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Research experience provides critical training for new biomedical research scientists. Students from underrepresented populations studying science, technology, engineering, and mathematics (STEM) are increasingly recruited into research pathways to diversify STEM fields. However, support structures outside of research settings designed to help these students navigate biomedical research pathways are not always available; nor are program support components outside the context of laboratory technical skills training and formal mentorship well understood. This study leveraged a multi-institutional research training program, Enhancing Cross-Disciplinary Infrastructure and Training at Oregon (EXITO), to explore how nine institutions designed a new curricular structure (Enrichment) to meet a common goal of enhancing undergraduate research training and student success. EXITO undergraduates participated in a comprehensive, 3-year research training program with the Enrichment component offered across nine sites: three universities and six community colleges, highly diverse in size, demographics, and location. Sites’ approaches to supporting students in the training program were studied over a 30-month period. All sites independently created their own nonformal curricular structures, implemented interprofessionally via facilitated peer groups. Site data describing design and implementation were thematically coded to identify essential programmatic components across sites, with student feedback used to triangulate findings. Enrichment offered students time to critically reflect on their interests, experiences, and identities in research; network with peers and professionals; and support negotiation of hidden and implicit curricula. Students reported the low-pressure setting and student-centered curriculum balanced the high demands associated with academics and research. Core curricular themes described Enrichment as fostering a sense of community among students, exposing students to career paths and skills, and supporting development of students’ professional identities. The non-formal, interprofessional curricula enabled students to model diverse biomedical identities and pathways for each other while informing institutional structures to improve diverse undergraduate students’ success in academia and research.

In recent years two lines of research on USSR power and personnel have challenged some long-standing interpretations of the bases of Soviet political activity. In one line, historical studies dealing with the Stalin era have called into question the conventional emphasis, epitomized in the totalitarian model, of a single leader who commands an army of loyal apparatchiki and monopolizes the political agenda. A number of scholars have shown that chaos and confusion in personnel matters were the salient characteristics of this period, rather than a coordinated system for the recruitment, placement, and promotion of cadres—an image suggested by both the totalitarian model and Stalinist boasting of a “monolithic party,” a “unified state structure,” and so forth. In substantive policy, the actual results in implementing regime directives in the Stalin period regularly bore no better than the faintest resemblance to the announced policy. Absent the well-oiled machine highlighted in images of the “totalitarian party,” the regime's failure to control real policy results seems to have followed as a necessary consequence.

Scenes From Imaginary Operas is a large concert work comprised of four scenes scored for a variety of ensembles and voices. The theme of this work is transformation embodied in the persona of the central character, Espantine. Loosely based on the idea of disappearance and duality developed by E. T. A. Hoffmann in Lebens-Ansichten des Katers Murr Nebst Fragmentarischer Biographie des Kapellmeister Johannes Kreisler (1820–1821), Espantine, a noted performer, mysteriously disappears; her friends later discover poems scattered throughout her abandoned apartment and realize that she has led a secret, mystical life centered around her ideas of love and its relationship to our perceived reality. The first scene introduces Espantine, tells the story of her disappearance and the discovery of the poems. The poems “Evidences of the Kisses” and “Note found on the Bed” expose her thoughts about The Kisses—a name she gives to her general idea of mystical love. “Song of the Sky-Children” sets up the idea of the collapse of the horizon or the blending of the sky and the earth—another concept of mystical love investigated by Espantine. The second scene describes Espantine before her disappearance. Her stage name was Moanicia Snow, and this scene presents her triumphant return to the stage after surviving a suicide attempt. The third scene presents a nameless post-operative transsexual, who may or may not be Espantine. The purpose of this scene, in terms of the large-scale structure, is to draw the dramatic tension toward the darker side of transformation—mutation, loss of identity, manipulation, death. The political tone of the dialogue creates tension and distance between the ideas of transformation, or transfiguration, and the limitless self-protective stagnation that power craves. The final scene presents Espantine as a saint/deity who returns to our reality to proclaim her love trompe l'oeil and announce the arrival of the magic pillow. Love trompe l'oeil refers to an imagined reality, or idea of love, that is drawn over, or grafted onto, perceived reality. The magic pillow is the transport to this new reality.

The focus of this study is the design, construction, and performance of seacoast fortifications built by the Corps of Engineers during the period of the Third System. The study examines the permanent defenses planned and executed by the Board of Engineers, from the time of its formation in 1816 to its recommendation in 1864 to end the use of exposed masonry in seacoast works. It also considers how effectively the forts withstood bombardment during the Civil War. This analysis investigates two related subjects: the development of the art of fortification during the Third System period and the performance of the permanent forts in combat. The art of fortification, responding to advances in transportation, naval construction, and artillery, improved significantly during the fifty years following the War of 1812. The Civil War was the only test of combat the coastal forts endured; however, it is an imperfect example because the South lacked the resources to arm, garrison, and reinforce its captured permanent works fully. Nevertheless, it is possible to obtain some measure of the forts' performance according to the objectives outlined by the Board of Engineers. Simon Bernard, who first incorporated the theories of Vauban and Montalembert into single forts, designed the initial works. Bernard used caponniers, counterscarp galleries, and tower bastions as alternatives to costly flank bastions. Joseph Totten, who after Bernard became the nation's leading fortification expert, designed the latter permanent works. He answered advances in transportation and weaponry with defenses that were reduced in area, symmetrical, multilevel, and armor protected. The Confederacy's lack of a complete coastal defense system coupled with the Union's employment of land-based rifled artillery hastened the surrender of the rebel-held forts. The Federal engineers, however, had designed the coastal defenses to fight warships, not to withstand powerful siege trains. The events of the war demonstrated that the relative strength of ships versus forts had not yet shifted in favor of naval forces. While permanent seacoast forts were vulnerable to land-based rifled artillery, they were still effective bastions against warships armed with rifled guns.