United States.

The education of profoundly intellectually disabled individuals requires identifying motivators to help them learn basic tasks and skills. When these individuals also suffer from Autism Spectrum Disorder, one promising method of therapy, multisensory therapy, has been shown to relax patients, facilitating the educational process. Relaxation drastically minimizes maladaptive behaviors such as repetitive movement (stereotypy) and self-injury, allowing the participant to learn efficiently. In this study, a multi-axis measure was developed to determine behavioral differences between an experimental group that underwent the therapy and a control group that performed a functional task in their classroom. Stereotypic behaviors were significantly reduced and gaze focus was enhanced within the therapy. The significance of these effects carried over when participants were returned to their classroom.

The No Child Left Behind Act of 2001 makes schools accountable for the performance of their students, and measures that goal through standardized testing. Florida's standardized test is the Florida Comprehensive Assessment Test (FCAT). This paper investigates how the incentive structure of the FCAT accountability system has resulted in costly unintended consequences, such as the disruption of local home prices, teaching towards the test, manipulation of the test pools, and an increase in the number of school dropouts. The State of Florida officially estimates that the cost to administer the FCAT is $19.44 per student. My claim is that the Florida Department of Education's estimate is profoundly understated because it does not take into account an array of internal and external costs associated with the test. By including these costs of the FCAT, I show that the FCAT does indeed cost more than $19.44 per student.

DNA profiling is a newly developed technique used by law enforcement agencies in the United States as a form of individual identification to prove whether a suspect is guilty. Due to the fact that it is a newly developed technology there is little legislation to regulate its proper uses and restrictions. Therefore restrictions are largely determined by court decisions as to whether DNA profiling violates constitutional rights. Current decisions in state and federal district courts tend to permit use of DNA profiling without a warrant. These decisions violate principles of privacy guaranteed by the US Constitution as interpreted in pre-DNA fourth amendment cases. By drawing on fourth amendment case law and commentaries, I shall argue that while in some cases no warrant is required for DNA profiling - when it is conducted upon people who have been convicted of a felony - or all other people, a warrant should be required.

In 1987, Florida passed a Right to Carry Law, allowing citizens to purchase a concealed weapons license. Bill proponents believe that an armed citizenry will deter crime. This study examines the relationship between gun control legislation and violent crime in Florida. By using multiple regression analysis, I conclude that gun control legislation has a significant effect on homicide rates, and the presence of national economic conditions is associated with violent crime in Florida.

The Native American Graves Protection and Repatriation Act (NAGPRA) was approved by Congress on November 16, 1990 after years of American Indian lobbying due to the unfair treatment of American Indian remains. Since the enactment of NAGPRA there have been multiple complaints from the archaeological community that the way in which they conduct their jobs has been severely limited by the implementation of NAGPRA. In this study I compare data from the Secretary's Report to Congress questionnaire, conducted by the National Park Service's Federal Archaeology Program, to determine whether NAGPRA has caused an increase or decrease in the amount of archaeological administrative, laboratory, and fieldwork completed between 1985 and 2005. The comparison shows that there was a significant increase in specific archaeological practices in the years following the implementation of NAGPRA. Looking at the changes in work patterns of archaeologists allows us to assess the success of NAGPRA and it provides empirical evidence to evaluate the claims made by parties affected by the act.

The presidential election of 2000 was not the first United States presidential election to end with uncertainty. The contest between George W. Bush and Al Gore was not the first to introduce Americans to disputed vote tallies in crucial swing states, to the possibility of separate and competing slates of potential electors, or even to the notion that one person's vote really might matter after all. History had already born witness to many of those prospects during the 1877 presidential race between Samuel Tilden and Rutherford B. Hayes, which Hayes ultimately won. The 2000 election was novel, however, in the sense that it inspired a series of legal battles that culminated in a landmark United States Supreme Court case. Bush v. Gore (531 U.S. 98) provoked questions concerning the legal meaning of equality, the nature of federalism, and the role the Supreme Court should play in determining how state courts should interpret state laws.