Publication Type: Abstract
Abstract: Objective:
Many studies have assessed the importance of requirements in the selection of health profession students. Some criteria include GPA, Pharmacy College Admissions Test, interview/communication skills, critical thinking skills, and the like. Several studies have also correlated admission criteria with performance and attrition rates. However, few, if any, of these studies have assessed the importance of these criteria from the students’ perspective. The investigators seek to identify which admission qualifications are considered essential to the student for a successful application based on their response.

Hypothesis:
Students in the process of obtaining prerequisite coursework for application to a professional program have significant opinions regarding the weight of admissions criteria.

Methods:
Sample size: 55 pre-pharmacy students currently matriculating in the undergraduate program. Students will complete an anonymous survey identifying and weighing possible admission criteria. They will also be asked to complete an open response section. Appropriate statistical analyses will be performed on the responses. Results will be considered statistically significant if p<0.05.

Outcomes/Implications:
· This survey forces the students to think about what they consider important traits for admission
· This survey could be given to external pre-pharmacy students to determine overlap or exclusion
· The results could be correlated with previous studies that identified admission criteria found to be important by admission officers in health professions schools
· The results could also be correlated with previous studies that identified predictors of success for matriculation in pharmacy school

Publication Type: Abstract
Abstract: Objectives: Increased curricular experiential requirements, increased number of pharmacy schools and increased enrollment in current pharmacy schools have created the need for pharmacy schools to obtain more experiential sites to train pharmacy students. Knowledge and understanding of experiential education loads, quality-time issues, and compensation is necessary as experiential directors are searching for additional quality sites and preceptors. The purpose of this study was to determine regional differences among preceptor perceptions regarding experiential student loads, educational quality and time issues, and compensation for their time and work with rotation students.
Methods: A cross-sectional survey design was used that consisted of both Likert-scale and quantitative questions. The experiential offices of nine different schools/colleges of pharmacy from the Northeast, Midwest, South and West geographic regions administered the survey to their preceptors in various pharmacy practice settings who routinely take students for them. The questionnaire was sent to 4,396 preceptors and assessed the following: number of students precepted, number of schools that sent them students, ability to accommodate all requests for precepting students, reasons for declining to precept students, quality of experiential teaching, and compensation.
Results: Descriptive and bivariate statistical analysis according to the geographic regions will be presented.
Implications: The results of this comparative assessment will assist pharmacy schools in understanding the relationships within the experiential environment that may affect the search for additional quality experiential sites in different regions across the country.

Publication Type: Conference Paper/Unpublished Manuscript
Review Method: Peer Reviewed
Abstract: Constructivists presume shared, collective ideas of appropriate behavior guide states in their international relations. While such rules exist, it is less certain they are equally shared or understood by all. I argue that the publics (and elites) of constituent states vary in their beliefs and understandings of appropriate rules of force. In this paper I outline and test three basic conceptions of international norms of force to see which are prevalent in the thinking of US public opinion: classical-legal, realist, and humanitarian. I also test the presence of the “nuclear taboo” in American thinking. The results from a pilot study of university students asks opinions about abstract questions regarding the appropriate role of force as well as concrete scenarios applying different rules. I find that there are fissures in public thinking about when force is legitimate, suggesting the presumption of homogenous socialization is premature. The most potent normative presence is the nuclear taboo, with most agreeing the use of nuclear weapons is illegitimate. There is division between legalist and humanitarians, but it is clear from the results that “realists” are scarce in the study. While elites should be included in future research, insight into what the public permits is useful to understand how permissive an environment decision-makers find themselves.

Publication Type: Conference Paper/Unpublished Manuscript
Abstract: War is the ultimate cauldron of identity politics. The environment of heightened threat and hostility of war situations is both the consequence of identity clashes as well as fertile ground for deepened entrenchment of identities. While an in-depth examination of the relationship between war and identity is necessary, I take on a subset of those issues in this paper. I argue that certain assumptions about biology, ethnicity, genetics, and gender construct a permissive environment for sexual violence during war. I further argue that children born as a consequence of these policies represent the complexities of these identities in an important and illustrative manner. The ways in which they are perceived by their societies, governments, and families advance the assumptions about identity that underpin the policies that gave rise to their births in the first place.

Publication Type: Conference Paper/Unpublished Manuscript
Abstract: As adolescent pregnancy, childbearing and STD transmission have continued to be a pervasive problem in American society, it has become more and more critical to understand the nuances of teen sexual behavior. Policy makers, parents, teachers, and community advocates are actively searching and advocating for interventions that will assist young people in reducing the risk associated with sexual involvement. Thus, this research focused on expanding our understanding of adolscents’ communication regarding sex and contraception.

This study focused on 18- and 19-year old adolescents, seeking to advance our understanding of the theoretical frameworks that may predict or be associated with adolescent sexual and contraceptive communicative behavior. Identity and self esteem were used to investigate these antecedents’ influence on adolescent sexual and contraceptive communication. In particular, this research examine how these theoretical perspectives affect adolescents’ communication self efficacy, comfort discussing sex and contraception and perceived communication self efficacy regarding sex and contraception.

This study adds to the research in interpersonal communication and adolescent development by probing what theoretical perspectives may offer a framework for understanding adolescent communication related to sex and contraception; it illustrates that adolescents’ identity status does increase one’s communication efficacy, but the results did not confirm the relationship between identity status and sex and contraceptive discussions. It remains to be seen whether identity status differences influence adolescents’ communication about their sexual behavior.