Digital Commons Network^™

El Valle Del Río Grande Siempre Ha Sido Bilingüe. ¿Por Qué Sus Escuelas No?, Karina Guerrero, Jesus Chapa-Malacara

Capstones

Months before the pandemic began its wrath on education in the U.S., highlighting inequities that disproportionately impact English Language Learners, the Texas Legislature passed legislation (HB3) that created a funding incentive for starting dual language programs – a type of bilingual education found to be the most beneficial for English learners. As schools presumably “return to normal” and at an inflection point that could define the future of multilingual education in the United States, we catch up with several district’s in the country’s most bilingual region as it wrestles with and fights for how to preserve and promote bilingualism. English …

Marginalized Communities Are Facing The Brunt Of Student Homelessness, Alicia Gajraj S. Gajraj

Capstones

Headline: Marginalized communities are facing the brunt of student homelessness.

My capstone is a news article focusing on the rising number of students who are homeless in New York City. It explores how advocacy groups and active community members are working to help those in marginalized communities experiencing homelessness at higher rates.

Data: Data collection on the number of students unhoused in the past 11 years was done on Datawrapper. The numbers were found on NYSTEACHS.ORG.

Keywords: Student homelessness, Shelter system, Unhoused, Advocates for Children, Mckinney-Vento Homeless Assistance Act, Schools, Education

Here is the link to my capstone: https://gajrajalicia57.wixsite.com/website/general-8

Report Card: Nyc's Student-Powered Newsroom, Julian Roberts-Grmela

Capstones

During my time in the engagement journalism program at CUNY, I aimed to use journalism to serve the community of students in New York City’s public school system. At first, I tried to serve students through my reporting, by aiming to center student perspectives in education-related stories in order to uplift their feedback about the system. But I realized I could do more to report with students, instead of just about them. So, during my final semester, I launched Report Card: NYC’s Student-Powered Newsroom. Report Card is a Substack-based newsletter and a training program for middle-high school aged students …

Special Education Teachers’ Perceptions Of Self-Determination Supports In Inclusion Classrooms, Suzanne Tiffany-Salogub

Theses and Dissertations

The outcomes presented in this dissertation were motivated by a scarcity of research that explores self-determination practices explicitly within inclusive classrooms. Three overarching goals motivated my research. The first was to understand what inclusion teachers know and do in relation to self-determination (Chapter 2). The second was to understand how their practices align with existing knowledge about self-determination in the field (Chapter 3). Finally, I sought to create an accessible, research-based tool tailored to inclusion teachers who seek to support their students in developing self-determination skills (Chapter 4). To achieve these goals, I designed an investigation using a case-study design …

Children And Technology: Why Technology Is Important For Our Children, Jill Mactiernan

Student Theses

Many people get scared when they hear about how much technology runs the world today. They tend to get frightened when they go to a store and have to use a selfcheckout instead of a cashier. Parents are scared of the dangers of the internet and how it will affect their children, so they tend to try to prevent/limit their children’s usage of the internet and other technologies. However, that may not always be the right move. Technology can not be avoided; it is a part of our everyday lives. With proper guidance and teachings, children can learn how to …

The Perceived Impact Of Project-Based Learning (Pbl) On Middle School Students’ Science, Technology, Engineering, And Mathematics (Stem) Identity And Engagement, Jonathan Olivera

Theses and Dissertations

Despite multiple calls to action, the United States educational system is not producing enough viable contributors in the areas of science, technology, engineering, and mathematics (STEM). These fields continue to grow, and the STEM workforce continues to expand. However, the pool of citizens prepared to enter these professions is not keeping up with the demand. Part of this issue can be attributed to a diminishing interest in STEM by students, particularly during their identity forming adolescent years. Active learning strategies have proven successful in preventing this decline with project-based learning (PBL) being one of the most successful active learning strategies. …

Assessment Literacy: Using Computer Adaptive Test Data, Ogechi Iwuoha Njoku

Theses and Dissertations

This study employed a quantitative research design to examine teacher assessment literacy and its relationship to external and internal factors. The researcher sought to describe the level of assessment literacy that teachers demonstrate when using score report data from computer-adaptive interim assessment and to analyze whether teachers’ assessment literacy seems to be affected by: a) the quality of professional development training received; b) teachers’ level of self-efficacy; c) teachers’ attribution to student effort, that is their perception of the importance of student effort; and d) teachers’ attribution to context, specifically their perception of the importance of tests. For this study, …

The ‘Ezel Project’ Inquiry: Mesotransformative Praxis To Decenter Whiteness In Racialized Organizations And Schools, Justin Gerald

Theses and Dissertations

In this study, a Black scholar in the midst of understanding his neurodivergence and his identity as someone who has been dis/abled reacts to the prodding of white peers by creating a course on decentering whiteness. The scholar then interviews ten of the participants in said class to understand how they came to select such a course and what they might have accomplished in attempting to challenge the structure of whiteness in their institutions. Drawing on Critical Race Theory, Critical Whiteness Studies, Dis/Crit, and in particular the work of Victor Ray, this work seeks to examine the narratives that brought …

Does Race Still Matter? An Exploration Of Race And Mentoring Relationships From The Perspective Of Early Career Teachers Of Color And Mentors, Franchesca R. Ho Sang

Theses and Dissertations

Mentoring has been attributed to lowering attrition rates of teachers. At present, the majority of teachers in the United States are White and female. The national teacher workforce does not represent the student body. Although there have been recent initiatives to improve the diversity within the teacher workforce, by explicitly recruiting teachers of color (TOC), the attrition rates of these teachers are negating the effects of recruitment efforts. Previous research has pointed to the need to consider race in novice TOC mentee and mentor matches, as cultural capital theory suggests common knowledge and experience may lead to stronger mentor relationships …

Disrupting Inequitable Practices In Special Education: Privileging Student And Family Voices, Armineh E. Hallaran

Theses and Dissertations

Black, Latinx, and other minoritized students have long been overrepresented in the high-incidence, subjective, disability classifications including Learning Disability, Speech and Language Impairment, Emotional Disturbance, and Intellectual Impairment. Special education places these students on trajectories that deny them access to quality education and the same postschool outcomes and opportunities as their nondisabled peers. Using Disability Critical Race Theory (DisCrit), and grounded theory analysis this study foregrounds the voices of minoritized middle school students receiving special education under high-incidence classifications. DisCrit allowed for an investigation of how student’s intersecting marginalized identities impacted their experiences as special education students. Further, Education Journey …

Free Improvisation Pedagogy: An Arts Based Research Approach To Promoting Student Agency And Embracing Difference, Nicholas Catino

Dissertations, Theses, and Capstone Projects

Free Improvisation Pedagogy explores the changing perspectives of students as they co-create musical improvisations. Free improvisation is understood as a site for transformative pedagogy, with the possibility for people to break free of structures, think and perform independently, broaden their perspective of proper tonality, engage in musical democracy and equality of voice, and participate in music making that is active, participatory, and continually evolving.

Working with a small group of High School students in suburban New York, this research explores these topics and documents, through audio, video, visual art, and conversation, how students experience this type of music making and …

Let ‘Em Talk: An Exploration Of And Challenge To The White Supremacy And Colonization Of Black And Brown Girls In United States Public Schools, Keara Small

Dissertations, Theses, and Capstone Projects

The United States Department of Education’s mission statement is described as evolving to “Promote student achievement and preparation for global competitiveness by fostering educational excellence and ensuring equal access.” A key piece of this statement is educational excellence and equality. The pathway to educational excellence and preparation is founded on public school students growing aware of their culture, identity, and history. My objective in this research is to discuss educators’ perceptions and misconceptions about Black and Brown children — especially Brown and Black girls—who attend public schools across the United States. Present-day research regarding school discipline policies and the “policing” …

Analyzing The Linguistic Features Of Standardized Math Items: A Text Mining Approach, Magdalen A. Beiting-Parrish

Dissertations, Theses, and Capstone Projects

The following is a five-chapter dissertation surrounding the use of text mining techniques for better understanding the language of mathematics items from standardized tests to improve linguistic equity of these items to support assessment of English Language Learners.

Introduction: The dissertation begins with an overview of the problem that English Language Learners are likely not able to demonstrate their full mathematical ability due to the construct irrelevant variance caused by these items being written in English. This introduction also introduces the idea of text mining as a methodology for use in exploring this test design issue.

Article 1: This article …

The International Academy Of Language And Culture: The Global (Pre)K-12 Charter School Network, Dree-El Simmons

Dissertations, Theses, and Capstone Projects

The International Academy of Language and Culture (IALC) is a charter school based on the original concept of charter schools by Ray Budde and Albert Shanker, as an academic environment dedicated and designed to improving the educational outcomes for its students through innovative pedagogy. Committed to American (and global) education reform, the IALC incorporates elements from higher education into the early childhood and adolescent settings. We accomplish this by utilizing an interdisciplinary approach in our language and culture-based program.

The IALC is a multilingual, full-immersion program. Food Studies (including culinary arts), the Arts, the Humanities, Social Sciences, and Martial Arts …

Retrieval Practice Promotes Learning Of Turkish As A Foreign Language: A Computer-Assisted Language Learning Study, Maya C. Rose

Dissertations, Theses, and Capstone Projects

Adults generally find it difficult to learn a new language, yet exhibit remarkable individual differences in outcomes. Variation in second language (L2) learning is associated with input conditions (Morgan-Short et al., 2010) as well as learners’ aptitude (Dörnyei, 2005). Recent work has demonstrated benefits of retrieval practice in promoting L2 learning of grammatical patterns and vocabulary in both artificial and natural languages (Hopman & MacDonald, 2018; Keppenne et al., 2021). With that said, when retrieval practice is based on oral recall as opposed to a recognition test, it confounds potential benefits of repeated testing (Rowland, 2014) with those associated with …

A Survey Study Of Speech-Language Therapists’ Experiences With Teletherapy At The Onset Of The Covid-19 Crisis, Jason A. Rosas

Dissertations, Theses, and Capstone Projects

The present study aimed to understand how delivering pediatric treatment services via ‘teletherapy’ affected speech-language therapists (SLTs) during the initial outbreak of the COVID-19 pandemic crisis in 2020. SLTs reported on their experiences with the change from in-person to remote service delivery via two national surveys distributed at the start of the pandemic between April 2020 and July 2020. To explain SLTs’ survey responses, this dissertation introduced the Professional Adaptation Model (PA Model). The PA Model facilitated evaluation of the SLTs’ professional environment and the psychological constructs of their professional identity believed to influence the transition to speech-language teletherapy. Specifically, …

A Longitudinal Analysis Of The Development Of Mandarin Chinese In Fourth Grade Chinese Immersion, Robin E. Harvey

Dissertations, Theses, and Capstone Projects

Many studies have confirmed the benefits of dual language immersion programs. Research into reading and writing development in these programs, and particularly in Chinese immersion, is less common. In this dissertation, an attempt is made to address this gap in research by exploring the literacy development of fourth grade Chinese immersion students. Participants were 70 students, the entire fourth grade of an urban Chinese immersion school in the northeastern U.S. The school had recently made several curricular changes. They were adopting a practice of freewriting, or independent writing. In freewriting, students are encouraged to write as much as they can …

Effects Of Redundancy Of Multimedia Instruction On Spanish Reading And Listening Skills, Charles Raffaele

Dissertations, Theses, and Capstone Projects

The redundancy principle of multimedia learning indicates that people learn better from graphics and narration simultaneously than from graphics, narration, and printed text simultaneously. The current study investigated whether the redundancy principle may apply to multimedia instruction of correspondences between a second language (L2) and a native language’s reading and listening content. 100 college students in New York City learned correspondences between Spanish and English words and phrases in a counterbalanced within-subjects design, from three trials of video instruction that was redundant (including text as captions) or non-redundant (including text as non-concurrent text slides). For each condition, participants completed tests …

The Making Of A Bilingual University In The 21st Century, Michael Mena

Dissertations, Theses, and Capstone Projects

At the southernmost tip of Texas, the University of Texas Rio Grande Valley (UTRGV) opened its doors on August 31, 2015 as a ‘bilingual, bicultural, and biliterate’ campus—the only one of its kind and at a scale never before attempted in the United States. This is a categorical achievement in the near 200 year-long quest for the educational advancement of Latinxs in Texas—a state historically structured by white supremacist ideologies, violent economic and political disenfranchisement, as well as a racially segregated education system designed to maintain exploitative labor practices (Montejano 1987; González 1990, 2013, 1999; Blanton 2004). This constitutes the …

Learning Beyond Measure: Critical Numeracy And Resistance To Racial Capitalism, Atasi Das

Dissertations, Theses, and Capstone Projects

In this three-article dissertation, I connect with and expand from learning theories and mathematics and numeracy practices to reimagine numeracy as a potential tool towards liberation and human emancipation. Developing a framework and activity of critical numeracy, I explore the ways numbers and static categories have been used to “objectively” create, reproduce, and reify hierarchies within historical contexts and power relations. The core of this work examines, what do numbers and numeracy mean for us? Who are “the us” we can organize for? And for what purpose can and should we utilize, teach, and learn with numbers in and beyond …

Transforming Afterschool Programs Into "Engines Of Development": A Policy Analysis Of The Federal 21st Century Community Learning Centers, Jane Quinn

Dissertations, Theses, and Capstone Projects

Although schools receive most of the attention in discussions of and research about educational policy, an equally important—and under-investigated—arena is the non-school hours. American students spend more time outside of school than in school, and a host of studies have shown that the ways young people spend their discretionary time can greatly influence their short-term and long-term outcomes. Issues of educational equity are deeply embedded in the topic because opportunities to participate in high quality out-of-school learning experiences are not evenly distributed in American society. The single most important policy target in this aspect of student life is the federal …

Effects Of Telesimulation On The Health Literacy Knowledge, Confidence And Application Of Nursing Students, Susan Patton

Dissertations, Theses, and Capstone Projects

Background: Assessing and addressing health literacy (HL) in patients is an essential role of the nurse and a critical component of nursing student education. Yet, large gaps exist within nursing school curricula with regard to the development of HL knowledge and skills, and the confidence to implement practices that target HL. Furthermore, effective training modalities that examine the transformation of nursing students’ knowledge into practice through the development of confidence during experiential learning have not been well explored.

Purpose: Evaluate the effectiveness of a HL information and a HL telesimulation intervention on the HL Knowledge, Application and Confidence of first-semester …

Graphic Novels In The Foreign Language Classroom: Teaching Central American History In The Target Language, Vanessa Elizabeth Guzmán

Dissertations, Theses, and Capstone Projects

Graphic novels are becoming increasingly helpful in the foreign language classroom. As a Spanish teacher in the Bronx, I have introduced numerous graphic novels into my lessons. Some graphic novels include familiar characters and are presented in a translated work, while others are graphic novels that were originally printed in Spanish. I have witnessed the advantages of using graphic novels in my classroom as the illustrations provide my readers with context clues to better understand the reading. I have also found some graphic novels that focus on historical events in Latin America but these works were either written entirely in …

A Queens Community Teacher Storytelling Project: A Qualitative Research Study Of Five Local Afro-Caribbean And Latina Public School Teachers And Community Teachers In New York City, José Alfredo Menjivar Ortéz

Dissertations, Theses, and Capstone Projects

This dissertation thesis examines the lived experiences, life stories, and storytelling of five Afro-Caribbean and Latina people, who are all local from the borough of Queens, alumni of New York City’s public schools, and since then, became their local public school teachers, classroom practitioners, and local community teachers. We refer to this specific and unique population of teachers as alumni-community teachers and to these and other similar stories as teacher life stories.

This qualitative research and study were conducted through a series of writing workshops and semi-structured interviews. The study’s main examination is preoccupied to understand how local teachers make …

The Persistence Of Exclusion In Developmental Math Courses In Community Colleges: The Search For Equity And Justice In Math Education, Dora P. Trujillo

Dissertations, Theses, and Capstone Projects

This study examines how minoritized community college students taking developmental mathematics courses construct their math identities and how structures within academia affect this construction. It uses interviews and a focus group with open-ended questions to look beyond the quantitative studies examining the effectiveness of math developmental courses by exploring student narratives rather than statistical data. Both curricula and pedagogies need to be de-constructed so we may bring social change through diversity to the teaching and learning of mathematics at this level, as developmental math courses have become a systematized form of marginalization. In the process of de-constructing, we also need …

Building Racial Literacy Through Relational Trust, Teacher Solidarity, And Antiracist Praxis, Tanya E. Friedman

Theses and Dissertations

Schools in the United States continue to dramatically under-educate students with marginalized identities. Although professional development for teachers regularly fails to develop the knowledge, skills, dispositions, and commitment needed to interrupt educational inequities and ensure all students thrive, scholarship on teacher learning has identified promising practices such as critical inquiry groups for social justice which can foster teachers’ capacity to interrupt inequitable instructional practices and school policies. (Gorski & Dalton, 2020; Manfra, 2019; Peters, 2016). The three manuscripts in this dissertation explore the experience of a CIG comprised of seven teachers working in an urban elementary school that serves multiply …

Perspectives Of Students With Asd And Their Parents: What Does It Truly Mean To Be Included?, Keara M. Browne

Theses and Dissertations

Though there are a number of practices identified by researchers and other professionals as inclusive, the question remains about whether the students themselves truly feel included. There has been limited research surrounding specific experiences in inclusive classrooms that students with autism spectrum disorder (ASD) perceive to be facilitators and barriers to being included in general education and co-teaching settings. The purpose of this study was to inform educational policies and school practices surrounding the inclusion of students with ASD in general education and co-teaching settings by analyzing the perceptions of students with ASD and their parents to determine what it …

Professional Stem Identity, Achievement Goal Orientation, And Selfauthorship In Underrepresented Minority Undergraduate Stem Students, Christopher King

Theses and Dissertations

Post-secondary education is meant to build the cognitive and professional growth of the students studying all subjects. Yet, little is known about the development of how students think of themselves as members of the field, nor how they develop from a young novice to a person eligible for employment. A lens of self-authorship was used to compliment and interpret data collected regarding how students think of themselves as member of the STEM community (STEM Identity) and how they perceive their achievement STEM Identity. There was a significant link between student-mentor experiences and a higher professional identity and more progress along …

Effect Of The Virtual Simulation Paired Prebriefing-Debriefing Strategy On Nursing Students’ Self-Efficacy Perceptions And Virtual Simulation Performance In The Care Of Patients Experiencing A Myocardial Infarction, Laura M. Penalo

Dissertations, Theses, and Capstone Projects

Through the use of virtual simulations (VS) in nursing education, nursing students are exposed to a variety of clinical scenarios that may potentially improve their learning of competencies, increase their self-efficacy, and enhance their future clinical performance. Despite limited quantitative research incorporating evidence-based strategies such as prebriefing and debriefing as part of the VS experience, this educational technology continues to gain popularity. In 2020, the use of VS in the nursing curriculum exponentially increased when the global COVID-19 pandemic impacted traditional in-person clinicals, laboratory, and human patient simulation (HPS) experiences. Associate Degree Nursing (ADN) programs have benefited from the use …

A Case For Comprehensive Work-Based Learning And Career Education For New York City’S Public High School Students, Jacqueline De La Cruz

Dissertations, Theses, and Capstone Projects

As children progress through grades K-12 they are often asked what they would like to be when they grow up, but there are few opportunities for exposure to real world work experiences while they are in school. While many radical scholars have critiqued the primacy of the economic goals of schooling, in this paper I embrace the connection between education and employability to advocate for career education and work-based learning programs to bolster students’ postsecondary plans. Work-based learning does not substitute traditional forms of education and schooling, but when aligned with tenets of learning and career theories, it has the …