appalachia. Family dynamics, financial struggle, grit, mental health, and academic advising were the primary factors considered to have influence on college completion for students in Fentress County. To test this, ten former students from York Institute, a high school in Fentress County, who were first-generation college students were interviewed about their experiences. Three administrators from York Institute were also interviewed to discuss the current resources available to prepare high school students for the transition to post-secondary education. This research concluded that family dynamics, financial situations, grit, and academic advising were primary influences on college completion; however, themes of localism and transition also emerged from the interviews as potential factors. Using this data, educational institutions in Fentress County, as well as Central Appalachia as a whole, can better prepare potential first-generation Appalachian college students for post-secondary education.

A rational billiards surface is the outside of a three-dimensional shape (such as a donut) that allows one to view the path of a billiards ball as a continuous path instead of a jagged path obtained from numerous bounces off the sides of a billiards table. As one changes the shape of the billiards table, one obtains different billiards surfaces. Throughout the scope of this project, we investigated triangular billiard surfaces and their corresponding monodromy groups. These monodromy groups are permutation groups that map the dessin d'enfant from a sphere onto another sphere or a torus. We developed theorems for the general non-exceptional case for all triangles and are still in discovery of the exceptional case.

Many cancer treatments are currently as ineffective as they are expensive, however, naturally occurring substances have shown promise in cancer therapy. 6-shogaol (6-SHO) and Bergamottin (BERG) have been shown to have significant effects on cancer cells. Known to induce apoptosis individually, research has not been performed to consider potential synergic effects of combination therapy. This research focused on measuring the cooperative effect of 6-SHO and BERG on cell viability and apoptosis on A-375 melanoma cells (that harbor the most common mutation in melanoma, V600E B-Raf). Additionally, effects on specific molecular pathways were explored. The cell viability was measured qualitatively and quantitatively via Nuclear/Caspase staining and Trypan blue/MTT assays respectively. p-AKT and caspase-7 were measured using western blot analysis and NF-kB was analyzed using immunocytochemistry (ICC). The results showed notable decrease in cell viability for individual treatments (at 25µM and 50µM). It also showed significant decrease in cell viability for the combined treatments which indicated a synergistic effect between 6-shogaol and Bergamottin. The western blot analysis of both p-AKT and Caspase-7 proved inconclusive which indicated the need for a modified protocol in carrying out the western blot for future directions. Preliminary ICC results suggest localization of Nf-kb in the cytoplasm of the cells treated with 6-SHO and a combination of 6-SHO and BERG. Cells treated with BERG did not appear significantly different from controls. It is possible that the two chemicals act through different pathways, however, this should be further explored.

Fluorescent proteins have been used for decades, serving as biological markers that can provide insight into conformational changes and interactions within the proteins themselves. This study seeks to investigate the intrinsic fluorescence of covalently bonded dityrosine (diY) linkages within super-folder green fluorescent protein (sfGFP) under various oxidation conditions. In theory, dityrosine could be genetically tagged onto any protein to aid researchers in tracking proteins through oxidizing conditions via its intrinsic fluorescent properties. To investigate this theory, we genetically cloned a short peptide tag containing two tyrosine residues into at the C-terminus of sfGFP and purified the tagged protein. Next, we subjected the purified proteins to various concentrations of horseradish peroxidase (HRP) and hydrogen peroxide (H2O2) to oxidize the protein and allow diY to form. We assessed the intrinsic fluorescence of sfGFP and the diY linkages using a fluorometer that measured the intensity of both the GFP and diY signals. Three different oxidizing conditions were tested, and the results indicate that the intrinsic fluorescence of sfGFP varies with each condition. We were unable to reach a conclusion on which oxidation condition allowed for the most dityrosine formation. During our study, we also began the cloning work with another fluorescent protein, mCherry, with the end goal of oxidizing it for dityrosine formation. In future studies, we plan to utilize this approach with a variety of other model proteins to test the viability of each protein under oxidizing conditions.

Within many written lives of martyrs, an author’s reliance on physical depiction communicates torture to commodify the trials of the body and highlight the piety of the soul. As the author makes narrative use of the threat of sexual violence or torture on the bodies of women, certain motifs demonstrate specific concerns with a Christian woman’s modesty, lifestyle, and public reputation. This presentation will compare two late antique texts as they utilize female bodies undergoing physical torture and sexual subjugation to establish one pious mindset over another. In most cases, the text surveyed will address the question of whether or not a Christian woman should follow the “Lucretia paradigm” and commit suicide while under the threat of rape, or after a rape has been perpetrated. The primary texts translated and used will be Rufinus of Aquileia’s Latin translation of Eusebius’s Historia Ecclesiastica (402/3), sections 9 and 12 and St. Augustine of Hippo’s City of God (410), Book I, chapters 16-19. Both these authors offer differing views on the ethics of suicide, and use the bodies and minds of violated women to demonstrate their viewpoints. In doing so, they display the complexity of the developing Christian discourse on women and the body in the context of the Classical tradition.

This research paper sought to define justice for American democracy in light of several philosophical works. It was intended to be an overview and analysis of the major philosophies on democracy and justice that dominate the American political sphere that would aide a larger thesis dedicated to understanding what is considered to be the American identity and how that shapes both the legal and social systems that ungird America’s polis today and how it has affected the American identity. It must be noted that this project was more of a literature review and prospectus seeking to understand the literature and commentary behind this question to ask a further question of how exactly this vision of justice was implemented within America’s political society. For example, John Rawls, in his books A Theory of Justice and Justice As Fairness: A Restatement, asserts that justice as fairness. This particular vision of justice has greatly influenced America’s current political society, however, other theories have also had a significant impact on America’s vision of justice so much so that there is no one definite answer that can be given. Contrastingly, much of the literature on democracy and justice discusses the idea of justice and a transcendent good. Alasdair MacIntyre, author of After Virtue; Alexis De Tocqueville, author of Democracy in America; and President Abraham Lincoln imply that man inadvertently finds that justice can only be found through human flourishing and that democracy is the collective pursuit of this transcendent good. These two major visions of justice reflect an existing debate within political philosophy between the ancients and the moderns that has yet to be resolved. This literature review brings a modern light to this philosophical debate. Overall, this research project was unsuccessful in adequately defining in light of democracy but, it successfully reviewed the literature surrounding a philosophical debate that implicitly affects much of today’s political life and literature.

Since the end of 2019, the world was awakened with new challenges brought forth by COVID-19, an unexpected deadly virus that swept the world. Three months after the World Health Organization declared a global pandemic, there were over 3.2 million cases confirmed globally and 230.1 thousand deaths (WHO, 2020). In the United States at the time, there were 1.1 million cases with 64.2 thousand deaths (CDC, 2020). With televised deaths and day to day documentation, the world is seeing a new trend of hysteria among people who are both directly and indirectly affected by this phenomenon. Some are unable to bury their dead or attend funerals. Others can only watch the devastation and misfortune of others from a distance. Even more so, mass graves are being televised and corpses are left on the streets, such as cases in Ecuador, as a way to deal with overburdened health care systems. However, grieving from a distance and virtually has become a norm for many people. Yet, there is lack of documentation in how such exposure to public remorse are affecting individuals privately. The purpose of this paper is to explore the gendered ways of grieving virtually during the COVID-19 pandemic, looking at variation between ethnicity and race. Using a survey and structured interviews this project will test theories of loss and grief sociologically.

The magnitude of COVID-19 impacts each aspect of the American family, negatively affecting national fertility rates in particular. With marriage rates and fertility rates already at an all-time low, my project will consider the antagonistic effects of COVID-19's shelter in place orders, health concerns, financial insecurity, and fear upon the current and estimated birth rate. By briefly considering equitable past health crises, I will discuss the current socio-political state of and ramifications following this "baby bust," and conclude with policy suggestions which could alleviate the financial stress associated with having children during/following COVID-19.

In their landmark publication “For God so Loved the World”, Joanne Carlson Brown and Rebecca Parker offered a critique of Christian atonement theology based on the notion of “divine child abuse.” While their critique is inadequate due to its being predicated on a non-trinitarian doctrine of God, it does bring to light the issue of atoning violence and the implications therein for the moral character of God. In this paper, I address the critique leveled by Brown and Parker, establish a theological anthropology indebted to John Chrysostom and Irenaeus of Lyons, and, after proving the death of Christ only to be necessary for Christ to fully participate in the human condition and thereby inaugurate the New Covenant, develop a paradigm for atonement based on incarnational intercession that will provide a way forward in the discussion among feminist and Reformed theologians.

The Presenter will share the process of collecting research on Deaf and Hard of Hearing literacy levels and practices. Participates will understand reading literacy of deaf student. Participants will gain knowledge of Deaf and Hard of Hearing students literacy levels and historically what has been recorded. Also, Participants will learn about different literacy approaches to increase Deaf and Hard of Hearing students reading and writing levels. While anyone would benefit, educational practitioners, and those working in the Deaf field will gain the most insight.

This study aimed to research Deaf and hard of hearing (DHH) college students’ access to appropriate information about the COVID-19 pandemic and how barriers to information have impacted them emotionally. In order to thoroughly study the effect of this unique time on DHH college students, this project consisted of three components: review of literature, comparison of English and American Sign Language (ASL) news programming, and a survey of DHH and hearing college students. The study revealed that DHH college students have a more negative emotional response to the pandemic and have less access to information in their first or preferred language.

During a time of increasing civil unrest and distrust in the American system it seems that faith in The United States’ democratic regime is at an all time low. Rather than proposing civil upheaval, an alternate solution appears to be present within ancient sources. Friendship as described through the writings of Plato and Aristotle could be a novel solution, however, their writings fall short when it comes to using friendship as a connection between a citizen and their government. Nevertheless, the encouragements of more modern political thinkers such as Abraham Lincoln offer a new method of promoting trust within a democratic system. Civil religion, which is what Lincoln proposes, is a system of encouraging unity and trust within one’s citizenry and regime. Yet, the nature of democracy is such that it encourages a different form of civil religion than Lincoln proposes. Given that democracies are governed by the public, they are more capable than other regimes of engaging in friendship with their citizens. Unfortunately, democratic regimes lack the capability to truly engage in friendship with each of their citizens. Instead, they can engage in an image of friendship by creating a uniting poetry that can influence the public. I propose that through promoting civil friendship among their populace democratic regimes can solve the problems of unrest and uncertainty that may plague them.

Certain phytochemicals such as apigenin and curcumin have been shown to decrease PD-L1 expression within melanoma cells. Decreased PD-L1 expression can limit the cancer cell’s ability to repress T cell activation and allows the host’s immune system to properly dispose of cancerous cells. In this study, we tested the effects of Indole-3-carbinol (I3C) on PD-L1 expression. In order to do this, western blots were used to visualize IFN-gamma induced PD-L1 protein expression alone and in response to our treatments. Western blots were also used to determine if the phytochemical dampens PD-L1 expression by inhibiting phosphorylation of the STAT1 protein into its active form. According to our cell viability assays and western blots we saw a decrease in cell viability and less PD-L1 expression in response to our treatment. The 200uM I3C treatments appear to inhibit PD-L1 expression through preventing STAT1 phosphorylation and promote cytotoxicity within our melanoma cell line. These experiments still need to be repeated to confirm the preliminary results. Overall, our evidence suggests that I3C would be an effective cotreatment with melanoma immunotherapy to encourage cancer cell death by enhancing the host’s own immune system.

Coal extraction throughout the United States has been in decline for decades due to the demand for natural resources, the government’s environmental regulations, technological advances overtaking jobs, and the political agenda of our nation’s leaders. The consequences of this are towns and people left suffering and unemployed from the economic downturn, especially in Appalachian areas. With economic dependency on the coal industry for many of the Appalachian areas, these people are left grappling for any vestige of employment, but unfortunately the available jobs are not sufficient for survival. With a lack of employment options, some people throughout Appalachia are being forced to move from the area that has been their home since childhood to seek employment elsewhere. Others, unwilling or unable to leave the area, struggle to find sufficient employment to save themselves and their families.

This paper focuses on a specific area in the Appalachia called Tazewell County and explores how the economic downturn of the coal industry has affected them. The paper concentrates on four towns namely Tazewell, Richlands, Bluefield, and Pocahontas. The paper reflects their voices (anonymously) as they give their thoughts on the struggles and mindsets of the people, the revitalization efforts being undertaken, and the challenges that everyone is facing. This paper also includes an analysis of how the current corona virus pandemic is affecting revitalization efforts and a discussion of whether this setback will be the ultimate death sentence of the area. After the analysis of all four towns, the research concludes with a discussion of what revitalization strategies would be best suited for the entirety of Tazewell County.

A study conducted by Burton (2019) found that the foods in McMinn county’s food pantries, located in Tennessee, failed to meet nutritional standards recommended by the Food and Drug Administration. However, the reason as to if the food failed to meet nutritional standards because of lack of healthy food options or because of low nutrition literacy levels of pantry workers was inconclusive. Nutritional literacy is the ability for an individual to determine what foods are healthy and is vital for encouraging health through nutritious eating. The goal of this study was to determine the nutritional literacy of the pantry workers from the five food pantries observed in 2019. By using a Likert-Scale formatted survey, the pantry workers were evaluated for their nutritional literacy. The results typically showed a high self-assessments of nutritional literacy, however, further study is required to determine if these results are accurate.

This study was primarily conducted to investigate the possible difference between religious and non-religious individuals, and how they emotionally regulate. This was done by surveying 101 participants gathered through Prolific (prolific.co) by measuring their centrality of religiosity, emotional intelligence, emotion regulation techniques, and coping strategies. It was hypothesized that religious individuals would use cognitive reappraisal to emotionally regulate and would be less likely to use expressive suppression, and that non-religious individuals would use substances to cope more than religious individuals. Analyses revealed that there was no difference between religious and non-religious participants and their use of emotion regulation strategies. Additionally, there was no significant difference between the use of substance to cope or humor and religiosity. However, there were significant relationships between religiosity and coping styles such as: acceptance, denial, and finding comfort in their religion or spiritual beliefs.

Hydroxyl radicals play an important role in the atmosphere. They function as a detergent for the chemicals in the atmosphere by reacting with harmful compounds to make them harmless. This is a preliminary experiment in which the desired outcome is to determine the methodology that yields desired results when compared to previous published data. Determining this methodology gives the potential to conduct future experiments. Gas-phase compounds were injected into a Teflon bag which is inside a wooden chamber with UV light bulbs inside. Samples taken from this reaction chamber were collected with a Tenax sorbent and injected and analyzed with a Gas Chromatograph (GC) with a Flame Ionization Detector (FID). The Tenax was heated or cooled to a range of temperatures in multiple combinations to determine a collection and injection temperature which produced desirable results. Hexane and heptane were the organic gases used. These two compounds were used because a linearity of collected sample present associated with an increase of amount of sample, signifying that all of the sample was being collected on the Tenax without a significant amount escaping. Urea-H2O2 was decomposed and the dissociated H2O2 was injected into the reaction chamber. Hydroxyl radicals were produced when the H2O2 was exposed to the UV light inside the chamber. The reaction between the hydroxyl radicals and the organic gases were measured with the GC. Using the Relative Rates Method of reactions, the ratio of the rates of hydroxyl radicals with heptane and hexane produced was an average of 1.338. The ratio in comparison was 1.3. With this comparison, the methodology used produced a result within a desired range of precision.

The purpose of this study is  to determine if New World primates raised in captivity respond with antipredator behaviors to  vocalizations of predators from their native range.   We tested this  by comparing monkeys’  responses  to  harpy eagle calls versus  the songs  of thrushes from the  monkeys’ native range.  The outcome will differ if  antipredator behavior is learned  versus  innate.   Behaviors of  nineteen  callitrichids  of five different species  were observed  during a  sixty-second  pre-stimulus and post-stimulus period.   The monkeys’  behavior along with their location in the enclosure were analyzed every second throughout the  trial.  

Based on the  preliminary  results,  we  observed  no significant difference in responses between harpy and thrush  trials.   If this  observation  holds true  with a larger sample  size,  then we can  conclude  that antipredator responses  have an important learned component  that has been lost in captive populations.  If zoo-raised monkeys do not have a natural antipredator response, then this understanding could lead to improvements of conservation efforts for threatened and endangered species. Specifically, in order to maximize survival and reproductive success in reintroduced captive species, we should ensure they are exposed and conditioned to their native predators prior to reintroduction to the wild.

Irreversible Electroporation (IRE) is a novel therapy used in thermal ablation of tumors. It has been effective for treatment of tumors in difficult areas that are highly vascularized, such as the pancreas and liver. Cancer treatments aim to limit recurrence and resistance to treatment, so understanding the possible mechanisms cancer cells could use to evolve resistance to IRE could be informative for treatment strategies. This study uses a HeLa model of cervical cancer and the A375 cell model of melanoma to assess various factors that may affect cell susceptibility to IRE. Chemical, environmental, and physical factors were tested by 1) chemically altering membrane composition, 2) varying the amount of growth signaling in the environment, and 3) exposing the cells to repeated rounds of IRE treatment. A significantly higher viability was found in HeLa cells pre-treated with atorvastatin compared to control cells, but the trend did not hold for melanoma cells. Decreased growth factor availability resulted in a trend of lower viability. In the HeLa cell model, cell viability decreased with repeated IRE, suggesting that HeLa cells may not develop resistance to repeated IRE treatment over time. In A375 cells, viability also decreased with three rounds of IRE. These results suggest HeLa and A375 cells do not develop resistance to IRE.

The proposed project will be a comparative case study of two conservation projects conducted by non-governmental organizations. Non-governmental organizations that target environmental conservation have been pivotal in the fight to create a better and more sustainable Earth. This project will explore the activities of two organizations as they relate to the social, economic, and demographic context of the conservation interventions. The projects are the Mesoamerican Reef project conducted by the World Wildlife Fund and the Resilient Island initiative conducted by the Nature Conservancy. The Mesoamerican Reef stretches from the Yucatan Peninsula on the coast of Mexico to the Honduran Bay Islands. The reef also spans the coasts of Belize and Guatemala. The Resilient Island initiative focuses on Jamaica, Grenada and the Dominican Republic. The assessment of each project would be based on the United Nations Development Programmes’ Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs). These goals serve as a call to action for all people of the planet to improve life in many facets. This research will explore the interventions used by these projects according to their direct fulfillment of three SDGs, those being, Sustainable Cities and Communities, Climate Action and Life Below Water. These goals will be compared with data from the website pages and provided resources. The success of intervention projects often relies on interactions with local communities and economies. In order to contextualize the conservation initiatives into the specific social and economic positions in the communities where they are located, additional secondary data regarding population and development will be included in the analysis. This includes economic data from the World Bank and development information from the United Nations Human Development Report. With this research, the hope is to objectively describe the intervention process of dissimilar projects which have similar goals. The research aims to situate the initiatives in specific places and suggest the importance of cultural context and location in the successful attainment of SDGs

The study conducted illustrates the characteristics of the employees that work in a not-for-profit agency to the demographics of the community that they serve. The characteristics that were sought are the educational and experiential backgrounds that the employees portray as well as the way that non-profit agencies operate to serve the community, including briefly describing challenges that the nonprofit sector faces.

There has been a vast amount of research that has studied injuries of athlete, but few have looked at the psychological response that athletes face. There are a variety of models to explain how a person may cope following trauma. Currently it is unclear how athletes cope following season ending injury. Purpose: This study examined how Division II athletes cope with season ending injuries. We anticipate athletes will utilize a variety of methods to cope with season ending injury. Methods: This study examined the different coping mechanisms an athlete uses by implementing the Brief COPE Inventory to eligible athletes. Athletic trainers of the Gulf South Conference were emailed to explain the purpose of the study and asked to provide the inventory link to any athlete suffering a season ending injury in the past five years. 34 participants (m=15, f=19) completed the study, the results were analyzed using a Repeated Measures ANOVA through JASP software. Results: Our results indicated athletes suffering from season-ending injuries choose primarily positive ways of coping over negative ways of coping with the top three coping mechanisms being acceptance, planning, and active coping. Seeing that positive ways of coping were used over negative ways is something that can be useful in the future when an athlete faces a season-ending injury. Conclusions: The results yielded from this study will be able to be used by many medical professionals to enable athletes to more positive ways of coping for an enhanced recovery from an injury.

The main objective of this study was to further understand that relationship between mood and creativity. Past research has measured these creative thought processes through the use of the Associate Uses Task (AUT) and Remote Associations Task (RAT), as well as the Abbreviated Torrance Test for Adults (ATTA). Consequently, this study aimed at further exploring the congruence between three creativity assessment tools: ATTA, AUT, and RAT. Due to the subscales within the ATTA and past mood literature, the researcher predicted that positive mood would influence creative performance of this task. Furthermore, the researcher predicted mood would have an influence on creativity in tasks such as the AUT and RAT (Davis, 2009). The researcher, however, hypothesized that there would be a difference in creativity predictors across assessments. In this study, creativity was studied through two dimensions, divergent and convergent thinking. Creativity that focuses on fluency, flexibility, originality and elaboration is known as divergent thinking and was assessed using the RAT and ATTA. Convergent thinking engages in a form a creativity that facilitates focusing on relevant information and stimuli, while excluding irrelevant information leading researchers to believe it to be an associative function and was assessed using the AUT and ATTA. Within the literature, research has favored the use of the AUT and RAT. The ATTA, however, assesses for the four elements of divergent thinking, but also assesses for richness, emotions and feelings. Results are discussed in the presentation.