This textbook attempts to provide you with an overview of the commonly used basic mathematical models, as well as a wide range of applications. It offers a perspective that brings you back to the modeling process and the assumptions that go into it.

This series of technical quarterly reports from the Alaska Earthquake Center (AEC) includes detailed summaries and updates on Alaska seismicity, the AEC seismic network and stations, field work, our social media presence, and lists publications and presentations by AEC staff. Multiple AEC staff members contributed to this report. It is issued in the following month after the completion of each quarter Q1: January-March, Q2: April-June, Q3: July-September, and Q4: October-December.

Provides high level results for open-ended questions from the Alaska Partnership for Teacher Enhancement District Questionnaire Fall 2004. No interpretation is provided.

This report summarizes and incorporates various materials prepared for the Bristol Bay Native Association (BBNA) under contractual agreement with the Institute o f Social and Economic Research (ISER) o f the University of Alaska Anchorage (UAA). The project is known as the BBNA-UAA/ISER Pebble Mine Technical Assistance Project. The project period was September l, 2005 through November 30, 2006. The Pebble Mine Technical Assistance Project was funded by U.S. Department of Environmental Protection through the Indian General Assistance Program (!GAP) for Alaska Native tribes. The funding was provided to the Bristol Bay Native Association through an "unmet needs" grant designed to provide technical assistance to the Bristol Bay tribes and tribal members in addressing environmental quality and subsistence issues associated with the proposed Pebble Mine project. The proposed Pebble Mine would be located in the Kvichak River drainage, home of the world's most productive sockeye salmon fishery and possibly draw water from the Nushagak-Mulchatna River watershed as well. This proposed development raises major issues related to environmental quality o f the lands and waters customarily utilized by Bristol Bay tribes situated in the Kvichak and Nushagak-Mulchatna River drainages. Bristol Bay tribal members from local communities in the vicinity of the proposed Pebble Mine project make substantial subsistence use of natural resources in the area which sustain the nutritional, economic, social and cultural health of tribal members. The purpose of the project was to provide technical assistance to the tribes to allow them to fully comprehend the nature of the Pebble Mine project and its potential impacts on the environment and their subsistence uses, and to enhance their capacity to fully participate in the review and permitting process should permits to develop the Pebble Mine be sought. The purpose of participation is to insure that protection for the environment and subsistence uses that depend on a healthy and productive ecosystem are fully addressed in the project review process.

Alaska voters will decide whether the state government should start taxing the natural gas reserves in the two largest North Slope gas fields. The idea behind the proposal is to jump-start construction of a gas pipeline. The North Slope has one of the largest accumulations of natural gas in the U.S., and Alaskans have been waiting a long time for a pipeline to carry that gas to market. Recent higher gas prices have made the project more attractive. Several oil companies hold leases on the gas. They’ve taken steps toward a pipeline—like negotiating fiscal terms with the state—but they haven’t committed to building one. Supporters of the reserves tax think they’re delaying the project (for various possible reasons) and should be pushed. The ballot proposal calls for the oil companies to pay a reserves tax—a tax on gas in the ground—until a pipeline is completed and North Slope gas is up for sale. It offers incentives for them to speed up the project: the sooner the pipeline is finished, the less they pay; and later they would recover some of what they did pay, in credits on gas production taxes. This report is summarized in the fifth Fiscal Policy Note which is included with this document record.

Health professional shortages can be decreased through the start of new training programs, the expansion of existing programs, and the improvement of the effectiveness of recruitment and retention efforts. However, strategic planning and the execution of such programs require valid and accurate data. To this end, stakeholders such as the Alaska Mental Health Trust Authority (AMHTA) and Alaskan's For Access to Health Care (ACCESS), along with schools and departments within the University of Alaska Anchorage (UAA), funded the Alaska Center for Rural Health-Alaska’s AHEC (ACRH) and the Institute of Social and Economic Research (ISER) to conduct a comprehensive health workforce study during winter and spring of 2009. This report highlights employers’ needs for employees to fill budgeted positions. This is different from a needs assessment that would take into account population demographics and disease incidence and prevalence. This health workforce study is an assessment of health manpower shortage based on budgeted staff positions and their vacancies in organizations throughout the state. Respondents included part-time positions, which resulted in our counting full-time equivalent (FTE) rather than individuals (“bodies”). In situations where a position was divided among more than one occupation (e.g., Dental Assistant and Billing Clerk), we asked the respondent to count the position under which they considered the position’s “primary occupation.” The study was designed in consultation with an advisory group that included AMHTA, ACCESS, and UAA. The study targeted 93 health occupations. The unit of analysis was the employment site by organization type, which allowed for the allocation of positions and vacancies by geographic region. APPENDICES: Appendix A. List of Health Occupations, Appendix B. Health Workforce Surveys, Appendix C. Cover Letter Accompanying Survey Forms, Appendix D. Confidence Intervals for Positions, Vacancies, Number of Vacancies Filled with New Graduates, and Length of Longest Vacancy in Months, Appendix E. Tables of Samples and Estimates of Positions, Vacancies, Vacancy Rates, Number of Vacancies Filled with New Graduates, Mean and Maximum Length of Longest Vacancy in Months, Appendix F. Tables of Occupations Sorted By Estimates of Positions, Vacancies, Vacancy Rates, Number of Vacancies Filled with New Graduates, Mean and Maximum Length of Longest Vacancy in Months

Recent reports on higher education in the U.S. say it’s in trouble— that it’s too expensive, doesn’t offer enough need-based aid, isn’t educating people for today’s jobs, doesn’t demand enough of instructors or students, and isn’t sufficiently accountable to policymakers and taxpayers.1 Is the University of Alaska (UA)—the state’s only public university —offering a good, affordable education for Alaskans? This paper looks at that question. It first presents the available data on various measures and then summarizes successes and continuing challenges for UA. It ends with a discussion of how UA and the state are addressing higher-education issues and what other steps they might consider. UA has made substantial progress on a number of goals in the past decade. For example, it’s attracting a growing share of Alaska’s college-bound freshmen, and it’s educating many more students for jobs in high-demand areas like health care and technology. The school’s overall retention and graduation rates are improving. But UA also faces many of the same issues as other public universities— like sharp increases in tuition and significant numbers of students who come out of high school unable to read, write, or do math at college-level.

This report examines economic and policy issues related to wild and farmed salmon in North America. These issues have received a great deal of attention in recent years, reflecting the environmental, economic and cultural importance of salmon to Americans—and the fact that salmon issues span many important policy debates ranging from environmental protection to trade policy. The salmon industry has experienced dramatic change over the past two decades. Two major trends gave rise to many of the issues discussed in this report. The first trend is the rapid and sustained growth in world farmed salmon and salmon trout production, from two percent of world supply in 1980 to 65 percent of world supply in 2004. The growth of farmed salmon and the decline in the value of wild salmon has given rise to two broad sets of questions: • How has salmon farming affected wild salmon resources and the wild salmon industry? • What should be done to protect wild salmon resources and strengthen the wild salmon industry?"

In May 2004, the Alaska legislature established new licensing requirement for sport fishing guide business owners and sport fishing guides on a statewide basis. As part of this new registration process, a registered guide vessel must display an ADF&G guide decal on both sides of the vessel along with a current year tag provided when the logbook is issued. The vessel registration portion of the logbook distribution does not collect all the information that CFEC previously collect; the primary mission at Sport Fish Division is monitor fishing pressure on fish stocks by tracking the number of vessels used in the guide industry including the number of vessels used by an individual business. Since a logbook is issued to a unique business, it is possible to determine how many vessels are being used by that given business. The new licensing requirements initiated in 2005, require that a business maintain current Occupational License and Liability Insurance. A guide is also required to have a current sport fish license, first aid certificate and a Coast Guard license if they plan to operate a motorized vessel with clients on board.The purposes of this study are 1) to estimate the economic significance of saltwater charter sport fishing in Southeast Alaska and 2) to test a new methodology for developing these estimates. In addition, this study lays the groundwork for additional spatial analysis relating fishing activity to spawning habitat and to local economies. By making these spatial associations we hope to generate a clearer picture of the economic values generated by riparian ecosystems and captured by anglers and captains from specific communities. "

The purpose of this research is to assist the National Park Service (NPS), Southwest Alaska Network gain a better understanding of current visitor use volumes and patterns, develop a system to monitor visitor use over time, and use this information to evaluate the impact of visitors on the SW Network Park systems (Kenai Fjords National Park, Lake Clark National Park and Preserve, and Katmai/Aniakchak/Alagnak National Park and Preserve) as part of the NPS Vital Signs Monitoring program. Data about visitor use are important because of the driving force humans have on ecosystems. Not only are total numbers of visitors important in understanding overall usage of park resources, but understanding the trends in visitor use can aid managers in minimizing the impacts of humans on sensitive animals and ecosystems. This report provides information on the project protocols, databases, and visitation trends.