Publication Type: Roundtable
Abstract: This self-study raises questions about how we engage our students in addressing the complexity of teaching and learning within the context of an introductory course.

Publication Type: Poster
Abstract: When the sun shines down on Union Square, the park in its center teems with women in suits, boys on skateboards, protestors holding signs, tourists snapping photos, transients at rest, and shoppers in between stores. Whether they ascend from the subway or approach from the shadows of buildings in New York’s canyon-like streets, they pause, however briefly, to bask in the sun. Union Square, located between Broadway and Fourth Avenue above 14th Street, is a bustling, crowded, commercial and transportation hub, where global forces and neighborhood concerns, notions of private and public, and belief systems collide. This has been the case since the 1830s, when the Common Council purchased private property to create an open space in an increasingly dense city. Over the past 175 years, competing constituents have negotiated their agendas to produce Union Square’s dynamic and complicated landscape.
My poster, illustrating some of my dissertation research, will represent four transitional moments in the history of Union Square: its original construction in the 1830s and three subsequent renovations in the 1870s, 1930s, and 1980s. For each construction, I will show a diagram of the park, photographs and/or illustrations, and some explanatory text. This will provide the foundation for discussions about how debates over the space and decisions that found physical expression were inextricably linked to larger social dynamics within the neighborhood, city, nation, and world.
An example from each period illustrates my intention. In the 1830s, the Common Council began building small parks in the upper districts of the city to improve health and increase property values. Union Square was one of these fenced-in parks, designed more for beauty than recreation. By the 1870s, as a diverse array of classes and ethnicities were intermingling in and around the park, some of the city’s leaders viewed this as an opportunity to educate the lower classes on proper behavior in American society. Frederick Law Olmsted’s design removed the fence to accommodate large gatherings and made the paths more accessible. In the early- to mid-twentieth century, this intermingling became more contentious as Union Square became a major American battlefield in the global war between capitalists and anti-capitalists. During the 1930s renovation, business owners lobbied the city to limit the amount of space that could be used for gatherings. In response, the city planted trees, straightened the paths, and installed parking meters around the park. By the 1950s and 1960s, as suburbanization increased and people continued to identify it with political radicalism, business owners vacated their stores and the park became less hospitable. By the 1980s renovation, the park was in disarray and considered a dangerous place. Inspired by such intellectuals as Jane Jacobs, city planners created a mixed-use space with open lawns, playgrounds, dog runs, and a greenmarket.
To consider Union Square’s transformations is to understand the role of public space in America and to look toward the future. Please let me know if you need any additional information and thank you for your consideration.

Publication Type: Conference Paper/Unpublished Manuscript
Review Method: Peer Reviewed
Abstract: To fit some data to models during tests, it is occasionally necessary to adjust the data to fit the requirements of a reasonable solution concept. Sometimes this produces changes that alter important properties of the matrices. In some cases, this has desirable consequences and losses are minimal. In others, losses exceed benefits. How can we distinguish between the two? We discuss ways to achieve what we seek, while minimizing changes that unsought effects. We restrict the argument to special kinds of matrices. Advice is somewhat counter-intuitive: Subtract a tiny amount from a large eigenvalue that is relatively widely separated in size from thge other eigenvalues.Matrices

Publication Type: Conference Paper/Unpublished Manuscript
Review Method: Peer Reviewed
Abstract: Increasing investment by Japanese multinational corporations in Asia has confronted Japanese political parties, and especially the Liberal Democratic Party, with a dilemma. If parties support continued regional investment of large Japanese firms, they risk alienating domestic small- and medium-sized businesses which stand to lose the most from increasing competition. Not only do SMEs provide employment for politicians' local constituents, they regularly provide votes and volunteers for election campaigns. In rural areas, owners of SMEs also are core members of politicians' personal support groups and local party chapters. On the other hand, if political actors do more than offer token compensation to firms adversely affected by hollowing out, they risk losing national endorsements and major campaign contributions provided by big business and industry associations. This paper examines how parties responded to hollowing out and in which ways parties' responses affected relations with business supporters since the early 1990s.

Publication Type: Conference Paper/Unpublished Manuscript
Abstract: In this talk we present a less well known but explicit formula for Bernoulli polynomials expressed as determinants of square matrices constructed from Pascal’s triangle. We demonstrate how this formula extends to hypergeometric Bernoulli polynomials, a class of polynomials generated from the confluent hypergeometric series and containing the classical Bernoulli polynomials as a special case.