State Of Kansas Research Articles

A Time to Lose

A Time to Lose Paul E. Wilson It has been a long time since I first came to this chamber to speak about Brown v. Board of Education of Topeka.1 In 1952,1 stood facing this Bench and urged that a Kansas statute that permitted racial segregation in some of the state’s public schools was not unconstitutional. I lost. This evening I have a different purpose. I have no case to argue, no ax to grind. I shall not talk about constitutional law. My remarks will be personal and anecdotal - some even trivial. They will concern matters not written about by scholars, but they will reflect some ofmy recol­ lections about Brown. In Richard Kluger’s book, Simple Justice, the author introduces me by writing, “By East­ ern standards, Paul Wilson was a hayseed. His background and practice did not seem to qualify him very well... as a reluctant dragon [in] defending his state’s Jim Crow public schools.”2 I do not take exception to Mr. Kluger’s assessment. I was a country lawyer. I had practiced in the county seat of the rural Kansas county where I was bom. My clients there were farmers and tradespeople and the proprietors ofsmall businesses, most ofwhom found litigation distasteful. I served as pros­ ecuting attorney but my constituents were law abiding people and serious crime was minimal. Felonyprosecutions were rare. Racial discrimi­ nation cases were unknown because there was no one to discriminate against. We were all white. My courtroom experience was largely limitedto the local county and district courts. I had never argued an appeal, either on the fed­ eral or state level. After four years, I had left this prairie nirvana to become an assistant state attorney general. My objective was twofold. I had an interest in state politics and wanted to extend my statewide acquaintance. Also, I wanted to broaden my professional experience. Particularly, I wantedto get some experience as A TIME TO LOSE 171 an appellate lawyer. A year later I made my first argument before an appellate court. The court was the Supreme Court of the United States. My case was Brown v. Board ofEducation of Topeka. In the language of civil rights, Brown v. Board of Education of Topeka means not a single case, but the rule drawn from the con­ solidation of four, or perhaps five, cases. Dur­ ing the second week in December 1952, the Su­ preme Court heard appeals from the states of Kansas,3 South Carolina,4 Virginia,5 Delaware,6 and from the District of Columbia.7 Although each was a separate case and was appealed on its own discrete record, all raised the issue of the constitutionality of laws requiring or per­ mitting racial segregation in the public schools. The four state cases were decided in a single opinion bearing the caption Brown v. Board of Education of Topeka. Kansans are often em­ barrassed that their state is so conspicuously known as a place where racial discrimination was sanctioned by law. They ask why couldn’t it have been South Carolina or Virginia where the issue was more critical and the impact of the decision was greater. The answer is that the Kansas case was the first docketed for argu­ ment in the Supreme Court. It was not the first to be appealed. The South Carolina case was appealed earlier but was returned to the trial court for further proceedings. Meanwhile, the Brown appeal reached the Supreme Court and was assigned a place in the docket. Thus the free state ofKansas and not Clarendon County, South Carolina, became identified as the place where public school segregation made its last stand. My remarks here will be limited to the Kansas case. In 1951, the laws of Kansas prohibited racial discrimination in the public schools, ex­ cept in cities ofthe first class where boards of education were empowered, not required, to segregate in the elementary grades only.8 Cit­ ies of the first class are those with 15,000 or more inhabitants. In 1951 there were twelve such cities. The elementary grades were grades one through six. Of the twelve cities affected Paul Wilson was a country lawyer from...

The Case of Leroy Hendricks: A Blueprint for Successful Implementation of a Sexual Predator Statute

The handling and care of dangerous sexual predators has typically been a function of the criminal justice system. Recently, however, the state of Kansas became the focus of a Supreme Court challenge regarding the states' use of civil confinement following the completion of the criminal sanction as it's method for protecting society from dangerous sexual predators. The Court held that the procedure did not constitute double jeopardy, or any other Constitutional violation. Leroy Hendricks, the case principal, the state statute and policy implications are discussed.

Reforming Medicaid through Contracting: The Nexus of Implementation and Organizational Culture

This article investigates the administrative experience resulting from the intersection of two popular public management trends: social service reform and contracting out. In this case, the reform involved the state of Kansas contracting with nonprofit agencies to provide Medicaid case management services. Implementation of the reforms entailed substantial changes in the roles and scope of administrative activities for the agencies involved and significant challenges to the administrative cultures of each. As a result, the nonprofit agencies now play a more central role in state policy deliberations and encounter higher levels of interagency political conflict than they did prior to their contracting role. While some of the rationales for the policy reform have been realized, others have been more elusive, including cost savings and the single-point-of-entry organizing principle of the reform. Implementation challenges due to turf issues, tensions over external monitoring, and differences in administrative cultures have contributed to a lack of policy subgroup cohesiveness, which could facilitate intragovernmental and intergovernmental relationships. This article examines the interaction of implementation dynamics and organizational culture in the context of a popular American public policy trend: privatization and contracting. Privatization and contracting have soared in popularity in the last decade and are now finding acceptance in heretofore unimagined arenas, such as prisons and welfare reform.' In the social welfare policy arena, privatization and contracting frequently are manifested in agreements with nonprofits. (Nathan [1997] refers to this phenomenon as nonprofitization.) Research on the subject indicates that contracting presents nonprofits with substantial challenges as they implement new 107/Journal of Public Administration Research and Theory An earlier version of this article was presented at the fourth national Public Management Conference, University of Georgia, Athens, October 1997. The authors are grateful to Denise Casamento and Kara Lindaman for research assistance and to the many state and nonprofit officials who agreed to be interviewed for this study. 'It is important to note that there are inherent differences between privatization and contracting. Privatization implies a more complete transfer of ownership and service delivery from the public to the private sector. Contracting involves government administrative responsibility, with service delivery and/or management provided under a formal agreement with nongovernmental agencies. In our case, the word privatization is used by Kansas elected officials to describe the reform that serves as the focus of our study. In reality, however, the reform entails a new contractual arrangement for service

Factors Related to the Absence or Presence of Pressure Ulcers and the Degree of Pressure Ulcer Involvement in Long Term Care

The purpose of this study was to determine the associations between the absence or presence and the acuity of pressure ulcers with Body Mass Index (BMI), food consumption patterns, use of between meal supplementation, use of parenteral or intravenous nutrition, use of enteral nutrition, diagnosis of diabetes mellitus and/or peripheral vascular disease, and bowel/bladder incontinence in long term care patients with marginal physical functioning and normal hydration. The patient sample was randomly selected from the population of approximately 19,000 residents residing in all long term care facilities from the entire state of Kansas whose medical status was profiled by Minimum Data Set Plus (MDS+). Half of the 200 subjects had pressure ulcers and the other half did not have ulcers. Multiple stepwise logistic regression was used to analyze the association of the occurrence of pressure ulcers with nutritional factors taken from the MDS+ assessment tool. Incontinence of bladder, incontinence of bowel, and supplements between meals significantly predicted the occurrence of pressure ulcers at the p <.05 level. Two methods were used to identify the degree of pressure ulcer involvement. The first method, “worse”, identified the degree of involvement based on the highest stage of pressure ulcer presented (Stages I-IV). The second method was related to the stage and number of pressure ulcers presented and is referred to as acuity. The acuity method for determining acuity of pressure ulcers resulted in ten categories. Using Chi square to determine the association of the acuity of pressure ulcer involvement with continence, incontinence and between meal supplementation resulted in too few numbers cells for meaningful analysis. An alternative method for Chi square would include re-categorizing acuity to allow for future analysis.

“Getting a Jumpstart On HACCP” - A Program To Introduce Foodservice Operators To The Hazard Analysis Critical Control Point (HACCP) System

“Getting a Jumpstart on HACCP” was developed to introduce foodservice operators to HACCP fundamentals and to assist personnel in implementing a basic HACCP system within their operations. The workshop materials were produced using information obtained from the Educational Foundation of the National Restaurant Association and the Food and Drug Administration's 1995 and 1997 Food Code. Content of the program incorporated an introduction to HACCP, food safety hazards including microorganisms, an in-depth review of the seven principles of HACCP, and active learning activities. These exercises included analysis of menus for hazards, identification of critical control points in recipes, and development of flow charts for recipes and/or groups of foods. Participants were recruited from the Kansas School Foodservice Association, Kansas Restaurant and Hospitality Association, Kansas Area on Aging, Kansas Dietetic Association, and Kansas Association of Sanitarians. Workshops were scheduled in five locations throughout the state of Kansas for the six-hour workshop. More than 300 persons including Registered Dietitians, school foodservice personnel, state sanitarians, Family and Consumer Science Agents, Dietary Managers, restaurant operators, and Area Agency on Aging personnel attended the workshops. A significant (p=<.001) increase in participants’ knowledge of HACCP concepts was found between pre and post evaluations. Participants stated that the workshop was effective in introducing basic HACCP principles and that the active learning exercises increased their ability to apply basic HACCP concepts. Materials developed for this program can be used by other states when presenting HACCP workshops. The increased emphasis by regulatory agencies on application of HACCP could provide those dietetic professionals knowledgeable of HACCP additional employment opportunities.

Structure and Evolution of Winter Cyclones in the Central United States and Their Effects on the Distribution of Precipitation. Part V: Thermodynamic and Dual-Doppler Radar Analysis of a Squall Line Associated with a Cold Front Aloft

Abstract On 8–9 March 1992, a long-lived squall line traversed the state of Kansas, producing hail and damaging winds. It was shown previously that this squall line was part of a synoptic-scale rainband 2000 km in length that was associated with a cold front aloft (CFA). The present study is concerned with the detailed mesoscale structure of this squall line and its relationship to the CFA. Examination of synoptic-scale cross sections based on rawinsonde ascents, and a mesoscale cross section of winds derived from dual-Doppler radar measurements, shows that the squall line was exactly coincident with the “nose” of the CFA. The dual-Doppler analysis also shows that the inflow of air to the squall line was elevated, drawing in air from the potentially unstable layer within the weak warm frontal–like feature that was being occluded by the CFA. The stability analysis of the air in the pre-squall-line environment shows that when the CFA overtook the surface position of the drytrough, the thermal and moisture s...

SPATIAL COHERENCE AND DECAY OF WIND SPEED AND POWER IN THE NORTH-CENTRAL UNITED STATES

Hourly wind data from a network of climate stations in the north-central United States (drawn from the states of Illinois, lowa, Kansas, Minnesota, Missouri, Nebraska, North Dakota, South Dakota, and Wisconsin) are analyzed to evaluate the efficacy of spatial analyses of near-surface wind speed and power. Spatial autocorrelation functions (acfs) were calculated at a number of timescales: annual, monthly, daily, and hourly. Annual wind speeds have virtually no coherent distance-decay relationship; monthly data produce a more consistent relationship, but still exhibit a large amount of scatter. Both daily and hourly data have classical decay with increasing distance between stations and there appears to be an optimal level of temporal aggregation, near the daily timescale, for spatial analysis of wind. In general, however, spatial acfs overestimate the spatial coherence of both wind speed and power. Temporal nonstationarities in wind data (i.e., diurnal and annual cycles) bias spatial autocorrelation functions and need to be removed before using spatial acfs to estimate characteristics of wind fields. Because mean absolute differences (MAD) of interstation wind speed and power are less affected by temporal nonstationarities, they produce more-robust representations of the spatial variability of wind speed and power. As a result, spatial MADs are recommended over spatial acfs for analyzing spatial coherence and decay of any spatial variable that contains nonstationarities. Methods for improving the spatial analysis of wind are discussed. [Key words: wind energy, spatial autocorrelation, spatial analysis, nonstationarity, north-central United States.]

Job Satisfaction and Employee Attitude Prior to and after Implementation of Cook/Chill Food Production System

LEARNING OUTCOME: To examine the effect of changing food production system on school foodservice employees’ job satisfaction and attitudes towards the new system To improve the quality of food and reduce labor and food costs, a school foodservice operation in the state of Kansas decided to convert from a centralized conventional food production system with a satellite delivery to 12 elementary schools to a cook-chill system preparing meals for 12 elementary, 2 middle, and 2 high schools. Before implementing the new system the operation conducted a feasibility study and trained key employees who would be primarily responsible for preparing cook-chill products. Employees participated in site visits of other cook-chill systems and formal training sessions offered by the cook-chill equipment manufacturer. A pre-test and post-test study design was used to examine job satisfaction of school foodservice employees and employees’ attitudes towards the new system prior to implementing cook-chill (pre-test) and after 4 months of implementation (post-test). Job Satisfaction Index (JDI) and an attitude survey were administered to measure job satisfaction and employees’ attitude, respectively JDI described job satisfaction in five job-related components: working environment, supervision, co-workers, pay, and promotion. T-tests were conducted to determine significant differences. No significant difference was found between the pre-test and the post-test in all five areas of JDI. However, school foodservice employees showed the lowest satisfaction scores in the pay and promotion components compared to the other. Significant difference was found in the attitude measures between two periods. Mean scores of positive attributes of the cook-chill system significantly decreased in the post-test. Findings from the attitude survey and employees’ comments indicated strong resistance and discomfort with the new system among employees. Although there is always resistance to any form of change in any organization, good communication system, continuous training, and good management are essential to the successful change during the early stage of implementation. School foodservice directors must consider human factors and management implications involved in and affected by the change process.

Application of geostatistics to evaluate partial weather station networks

Climatic data are an essential input for the determination of crop water requirements. The density and location of weather stations are the important design variables for obtaining the required degree of accuracy of weather data. The planning of weather station networks should include economic considerations, and a mixture of full and partial weather stations could be a cost-effective alternative. A ‘full’ weather station is defined here as one in which all the weather variables used in the modified Penman equation are measured, and a ‘partial’ weather station is one in which some, but not all, weather variables are measured. The accuracy of reference evapotranspiration ( Et r) estimates for sites located some distance from surrounding stations is dependent on measurement error, error of the estimation equation, and interpolation error. The interpolation error is affected by the spatial correlation structure of weather variables and method of interpolation. A case-study data set of 2 years of daily climatic data (1989–1990) from 17 stations in the states of Nebraska, Kansas, and Colorado was used to compare alternative network designs and interpolation methods. Root mean squared interpolation error (RMSIE) values were the criteria for evaluating Et r estimates and network performance. The kriging method gave the lowest RMSIE, followed by the inverse distance square method and the inverse distance method. Co-kriging improved the estimates still further. For a given level of performance, a mixture of full and partial weather stations would be more economical than full stations only.

Labor's Constitution of Freedom

According to the standard story, the basic structure of modern constitutional law emerged from a clash between two great constitutional visions: the laissez-faire constitutionalism of the so-called Lochner Era and the progressive vision concisely summarized in footnote four of United States v. Carolene Products. The standard story omits a third great constitutional vision: labor's constitution of freedom. In the early twentieth century, American workers advanced their own interpretations of the Constitution, often in opposition to those of the Supreme Court. Workers did not wait for judicial approval to put their constitutional vision into practice. Having declared laws unconstitutional, they endeavored to strike them down through noncompliance and direct action. The article begins by setting forth a theoretical model of constitutional insurgency, focusing on the roles played by popular rights consciousness, direct popular power, and professional legal representation in achieving constitutional change. It then presents a detailed case study of constitutional insurgency. In January of 1920, the Kansas state legislature enacted the Kansas Industrial Court Act, the most ambitious piece of American labor legislation prior to the Wagner Act. Although the Industrial Court ruled in favor of workers more often than not, the American Federation of Labor declared the law unconstitutional under the Thirteenth Amendment, and ten thousand Kansas coal miners staged a four-month winter strike “against the political powers of the state of Kansas, monopoly, [and] the industrial court law.” The article tells the story and examines the dynamics of this insurgency from the level of the miners’ local unions on up to the United States Supreme Court.

Geologic Studies in Western Kansas in the 19th Century

Geologic exploration in western Kansas in the early part of the 19th century was general, being performed as part of government surveys led by military officers such as Zebulon M. Pike, Stephen E Long, John C. Fremont, and others. These surveys began in 1806 and occurred irregularly until the late 1850's. Subsequent to the Civil War, surveys were undertaken by parties interested in a transcontinental railroad and the State of Kansas funded two surveys, the latter adding little new data regarding the western part of the state. Discoveries of fossils in the chalk, especially vertebrates, drew the attention of paleontologists such as E. D. Cope and 0. C. Marsh, who led or supported field parties in the chalk beds through much of the 1870's. Appointments of geologists to the faculty of the various colleges and to the State Board of Agriculture led to additional studies in the western part of the state. With the formation of the third State or University Geological Survey in 1889, systematic studies of the geology and natural resources of the state began. As the 19th century drew to a close, a better understanding of the geology of western Kansas began to emerge.

The Impact of Local Option Sales Taxes on Retail Sales, Employment, Payrolls, and Establishments: The Case for Kansas

This study examines the impact of local option sales tax differentials in the State of Kansas on retail sales, retail employment, retail payrolls, and the number of retail establishments. It was found that (1) the county tax rate is inversely and significantly related to retail sales per capita, retail sales per vendor, and retail employment per vendor; (2) the city tax rate is inversely and significantly related to the number of retail establishment per capita only; (3) there is a significant border effect for counties bordering another state on retail sales per capita, retail sales per vendor, retail employment per capita, retail employment per vendor, retail payrolls per capita, retail payrolls per vendor, and the number of retail establishments per capita; and (4) regional market dominance is directly and significantly related to retail sales per capita, retail employment per capita, retail payrolls per capita, and the number of retail establishments per capita

Home Health Visits using a Cable Television Network: User Satisfaction

There are about 1.5 million home patients who receive home health care (nurses visiting patients in their homes) in the US each year. In a significant proportion of these visits, hands-on care is not needed. Rather, the nurse needs to verify compliance with medication regimes, assess mental or emotional status, or check blood sugar levels, blood pressure and the like. Many of these activities might be handled by a nursing visit using interactive video to the patient's home, saving the nurse's time wasted in driving, finding parking, etc. A system for delivering home health care using interactive video has been piloted in the State of Kansas. Using the local cable television infrastructure for audio and video transmission, this system permits a nurse to see patients in their homes for a fraction of the cost of an on-site visit. This new method of delivering home health care is being evaluated with an ongoing study of utilization and user satisfaction. We conducted a prospective survey administered to home health nurses ( n=2) and homebound patients ( n=3) using a cable-TV-mediated interactive video system, to assess utilization and user satisfaction with televideo-mediated home health care visits. One hundred and eighty-one patient questionnaires and 193 nurse questionnaires were completed. The average length of a visit was 15 minutes (range 1–91). All mean scores tabulated for the questions indicated strong nurse and patient satisfaction with the system. Participating nurses and clients were satisfied with the televideo encounters. The mean score for all questions was better than neutral. Recognizing that this was a pilot study, hampered by small numbers and subject to the inherent biases of a single-institution study, the results support further investigation and implementation of this modality for home health care.

Home health visits using a cable television network: user satisfaction.

There are about 1.5 million home patients who receive home health care (nurses visiting patients in their homes) in the US each year. In a significant proportion of these visits, hands-on care is not needed. Rather, the nurse needs to verify compliance with medication regimes, assess mental or emotional status, or check blood sugar levels, blood pressure and the like. Many of these activities might be handled by a nursing visit using interactive video to the patient's home, saving the nurse's time wasted in driving, finding parking, etc. A system for delivering home health care using interactive video has been piloted in the state of Kansas. Using the local cable television infrastructure for audio and video transmission, this system permits a nurse to see patients in their homes for a fraction of the cost of an on-site visit. This new method of delivering home health care is being evaluated with an ongoing study of utilization and user satisfaction. We conducted a prospective survey administered to home health nurses (n = 2) and homebound patients (n = 3) using a cable TV-mediated interactive video system, to assess utilization and user satisfaction with televideo-mediated home health care visits. One hundred and eighty-one patient questionnaires and 193 nurses questionnaires were completed. The average length of a visit was 15 minutes (range 1-91). All mean scores tabulated for the questions indicated strong nurse and patient satisfaction with the system. Participating nurses and clients were satisfied with the televideo encounters. The mean score for all questions was better than neutral. Recognizing that this was a pilot study, hampered by small numbers and subject to the inherent biases of a single institution study, the results support further investigation and implementation of this modality for home health care.

Kansas: Library technology initiatives

The state of Kansas and the Kansas State Library are faced with the necessity of doing more with less. In a time of decreasing budgets and increasingly fastpaced technology changes, this is indeed a challenge. This is a period of evaluating existing services, developing new services, and re‐examining missions and priorities. As a state, we are also faced with a geographically large area (81,823 square miles), a few concentrated population centers, and a large rural citizenry (2.5 million total population). Kansas has over 30 different telephone companies, ranging from Southwestern Bell to Pioneer Telephone and United Telephone. That fact alone can make coordination and statewide projects a significant challenge.

Peak Flow and Volume Predictions Using Frequency-Equivalent Hydrographs

A new method for calculation of frequency-equivalent storms and hydrographs is presented. This procedure is an extension of the frequency-equivalent nonlinear hydrograph (FENLH) methodology. Streamflow data records for a total of 129 basins in the state of Kansas have been used. A new storm criterion for generating frequency-equivalent storms was selected. Peak flow rates, hydrograph volumes, and peak reduction factors, produced by the storm criterion, were related to the basin physiographic and climatic data. The combination of index flood and multiple regression techniques were used to obtain predictive equations for peak flow rates and hydrograph volumes for six different return intervals. The use of the FENLH model as a prototype and the selection of the criterion utilized in this study to determine frequency-equivalent conditions, provided storm dimensions that appeared realistic. The accuracy of the results obtained indicated that the methodology presented in this study can be applied to other areas.

Raising Less Corn and More Hell: Two Disciples of Mary Ellen Lease

Raising Less Corn and More Hell: Two Disciples of Mary Ellen Lease Melvyn Dubofsky (bio) Tom Copeland. The Centralia Tragedy of 1919: Elmer Smith and the Wobblies. Seattle: University of Washington Press, 1993. xv 233 pp. Map, illustrations, notes, bibliography, and index. $35.00 (cloth); $17.50 (paper). Sally M. Miller. From Prairie to Prison: The Life of Social Activist Kate Richards O’Hare. Columbia: University of Missouri Press, 1993. xv 261 pp. Illustration, bibliographical essay, and notes. $29.95. Today when such sons and daughters of mid-America as Robert Dole, Rush Limbaugh, and Phyllis Schlafly challenge “real” Americans to fight the evils associated with liberalism — welfarism, feminism, multiculturalism, secularism, among others — it is hard to remember that a century ago the plains states of North Dakota and Kansas produced such people as the subjects of these biographies. Kate Richards O’Hare and Elmer Smith were children of a different milieu and time, a daughter and a son of old-stock homesteading families who failed at family farming. Hard times, drought, locusts, bone-chilling winters, and sun-searing summers proved insurmountable enemies, as also did the town merchants, grain dealers, and bankers who demanded prompt and full payment for their services. Devout Christians, citizens who advocated republican civic humanism, practitioners of neighborly benevolence, and guardians of family values, the Richards and Smith families succumbed to more powerful forces that overwhelmed their way of life. Unlike Richard Hofstadter’s dyspeptic Populists who sought an outlet for their grievances in a chimerical pursuit of free silver and virulent xenophobia and anti-semitism, the Richards and Smith families, and more especially their daughter Kate and son Elmer, respected the dignity of each life, however mean. Their shattered dreams did not transform them into embittered Klan sympathizers or proto-McCarthyites. As these two slender biographies prove, Kate Richards O’Hare and Tom Smith behaved like old-fashioned radical democrats. Not only were O’Hare and Smith political radicals, they also rebelled against conventional definitions of domestic life and, in the case of the former, [End Page 266] against normative gender roles. Their lives, as limned by Miller and Copeland, simultaneously followed and diverged from convention. Smith, for example, like the children of many hard-scrabble homesteaders, rejected a future as a farmer and moved to St. Paul (with his mother’s blessing to be sure) where he worked his way through Macalester College. Upon graduation in 1910, he entered the St. Paul School of Law from which he obtained a law degree. As a young lawyer-to-be without family or other connections to the legal profession, Smith moved to western Washington state, near the lumber mill town of Centralia, where his parents and siblings had relocated after failing as homesteaders in North Dakota. There he was admitted to the state bar in 1914 and opened a law office. Thereafter his law practice alienated the local business and political elite and impoverished himself and his family. The young Smith became known in the Centralia area as counsel for the despised and downtrodden. Kate Richards O’Hare, like Smith, moved with her parents to Kansas City, after they, too, failed at homesteading. She received her secondary school education in the big city and after graduation followed a path common to women of her generation. As a good Christian she served an urban mission dedicated to saving “fallen women.” Kate also participated in the Women’s Christian Temperance Union, an organization which, as Mari Jo Buhle and Ruth Bordin have proved, amalgamated evangelical moral purity and secular social reform. 1 In these “female networks,” according to Miller, Kate “learned how to work with others, to organize events, to structure meetings, and to speak in group situations” (pp. 18–19). Yet Kate also traveled a road not taken by most women of her cohort. She chose her father, not her mother, as a role model and followed him into his machine shop where she served an apprenticeship, learning the skills that enabled her to become one of the few female journeyman machinists. Even after she left the machine shop to become a socialist, marry, and raise children, Kate rejected a conventional domestic life. Instead, she and...

Variables Affecting Student Interest in International Business Studies

To more effectively internationalize programs, schools of business must better understand the background and international interest of incoming students. The authors designed a study to determine the level of interest in international business studies and to identify variables that may have an effect on that interest. Students enrolled at two-year colleges in the state of Kansas were asked to complete a questionnaire. Over 4,000 completed forms were received from urban, suburban, and rural institutions. The results indicate that environmental factors affect respondents' attitudes and interests more than do demographic variables. Dominant factors influencing the level of interest in international business are: (1) discussions at home relating to international issues, (2) personal knowledge of firms and individuals involved in international business, (3) reading international material outside of required studies, and (4) the respondent's perceived ability to speak a second language. The paper closes with a series of recommendations to educators.

Analysis of telemedicine from an organizational perspective.

To conduct an in-depth case analysis of the University of Kansas Telemedicine Program in order to identify organizational and communications elements that may be hindering the program's effectiveness. A case analysis was done, employing a combination of methodologies (direct observation, interview, and survey) involving extensive data collection from telemedicine program personnel throughout the state of Kansas. Analysis of this program's organizational communication focused on structure and boundaries, definitions and goals, leadership and decision making, and membership and roles. Significant organizational communication deficits were identified. These included a dearth of perceived central leadership, lack of information about the technology itself, poorly designed and cumbersome means for scheduling and utilizing telemedicine technology, absence of explicit strategic goals; and poor communication in introducing this technology to medical personnel and to the public. Other important findings were: organizational members expanded the scope of this organization beyond the providing of a simple consultation; the perception that decision making falls into the hands of almost everyone but the referring physician; and the role that language (or lack of common terminology) plays in confusion about this innovation. Organizational factors may be critical determinants of success or failure of a telemedicine program. Innovations in telemedicine technology need to be matched by innovations in organizational communication and structure. Findings from this study can be applied to existing or planned programs. Examples include redefinition of the roles and responsibilities of certain personnel, increasing the efficiency and decreasing the complexity of the consultation scheduling process, clarification and formalization of leadership and decision making, and development of a universal terminology of telemedicine.

Biomass yield equations for short rotation black locust plantations in the central Great Plains

The objective of this research is to develop equations to predict yields for short rotation black locust ( Robinia pseudoacacia) tree plantations. The data set is from experimental black locust plantation sites located throughout the State of Kansas. Stepwise ordinary least-squares regression techniques are used to derive the equations. The final model selection is based on simplicity of use, statistical accuracy, and consistency with known biological relationships. Two models are selected: both models use precipitation and herbicide treatments as variables, however, one model also includes nitrogen content in the soil. The model predictions are compared to other plantation yield studies in the area and found to give similar yield estimates.