Changing Horizons as a Function of Limits on Certain Growth in American Higher Education

Paul Andreas Fischer

4/30/2016

Professor Anastasia Wilson

Changing Horizons as a Function of Limits on Certain Growth in American Higher Education

Student loans initiated at the height of the Cold War as a way of continuing private expansion of the academic system as government resources were gobbled up in the form of a developing arms race. These were successful, and allowed in a stagnant industrial economy, transfer of funds and resources to be reinvested into the expanding economy.  Government organizations were able to recruit and utilize graduates. The factors of production which were present in the previous generation fulfilled in spirit and reality the goals of the students in their educational system. While environmental toxins such as lead exposure decreased the available optimal brainpower of the nation relative to healthcare and other considerations, technological advances meant that the raw resources or intellect necessitated by such a massive expansion of the academic system were available.

The purpose of government involvement in the entrepreneurial industry is one which is meant to be symbiotic. As a solution to student debt, service learning programs unsuccessfully implemented in South Africa but more successfully implemented in the GI bill and Peace Corps in the United States will be analyzed. The aversion of state competition with the private sector will be seen to be critical to deconstruction of these divergent results. In the case of BEC, a state-run electronics firm in the 1970s, the company became a “training ground for engineers” and represents a trend which is emphasized in the role of higher education (Evans 1995, 130).

The presence of mass demonstrations on the topic of student debt today is ironical. The generation preceding the student loans had protested the failure to commoditize schooling, and these rights were closely tied in grade and high school to the feminist movement. Teachers had been only paid a token wage, prior to the expansion described during the next generation. This paper will identify the contemporary limits on growth in the academic sector after offering a selective review of how these limits were approached during the age of expanding student debt and under what levels of growth student debt can increase expansion, be forced to contract, or maintain a constant rate of development.

What Constitutes Interest on a Student Loan

Real interest rate is naturally inversely related to inflation during times of technological shock. Without a change in the factors of production necessitated by technological shock, inflation can occur without impacting output (Rudebusche 2010, 13). The nature of conglomerated series of loans, including student loans, have two primary determining factors in the amount individual holders of these endeavors can expect to receive in return for their lending capacity. Both of these play a role in the evaluation of the historical development of student loans as well as their current and future optimal interest rates.

Firstly, the amount of money supplied is positively correlated with the rate of return under normal economic conditions. More money, relative to the general economy, means a greater bargaining position and greater returns. With a smaller amount of initial capital relative to the emerging economy, expiring corporations or individuals can expect a lower return and bargaining power in negotiating interest rates. Secondly, the return which borrowers expect to receive from the funds that are made available is positively correlated with the interest rate. Exceptions to this rule can be made for the sake of security in investment, but in a combined loan setting, that factor loses importance.

Historical Application of Student Interest Rates

At the onset of student loans, the factors of production which were used to create the economy remained the same. This meant the resale value of these factors of production, at the time steel and oil, retained their relative economic importance. When expiring corporations or individuals paid taxes or went to banks with money to distribute in the form of loans, their bargaining position was relatively high. Students could be asked to share a greater part of the economic burden of training because forecasts to the nature of technological progress indicated that the factors of production they would need in the workplace were already extant, or at least cheap to build using resources utilized by the previous generation. This all resulted in mobility, though not a complete shift, of educational funding from government grants to loans (Subotsky 1999, 414).

What has occurred in the last generation is unprecedented in the history of industrialized economies, except perhaps by the progress from wooden looms and sailing ships to dreadnoughts and automatically powered factories. Students are being trained today so that they will build their own factors of production, which are more efficient and create greater wealth with a focus on innovation (Coad 2008, 646). More importantly, a different array of inputs are necessary to build the contemporary economy. As computers have shrunk in size and cost, while increasing in productivity, the value of the components which are necessary to maintain a certain level of output and growth has dropped. Where low-skilled labor was once a necessity, today the high-tech industries have made a higher education critical to the survival of an economy, or an individual (Berman 1997, 1246). Morphological change in the cross-index of resource utilization and resource arrays is a phenomenon which has had a significant impact on utilization of resources across many industries, indicated in the expansion of boundary roles in the modern economy (Aldrich 1977, 222).

The way this translates into actual student loan interest rates and returns as well as overall funding for educational endeavors can be seen with actual student debt data. From an initial system of higher education which did not include student loans but did not service all capable students, “within a decade average undergraduate student loan debt in 2002 was $18,900. It more than doubled from 1992, when it was $9,200” (Williams 2006, 157). This does not match with the models described above about interest rates and changing factors of production; the expansion of the academic sector to meet the new demands of innovation previously described does provide some offset to the evaluation. The discrepancy between relative initial capital provided and desired premium is the market inefficiency which is described in a contemporary setting by this work.

Use of Advertising, Taxation, or Economic and Social Policies to Confound or Exacerbate Results

The expansion of higher education in the United States has included significant advertising campaigns by corporations and universities to new consumers, who now, through student loans, have the capability of making such an investment. Universities prepare and evaluate a given product in the intellectual capacity of graduates. One of the best examples of the market inefficiencies in student loans is the changing rate of growth in student defaults, which matches the historical timeline for the economic switch to high-tech methods of production precisely (Hillman 2014, 173). Flatlining until the mid-2000s, the loans became impossible to pay back for an extra 5-10% of borrowing students. This is because the factors of production for the previous generations have changed dramatically, and the bargaining positions of the lenders have not changed in actuality with the relative importance of the goods, whether factories and methods of production or raw materials, which are being exchanged for a return on students’ productive capacity, now expected to be much higher and require different sets of inputs to previous generations.

Many universities receive a significant proportion of funding through government grants or programs, making issues of taxation appear to be irrelevant to this discussion. In such a subsidized system, however, in which the government enjoys a commensal relationship, dropping government funding actually amounts to an economic shock in the same manner that a sudden tax on any other industry could exercise. This is perhaps the most terrifying aspect of this research: a market inefficiency can be fixed with shifting economic horizons, through degrading or exporting factors of production and by limiting forecasts on growth by institution of economic policies to emphasize security. A strangling tax however, goes beyond this quid pro quo negotiation of relative bargaining power and could threaten to end academic institutions, as well as the government and industries reliant on the material talent produced in turn. In recent history programs including the Peace Corps and grant funding, lauded for their unconventional societal benefits (Williams 2006, 167), have regressed. 

Even though research suggests, as pointed out earlier in this section, that the student default rates have increased despite demographic or socioeconomic factors, there are also economic and social policies which have been shown to play a distinct role in the nature of higher education. At first, this seems to subvert the nature of higher education in measuring productive and intellectual capacity of students as they are being trained. Dealing with the extremes of intellectual capacity, as higher education does, IQ plays some role in the eventual income and ability of students to pay back loans (Bowles 2014, 9). Education and parenting play a far greater role, however, and as a measure of success in accessibility, research shows that segregation is not appropriately decreasing (Ong 2013, 270), which as the academic system expands into new demographic markets at greater rates may explain how default rates may increase even as more funds have become concretely available.

Distinctions Within Advantages of Entrepreneurial and For-Profit Universities and Colleges

One method of maintaining the spirit and perhaps even the growth of the entrepreneurial university which is offered and proposed by Subotsky is the initiation of community-service learning programs. There are both positive and negative externalities which are explored in that research, and become apparent after review of research. The goal of “the academic, the practical, and the civic… few reach it” (Subotsky 1999, 428), which adds to certain liability in these programs when compared to inefficient methods of educational standards which have the security of proven benefits. Generations of students lacking boundary roles may face similar aggregate problems in accessibility and matching roles in the actual work setting (Aldrich 1977, 228).

The directional impact of an implied tax on higher education did not strangle the economy. Despite increasing student default rates, the total amounts paid back by all students are greater. This supports earlier analysis of an increasing economic potential in the new economy. There is simply a disequilibrium which has been created by the changing bargaining position of lenders and lack of government support to make up for this gap. In the work of Subotsky, South African schools are shown to represent an example of a situation where the “redistribution and reconstruction” aspects of higher education can be at odds with the nature of entrepreneurial universities necessary to ensure growth, creating a unique paradox which must be delineated within a larger American analysis, that can be found here, through the advent high tech industries and changing factors of production (Subotsky 1999, 412).

Lessons in a Developing Economy Contribute to the Solution in a Developed Economy

The nature of the solution to a coming, and many would argue already present, student loan crisis can be a combination of cutting interest rates and expanding community service programs. While many economic programs or policies may not work in conjunction together, the actuality of the relationship between these two would be certainly synergistic in nature. A negative example of competition can be found in COBRA, a state institution which began, “selling commodity hardware in competition with Brazilian firms” and crippling the motivation of growth in both fields after decades of high-tech growth in 1989 (Evans 1995, 129). It would take the Brazilian high-tech industry throughout the 90s to recover from incipient, albeit natural, corruption. Factors of production are critical in evaluation of such shifting models. 

In South Africa, the economic inputs have remained constant, so redistributing wealth while investing in entrepreneurial universities plays at odds with each other. The role of the government in that case was inefficient and as can be seen in C-DOT, a company “able to play technological midwife to potential private-sector producers of electronic equipment rather than confronting them as competitors,” missed the direct role of such programs in the industry (Evans 1995, 135). In the United States, a moment of economic transformation has taken and is taking place. Consequently community service programs can actually accelerate this process with ample room to spare without impairing the ability of entrepreneurial universities to train and graduate high quality workers into a dynamically growing economy. 

The phenomenon described here is rather simplistic in nature but is critical to understanding and developing a feasible solution for the prevention of a legitimate student loan crisis which America may face in coming years given current policy decisions. As the former inputs and factors of production retain their value, a greater bargaining position is exercised by lenders, and students can expect employment through simple reprocessing of these factories or materials. This means greater interest rates such as those set in recent years on American student loans can be demanded at market equilibrium. Failure to do so and enforcement of service learning programs, which actually occurred in South Africa, compounds the demands of entrepreneurial market economies and creates inefficiencies as the programs eat up employment, factors of production, and material inputs which can still retain economic value. Student production cannot be as valuable as that provided by professional workers, and the opportunity cost of these endeavors skyrockets in relative terms.

Conversely, as a technological shock is experienced, such as that proven earlier in the United States, declining interest rates can be moderated at mutual benefit by implementation and expansion of service learning programs which eliminate liabilities and enhance assets of lenders, ie. taxpayers. An example of this in play is the Computer Maintenance corporation in India, which recycled hundreds of engineers from the departing IBM, showing how, “in a high-tech version of the state’s traditional role as a provider of infrastructure, state firms may have advantages over both local private firms and TNCs” (Evans 1995, 132). The factors of production which could form a substantial portion of lenders’ funds to students have now been made useless by the described economic conditions. Service learning provides students with the opportunity to train and reduces liability or helps to transform toxic assets into those useable by the new economy while placing the state in a role where it has a comparative advantage, rather than in an arena in which extraneous use of resources may be guaranteed. The limits to such an expansion are only moderated by the extent of implementation of new economic models and systems of production.

Integral Components in Forecasts for Coming Economic Evaluations of Higher Education and Summation

This research has successfully explored several options for higher education in the future and has made the evaluation with a proof of the necessity for dropping interest rates in the United States effective immediately. The symptoms for this include the increasing student debt combined with increased total defaults as well as total repayment figures. The consequences of these factors in play holding current advances in technology constant, assuming no regressions, are increasing total economic productivity regardless of policy change and dramatically shifting efficiency of that productivity based on changing levels of boundary roles. Categorical reminiscence of the original goals and objectives of student loans in the United States is useless when the factors of production are changing dramatically.

Rules of thumb or prospective nuclear evaluations of the excellent relationship between allegorical social pressures on the economic system cannot be integrated as an analogy to contemporary economic rules. New make-ups of IQ, social demographics of graduating students, and most importantly a shifting array of economic inputs for the economic system are dramatically changing the fashion in which the entrepreneurial university has a relationship with the state in the educational sector. Further research could investigate the nature in which, amongst institutions of higher education, the state can expand its role in a convergent manner, playing an infrastructural role, rather than operating as a competitive entity.

References:

Aldrich, H., & Herker, D. (1977). Boundary spanning roles and organization structure. Academy of management review, 2(2), 217-230.

Berman, E., Bound, J., & Machin, S. (1997). Implications of skill-biased technological change: international evidence (No. w6166). National Bureau of Economic Research.

Bowles, S. (2014). Schooling in capitalist America: Educational reform and the contradictions of economic life. Haymarket Books.

Coad, A., & Rao, R. (2008). Innovation and firm growth in high-tech sectors: A quantile regression approach. Research policy, 37(4), 633-648.

Evans, P. B. (1995). Embedded autonomy: states and industrial transformation (Vol. 25). Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press.

Hillman, N. W. (2014). College on credit: A multilevel analysis of student loan default. The Review of Higher Education, 37(2), 169-195.

Ong, P. M., & Rickles, J. (2013). The Continued Nexus between School and Residential Segregation. Berkeley Journal of Gender, Law & Justice, 19(2), 379.

Rudebusch, G. D. (2010). MACRO‐FINANCE MODELS OF INTEREST RATES AND THE ECONOMY. The Manchester School, 78(s1), 25-52.

Subotzky, G. (1999). Alternatives to the entrepreneurial university: New modes of knowledge production in community service programs. Higher education, 38(4), 401-440.

Williams, J. (2006). The pedagogy of debt. College Literature, 33(4), 155-169.

Tree Nurseries and the Enabling Acts: Examples of State and Federal Responses to the Unregulated Timber Industry Prior to the Great Depression

Paul Fischer

4/4/2016

Professor McCollough

Tree Nurseries and the Enabling Acts: Examples of State and Federal Responses to the Unregulated Timber Industry Prior to the Great Depression

The process of altering the landscape requires resources, and historically the dominant forms of construction, whether for the famous log cabins of the American frontier or the scaffolding for cement and steel structures which punctuate and bridge the distances in this nation even today, have been dependent on the timber industry. Previous discussion has been offered on the technical innovations which transformed the timber industry as well as the face and character of the United States, it is now time to move a generation forward and see the effects these innovations had on the new industry and the resources over which it presides. By examining the Green Mountain State Forest News during its heyday between the years of 1925 and 1935 it will be possible to retrospectively analyze the changing industry in a momentous period in American history, during the onset of the Great Depression and tail end of the Roaring 20s. The expansion and, for all intensive purposes, initiation of reforestation efforts on behalf of state tree nurseries will be viewed as an example of local regulation and offsetting of industrial efforts to increase production while the advent of National Forests and subsequent Enabling Acts passed by states under Calvin Coolidge’s presidency will be critically acclaimed as a fundamentally constitutional regulation of each state's timber industries, without which would most certainly have yielded devastating effects on the national economy under the conditions of the Great Depression.

Reforestation and Forest Nurseries

The Green Mountain State Forest News preceded the January edition of their

second volume, 1926, with “SET YOUR IDLE FOREST LAND TO WORK BY REFORESTATION” (Vermont Forest Service, V. 2: 1), and this was a process which had begun many years earlier, around the turn of the century. At that time, only thirty five thousand trees were being planted in Vermont. Just a couple decades later, this had become thirteen million with two million planted through two state tree nurseries (Vermont Forest Service, V. 2: 1 August). That same month, the Calvin Coolidge State Forest was authorized (Vermont Forest Service, V. 2: 5) and a fundamental change in the manner in which forestry in the United States was carried out occurred. President Calvin Coolidge entreated listeners to “treat our forests as crops , to be used but also to be renewed” as a domestic crisis was likely becoming apparent in the form of the rampant and careless deforestation occurring at the time (Vermont Forest Service, V. 2: 4 January).

While timbering issues were one cause of deforestation in Vermont, other concerns existed as well. In January of 1926 it is reported that 10% of losses were due to insects and disease, while half of forest fires were due to “carelessness”, primarily on railroads. During this period of prohibition, this may be that this is doublespeak for workplace inebriation. Accidental sources of railroad fueled forest fires began with sparks flying from the wheels of trains, which were inches long. This would later provide an incentive to change the design of elevated rails and local rail commuters (McCullough, 2016). Different solutions were advised for the various problems which faced forests which ranged from the advice of a W.E. Buton, the State Entomologist of Connecticut, to use Blackleaf-40, with the active ingredient of nicotine sulfate and soap to combat insect populations (Vermont Forest Service, V. 1: 12, December). This may also have been apparent in Fish and Game surveys as detrimental to bird populations, a demonstration of the particular relationship between hunter and prey (Modu) which will be returned to as the wildlife also plays a certain role in securing the lands for the National Forests that may have stopped the collapse of American ecosystems. The new insecticide began use in 1926 in Vermont, and replaced the lead based insecticide used previously (Vermont Forest Service, V. 1: 5, July).

Consequences of Spanish Deforestation and European Input

One of the incentives for change in the industry were the efforts of European foresters. A speech in Vermont outlined an official’s trip to Spain, and the total devastation to ecosystems and economic capabilities as a result of widespread deforestation there (Vermont Forest Service, V. 2: 6, December). Without the appropriate husbandry from humans to the forests, the crops and wider ecosystems also failed. With them dropped entire economic developments. Speculative investments to restore the glory of Spain were lost. In order to avoid such a future in the United States, or at least Vermont, this official recommended a regimen of “Study, Service, and Sacrifice” for students and future foresters. The amount of lumber cut in Vermont at the time was 112 million, outstripping reforestation efforts by a factor of nearly ten (Vermont Forest Service, V. 3: 2, July). While research abroad indicated that use of 35 seed trees (5) instead of 6 seed trees per acre (Vermont Forest Service, V. 1: 8, March) could mitigate damages, the consequences of deforestation were yet to be firmly established in the United States or Vermont. The number of trees which would have to be bought from a tree nursery in order to reforest an acre is 1200 (Vermont Forest Service, V. 1: 12, October), so considerable savings were found in either scenario.

Without complete social acceptance of these beliefs, however, there was sufficient evidence for state legislatures and the President to act. In 1925, funds were secured from Congress to request permission from private and state organizations for the Federal Government to purchase land on sovereign territory of the states for the purpose of the preservation of forests and the “nation’s natural resources” and an Enabling Act was proposed and passed in the Vermont Statehouse with a call for opinions occurring in January 1925 (Vermont Forest Service, V. 1: 5-6) and legislation being passed in March of the same year, just in time for Forest Protection Week (Vermont Forest Service, V. 1: 1). A critical part of passage of this Enabling Act was competition with New Hampshire for state forest lands and the resources that came with them.

Political Legislation as a Cause of Preservation of the Landscape

By examining the political process which allowed the preservation of our nation and state’s forests, a historiography of changing perspectives is offered in regards to natural resources. This gives constitutional and fundamental grounds for the institutions maintained in current legislation and operations. From the Forest Service to the Bureau of Forestry, many of these institutions remain. 

New resources have entered the economy and horizons of human exploitation, from dangerous new methods of extraction from the earth to safely extracting energy from dangerous radioactive elements and even, perhaps one day, utilization of the boundless expanses beyond our atmosphere. The trend to understand our landscape and the economic potential it holds remains critical to the success of the United States. Implementation into the political process is, for America, not extraneous but intrinsic to the process of development, growth, and security.

References:

McCullough, William. History on the Land., 2016. Lecture.

Modu, S., B. S. Binta, and A. U. Mani. "Effect Of Lead Exposure On Egg Production, Quality And Hatchability In Quail Birds (Coturnix Japonica)."Nigerian Quarterly Journal of Hospital Medicine 9, no. 3 (1999): 234-237.

Vermont. Forest Service. Green Mountain State Forest News., 1924-36.

Tiring Termites Give Up Rather Than Slow Down: Insights to Metabolism Through Rate of Travel

Paul Fischer

3/3/2016

Ravi Nagori, John Mitchell

Tiring Termites Give Up Rather Than Slow Down: Insights to Metabolism Through Rate of Travel

Introduction

Discussion has been given to the nature with which termites travel using bridges and pheromones as factors in rate and distance of travel. Limited laboratory equipment and resources as well as an exhaustive number of experiments will require significant effort to eliminate redundancy or inaccuracy in the trial which will be provided. After preliminary observations which identified some key characteristics in the nature and travel of the termites, a novel approach to determining existential factors in the metabolism of the insects has been concluded.

Some mention of metabolism is provided in the research from Loreto et al. (2013) but statistical analysis was not able to ensure a consistent nature to the basic rate of travel of termites, and in one trial results were quite unexpected. This offers some basis for return to laboratory experiments and investigation of possible sources of the inconsistent results. The experiment will evaluate the rate of travel at two points in a track by insects after eliminating outlying results, which will hypothetically establish the presence of a “tiring” mechanism, or a metabolism factor in the termites. This will be shown with a significant deviation (p<.05) between mid-trial termite times and terminal termite trial times. Rejection of the hypothesis will indicate that termites travel at a consistent pace throughout the course of the trial.

Methods

Observations were completed using termites in wet, infested logs. Collection by hand was performed and included addition of wet napkins to clear plastic plates which housed the termites in between trials. The track was constituted of kimwipes and included ink-penned marks along pheromone-laced trails which the termites followed; this was replaced with every trial of multiple termites. Termites that refused to follow the track or did not conclude the track were removed in a short period and their results were counted as incomplete and the rates of completion will be shown in Table 2.

A stopwatch or clock was used to observe the time for a fresh randomly assigned termite to complete each track, repeated 15-20 times, and basic calculations performed to obtain the rate of travel at multiple points 3”, 6”, and 8”, which will be provided in Figure 1 and Table 1 as well as statistical significance across results to eliminate the possibility of wide variance in the research. Times were collected at each of the three points in one trial and then repeated in three more trials with each individual distance. Termites were collected after individually completing their trials and transferred through a waiting cell with a wet kimwipe back into their natural habitat, the woody environment. This provides the first set of data necessary to confirm the hypothesis: termite mid-trial rates of travel. Standard temperature and pressure was expected as well as atmospheric qualities, and the track was encapsulated by clear plastic to help ensure this. The experiment was repeated using only 3”, 6” and 8” tracks, this time with 15 trials, to help ensure data accuracy, and to confirm the hypothesis.

Results

No instance of significant deviation was observed after statistical analysis using a p-value limit p<.05 to determine significance across multiple sets, except in comparison of different length tracks, which can be seen in Table 1 and Figure 1 below, though variance was likely too great to determine statistical significance in comparison of closer distanced tracks. Completion rates degraded as expected across the various length tracks of the termites, seen in Table 2. This establishes the premises upon which the hypothesis can be tested, as the termites were behaving in a logical fashion, and not attempting these tracks in a random sense, so statistical analysis across data sets can now be warranted.

Results were analyzed by comparing across two data sets of the same length, one three inch track mid-trial, and the other only 3 inches in sum. Comparison of 3-inch tracks with 3-inch mid-trial times results yielded a p-value of .447, indicating a statistically non-significant difference between rate of travel for termites mid-trial in comparison to a short trial, which rejects the hypothesis. Original inclusion of 2-inch tracks, raw data for which can be derived from the supplemental materials, into the Figure 1 below, did not demonstrate a significant difference in rate of travel for the late trial period, but did confirm significant difference in raw times compared to other lengths of travel, excluding 3-inch mid-trial results which is done because the p-value of .227 is likely due to variance, not in inherently significant changes in rate of travel that would result in an insignificant difference between overall times over different lengths.

Table 1: P-values between data sets obtained

	P-Value
3-inch mid-trial and 3-inch from start	.447
3-inch trials from start	.113
6-inch trials from start	.432
8-inch trials	.372
3-inch trials to 6-inch trials*	.0016
3-inch trials to 8-inch trials*	.0049
6-inch trials to 8-inch trials*	.044
2-inch mid-trial to 3-inch mid-trial	.227
2-inch mid-trial to 6-inch trials*	5 x 10^-5
2-inch mid-trial to 8-inch trials*	9 x 10^-6

*Denotes statistically significant difference

Table 2: Percent completion for each dataset

Datasets	3-inch mid-trial	3-inch trials from start	6-inch trials	8-inch trials	2-inch mid-trial
% Complete	35%	45-7%	35-40%	25-30%	30%

Figure 1: Average Times and Standard Deviations of Termites*

*No instances of statistical significance in comparison to mid-trial rates of travel.

Conclusion and Discussion

The greatest observations of note in this experiment are the degrading rates of completion by the termites with increasing distances, seen in Table 2, and the unwavering rate of travel in those that complete their tracks. This indicates that termites do give up traveling along pheromone laced lines when tired or distracted, but will not slow down. It is important to remove the outliers because it became apparent after preliminary observations that some termites do not have the capability of completing a track or identifying the pheromone trail which will determine their direction of travel. Some assumptions will remain in this trial, such as the amount of pheromone used, but the removal of outliers should have established a steady point to observe the individual insects, which presents in the statistical significance seen in Table 1 between distances traveled by the termites.

A significant difference between rates of travel from the start and rates of travel recorded in the middle of a trial would confirm the hypothesis that termites either tire or warm-up to complete a track, and change their rate of travel mid-trial. Failure to find a statistically significant difference between the rate of travel along three inch tracks when beginning a trial and mid-trial, seen in Figure 1, shows definitively the hardy behavior of the termites even with traveling periods of significant distances. That is a conclusion which is backed by the expression of a significant difference between trials of different lengths, necessary to show that there is not simply a wide variation in all termite travel which would indicate a necessity for retrial with a greater sample pool, or more precise laboratory equipment. For the purposes of this research, this experiment can be said to have to have rejected the hypothesis presented.

Indications of the nature of the termite behavior can be interpreted accordingly, and with cross-reference on dietary habits some insight can be drawn. Original interpretation demonstrated these percentages and differences as indicative of the termites’ stage in life, further investigation revealed this to be a function of the type of termite being used. This was confirmed in further reading among the metabolic nature of termites including an experiment from 1925 which demonstrates the consistent nature of the creatures even under such miserable conditions as acid and ash (Cleveland, 291-2).

The variation in completion of tracks proceeds logically, though is not subject to a statistical analysis, and termites were less likely to complete longer tracks than shorter tracks, as shown in Table 2, ranging from 47% at 3 inches to as low as 25% by 8 inches. Mid-trial results and 6 inch trials fall in between these results appropriately and consistently. These are the only indication of a tiring mechanism supported by data in this experiment, which warrants further investigation and is discussed to some extent with ants (Loreto, et al.) which follow bridges and perhaps scents based on absorption patterns but could be more difficult to evaluate in terms of termite behaviors.

One experiment coming to mind would be utilization of a plastic surface instead of a paper surface and perhaps a fabric one as well in order to firmly establish the impact of pheromone quantity on the results, a possible source of error discussed previously. It is worth mentioning that repetition with a greater data pool would likely establish statistical significance between 2 and 3-inch tracks, but would be unlikely to yield any change to analysis of mid-trial data, based on comparison of longer time difference analysis. This discrepancy is worth further investigation before warranting any full repetition of the data set. Another extension of this work would be to draw on the work of L. R. Cleveland and evaluate whether the longevity of termites is reflected in consistency of their rate of travel, though adequate conclusions may be possible simply from evaluation of the raw data provided here and in subsequent work to that study on the topic of termite longevity.

References:

Cleveland, L. R. (1925) The ability of termites to live perhaps indefinitely on a diet of pure cellulose. Biological Bulletin 48, 289–293.

Loreto, R. G., Hart, A. G., Pereira, T. M., Freitas, M. L., Hughes, D. P., & Elliot, S. L. (2013). Foraging ants trade off further for faster: use of natural bridges and trunk trail permanency in carpenter ants. Naturwissenschaften, 100(10), 957-963.

Supplemental Data (in seconds):

Experiment 1: 3", 6", 8"	Column1	Column2	Column3	Column4
trial	Start to A	A to B	B to C	A to C
1	2	5	3	10
2	9	7	5	22
3
4
5
6	6	6	4
7
8
9
10	7
11	10	7	11	28
12
13	4	8	7	19
14	9	7	4	20
15	7
16
17
18	13	8
19
20

Experiment 2:	3”	Experiment 3: 8"	Experiment 4: 6"
trial
1	6		18
2		14
3
4
5	7
6
7	8
8
9	7		15
10		29
11			8
12	5		19
13	4	20
14		27	15
15	4	16	14