Education Commons^™

An Evaluation Of A Cooperative Extension Internship Program, Lisa Ellis Mccormick, Karen A. Vines, Subrato Kumar Kuri

The Journal of Extension

The purpose of this project was to evaluate the Virginia Cooperative Extension internship program from the perspective of student participants and their supervisors. Three focus groups were conducted with internship supervisors from the summer of 2019. Student survey data was used to identify concerns from the student perspective to inform the supervisor focus group questions. In addition to the questions, a Strengths, Weaknesses, Opportunities, and Threats (SWOT) analysis was also used to collect qualitative data within the supervisor focus groups. Findings suggest areas of strength that can be used in marketing as well as opportunities for program improvement.

The "Essence" From Within: A Phenomenological Study Examining The Lived Experiences Of Racial And Ethnic Minoritized Women (Raemw) Senior Level Administrators At 4-Year Predominately White Institutions (Pwis) In The United States (U.S.), Felicia Crockett

Theses and Dissertations

The purpose of this study was to explore the experiences of senior level RAEMW administrators who work at 4-year PWIs in the U.S. and analyze the impact of institutional environments on their success. The theories that guided this study were: Crenshaw’s (1994; 1989; 2015) intersectionality framework and four tenets of CRT which include counter-storytelling, the permanence of racism, interest convergence, and intersectionality (Hiraldo, 2010, 2019). This study was guided by the three research questions: 1) How do RAEMW senior level administrators describe their experiences navigating higher education, 2) How do senior level RAEMW administrators describe the impact of institutional environments …

Phenomenological Research Examining Administrators And Special Education Teachers' Perception, Experience & Knowledge Of The Mississippi Special Education Growth Rubric, Tricia Pittman

Dissertations

In the current era of accountability, public school administrators’ responsibilities may include evaluating special education teachers and providing them with feedback and support to improve their effectiveness. The problem that exists is that administrators who do not have a background in special education are charged with the responsibility of evaluating special education teachers, resulting in special education teachers not getting the support or feedback necessary to improve their instructional practice.

In addition to administrators not having the background knowledge necessary to effectively evaluate and support special education teachers, the problem of developing an effective evaluation model to evaluate special education …

Politics, Policies, And Procedures: The Iron Triangle Of Implementing Education Reform, Clint Reardon Jr

Honors College Theses

Education is often seen as a living thing, something that should grow and change with time. However, for far too many people who experience education from both within the school structure and for those who experience education from outside the school structure it can often seem like the educational system is stagnate, dying, and in some cases dead. One shared reason for this perception is perceived barriers in education that stifle creativity and allow educational systems to grow, adapt, and change to meet the needs of the students they serve. This study set out to identify what those barriers are …

A Qualitative Study Focused On Understanding P-12 School Leadership Through The Perceptions Of P-12 Educators And Leaders, Amanda Lorraine Pederson

Dissertations, Theses, and Projects

This qualitative study was conducted to understand the perceptions of school leadership through the lens of P-12 educational leaders (superintendents and principals/assistant principals) and P-12 teachers. The focus was on the perceptions of important qualities and characteristics of effective school leaders. The study examined how P-12 educational leaders and P-12 teachers viewed leadership and what they identified as important skills and characteristics for effective educational leadership. The Minnesota Department of Education Teacher Evaluation of Principals was used as a guide to understand the characteristics and skills P-12 school leaders are expected to demonstrate. An email was sent to schools in …

A Phenomenological Study On The Impact Of The Experience Of A College Merger On Employee Engagement, Satisfaction, And Burnout In Faculty, Staff, And Administrators At Minnesota North College, Molly Elise Franz

Dissertations, Theses, and Projects

Higher education institutions were becoming more competitive due to meeting the needs of changing demographics of prospective students, increasing costs of tuition, fees, and operations, meeting workforce demands, providing access to high quality technology tools, and more. A merger process impacted employee engagement, satisfaction and burnout. It was important for administrators in higher education to create and maintain a supportive and inclusive culture for employees, especially during each stage of the merger process. It was also important to clearly communicate the purpose of the merger, and to provide employees an opportunity to engage with the planning and implementation stages of …

Offering Collegiate Livestock Judging As A Student Organization, Maryfrances Miller, Don W. Edgar, Lyle Logemann

The Journal of Extension

Resource constraints have lowered the number of collegiate livestock judging teams, dropping the number of opportunities for collegiate judging, even though interest among students remains high. These opportunities can be provided for less expense through student-led extracurricular organizations. This approach increases the student initiative required, but also provides an increased opportunity for developing and demonstrating leadership skills.

Co-Teaching In The Classroom: Students’, The Clinical Teacher’S, And The Classroom Teacher’S Perceptions, Allison Nicole Dale

Masters of Education in Teaching and Learning

Co-teaching, where the clinical teacher and classroom teacher teach using different models, has become widely used in clinical teaching placements. This action research study, conducted in a second-grade classroom, had two purposes: to learn teachers’ and students’ perceptions towards co-teaching, and how different co-teaching models were used in different content areas. Through collecting surveys, interviewing students and the classroom teacher, and composing journal entries, qualitative data was analyzed to find common themes that emerged, while quantitative data from the surveys was calculated to find the mean and mode. The study found that co-teaching enriched the learning experience and provided more …

Female Medical Students’ Lived Experiences Of Financial Stress And Coping, Untara Shaikh, Dr. Kimberlee Bonura

Georgia Public Health Association Annual Meeting and Conference

Financial stress is a pervasive concern among medical students, with documented associations with adverse physical health, psychological morbidity, and ineffective coping. This study focuses on understanding the financial stressors female medical students face and the coping strategies they employ. While financial stress and coping mechanisms have been explored in the literature, a notable gap exists in understanding these dynamics among female students.

The study employed a phenomenological research approach to obtain data from the respondents, where data collection involved face-to-face semi-structured interviews. The Adaptation Model of Nursing, complemented by Lazarus and Folkman's Coping Theory, was a comprehensive framework for analyzing …

Book Review: How Education Policy Shapes Literacy Instruction: Understanding The Persistent Problems Of Policy And Practice, Nicole Hertz

The Language and Literacy Spectrum

Abstract: This review of How Education Policy Shapes Literacy Instruction: Understanding the Persistent Problems of Policy and Practice, edited by Rachael Gabriel, explores the most pressing educational concerns and their relationship to history and policy, written by scholars from all over the country, such as retention, intervention, early childhood and English language literacy acquisition, and coaching. With the current Science of Reading (SoR) movement and all the related laws that are being passed throughout the United States based on current educational reform measures, this review explores the relationship to past, present, and future literacy legislation, through a historical lens, …

The Trouble With ‘Delivering Feedback’: Reflections Of A Supervision Scholar, Helen M. Hazi

Journal of Educational Supervision

As a scholar of supervision and after years of teaching principals, I have begun to rethink what it means for principals to deliver feedback to improve teachers’ instruction. I realized that I held many troubling assumptions. In this essay, I describe the contexts within which my assumptions had taken root, then use selected literature to look more closely at each. In the final section, I address the question: What do principals do if they no longer deliver feedback? This inquiry helped me understand that commonly held assumptions about “delivering feedback” promote an oversimplified view of teaching and its improvement, keep …

Gaps In Teacher Education: Defining, Developing And Diverting On The Path To An Equity Stance, Sherry Dismuke, Jenn Snow-Gerono

Journal of Educational Supervision

Heeding the call for equity and transformative praxis in teacher education, teacher education programs often focus on equity and justice in mission statements and program design. This bounded case study explores how the construct of equity stance is framed by one teacher education program and then how the enactment of an equity stance is actualized in clinical field experiences. Feedback from clinical supervisors during observation cycles along with focus group interviews, surveys, and the examination of addressing an equity stance in teacher education are the focus of this article. Findings documented a continuum of equity enacted practices building from inclusive …

The Matthew Effect Within South Side Chicago Public Schools, Jazmin S. Hollingsworth

Honors Capstones

The Matthew Effect was first developed by sociologist Robert Merton (1968) to describe a phenomenon they observed whereby wealth and credit is distributed to individuals based on the wealth or credit they already possess. Keith Stanovich further developed this theory around poverty and effects on students, their learning, and in particular reading (1986). The name Matthew Effect comes from the Bible book of Matthew chapter 25: verse 29. "For whosoever hath, to him shall be given, and he shall have more abundance: but whosoever hath not, from him shall be taken away even that he hath." The dynamics of poverty …

Designing Research Assignments That Enhance Student Research Skills, Kathleen Oakey

Books & Chapters

Hi, I’m Kathleen. I have worked as an academic librarian at Sheridan College in Ontario, Canada for the past 13 years. In my role, I help International and domestic students find, evaluate, and use information sources ethically for their research assignments.

This handbook is the culmination of an 8-month sabbatical project to create an open educational resource that supports research assignment design at post-secondary institutions in Ontario.

A Little Loud And A Little Alone: A Phenomenology Of Leadership Identity Construction Among Women In Higher Education Technology, Amy Barry

Department of Teaching, Learning, and Teacher Education: Dissertations, Theses, and Student Research

This qualitative study is an exploration of how women in higher education information technology (IT) positions navigate constructing their leadership identities. This includes the messy, personal, internal identity work that occurs prior to claiming their leadership identities on the public stage, followed by an examination of what the experience of attempting to claim and negotiate a leadership identity is like in the social context of their organizations. This educational and sociological study employs an Interpretative Phenomenological Analysis approach with a series of three interviews per participant that allowed the researcher to deeply explore the personal identity experiences of participants. Findings …

An Examination Of Early Childhood Leadership In Public Elementary Schools: A Mixed Methods Study, Wesam Alshahrani

Electronic Theses and Dissertations

As state-funded Pre-K programs in elementary schools continue to grow, elementary principals are increasingly responsible for supporting, supervising, and leading these programs. Therefore, examining elementary principals' early childhood leadership competencies and the factors influencing them may help understand and improve their experiences as early childhood education (ECE) leaders. This explanatory sequential mixed methods study examined the ECE leadership of Tennessee public elementary school principals in two phases.

In the quantitative phase, statewide surveys were used to collect data from 67 principals. The survey comprised 51 items assessing nine ECE leadership competencies, synthesized from statements of leading ECE and elementary education …

Step-By-Step Guide To Uploading Your Master’S Thesis, Doctoral Dissertation, Or Other Student Work In The Unl Digital Commons, Paul Royster, Sue Ann Gardner

Thesis and Dissertation Deposit Information Resources

Step-by-step Guide to Uploading Your Master’s Thesis, Doctoral Dissertation, or Other Student Work in the UNL Digital Commons

This is just what the title says: a step-by-step guide to online deposit procedures.

Note: Deposit of master's theses is required, not optional. Deposit of doctoral dissertations for public access is optional, but strongly recommended.

Theses and dissertations are treated the same with respect to UNL Digital Commons deposit procedures.

Examining Teacher Knowledge And Preparedness: Teachers From India In South Carolina And The Implementation Of Udl Principles In General Education Classrooms, Lakshmi Surya Narayana Vishnubhotla

Electronic Theses and Dissertations

Increasing student diversity and the global emphasis on inclusive education necessitate a critical focus on teacher preparedness in implementing inclusive practices within classrooms. Teacher preparedness in inclusive practices is essential to ensure all students thrive in a truly inclusive educational environment. Universal Design for Learning (UDL) promotes equitable learning environments by empowering educators to address the diverse needs of their students. This framework is aligned with inclusive education legislation and provides multiple ways for learners to engage, understand information, and express their knowledge. UDL recognizes learner variability and supports student self-determination by offering choices along the learning journey, fostering greater …

Navigating New Frontiers: A Narrative Of Cte Administrators Leading Rural Innovation, Claire Bass

Electronic Theses and Dissertations

Public school districts play a pivotal role in the well-being of rural communities. To help mitigate the impact of labor market trends, societal shifts, and the skilled labor shortage, rural schools are in the initial stages of expanding innovative career pathways. As such, career and technical education (CTE) administrators serve their rural communities by facilitating robust career pathways to support local labor markets. Due to a skilled labor shortage, a declining labor force participation rate, and a rapidly evolving labor market, there is a lack of qualified and certified personnel to fill industry jobs (Davis et al., 2022). School districts …

Conditions Affecting Adjunct Teaching Performance: A Descriptive Study, Terry Baggett

Masters Theses & Specialist Projects

Colleges and universities have been undergoing long-term structural changes and among these is the ever-increasing reliance on adjunct faculty. The most important goal of higher education is student success and faculty are one of the biggest influencers of student learning success. As a result, factors affecting faculty can also have secondary effects on students. The purpose of the study is to describe various conditions within selected institutions that are affecting adjunct faculty instructional performance as perceived by adjunct faculty themselves.

This study used a survey methodology with a descriptive design. Results from four community colleges and one university were collected …

From Pre-College Grads To Undergrads: Encouraging Full-Time Enrollment After Summer Programs, Meghan Buckley Ph.D.

Journal of College Access

This guest perspective argues that converting in-person summer pre-college program participants into matriculated, degree-seeking undergraduate students at that same institution is a multi-step process that involves: 1) strategic pre-college program recruitment, 2) a curated and well-rounded summer pre-college experience that is both academically rigorous and socially dynamic, and 3) continued and consistent post-program engagement. It also argues that summer pre-college programs should work intentionally with Admissions departments during pre- and post-program development to create the most effective recruiting and enrollment pipelines from pre-college to eventual matriculation

P-12 School Administrators' Experiences, Opinions, And Perceptions Of Speech-Language Pathologists In Written Language Instruction And The Response To Intervention, Alison Webster

Dissertations

Many speech-language pathologists (SLPs) are employed in public school systems as part of the special education department to work with students with deficits in oral and written language skills. The literature shows a direct relationship between oral language development and early literacy skills. SLPs can provide a preventative role through the multitiered systems of support (MTSS) or response to intervention (RTI) programs. However, many SLPs report barriers to accessing students in the general education setting. One of these reported barriers is a lack of administrative support. Therefore, this research explored factors that impact a P-12 school administrator’s experiences, opinions, and …

The Lived Experiences Of K-12 Instructional Technology Leaders During Covid-19, Robin Jackson

Dissertations

This study examines the lived experiences of K-12 Instructional Technology Leaders in rural schools and school districts throughout Mississippi. It sought to explore the challenges that were encountered, the strategies they were employed, and the lessons that were learned during the COVID-19 pandemic, as traditional classroom teaching and learning was abruptly transitioned to 100% online or remote teaching and learning. Five participants were recruited. Only one participant holds the actual title of an instructional technology leader of their school district, while the other four assumed the role and responsibilities of an instructional technology leader for their schools or school districts. …

The Experiences Of Postsecondary Students With Disabilities Utilizing One Stop Student Services: A Grounded Theory Approach, Ivan Noe

Education (PhD) Dissertations

The number of students with disabilities attending postsecondary institutions of higher education continues to rise. With it, it is necessary to understand better how they experience their institution beyond curricular spaces. Presently, there exists a gap in the knowledge of how these students experience co-curricular support, including assistance with enrollment services through one stops. This study sought to understand the multiple ways in which this population of students experiences the one stop at one of three four-year public research universities in California. This qualitative research study utilized the constructivist grounded theory methodology and methods to aid in the emergence of …

International Women Graduate Students: Transition To Public Research Universities In The Midwest, Tran Thanh Truc Nguyen

Department of Educational Administration: Dissertations, Theses, and Student Research

This phenomenological qualitative study explored the experiences of international women graduate students (IWGSs) in transitioning to public research universities in the Midwest. The study utilized Schlossberg’s transition theory (Anderson et al., 2012) to gain insights into the perceptions of six participants during their college transition process. Based on the analysis of data collected through in-depth phenomenological interviews with each participant, three themes emerged that described the challenges faced by the participants during their transition. These themes were: solitary voyage, a dilemma of self-reliance and reliance, and a vicious cycle of limited time and financial constraints. Through the three themes, the …

Music Education: Right From The Start. Primary Teachers Survey - South Australia, Rachel Felgate, Toby Carslake, Tanya Vaughan

School and system improvement

A broad-ranging survey of teachers and representatives from 115 South Australian government primary schools. The research in South Australia underscores overwhelming support among teachers for the benefits of music learning. However, it also highlights widespread concerns regarding inadequate investment in teacher training, dedicated facilities, and necessary resources.65% of respondents indicated that less than nine hours were allocated to music learning within their initial teaching degrees. Additionally, only about half (53%) said their school has appropriate musical equipment, with just 7% reporting having a purpose-built building to conduct music learning.

Factors Affecting Teacher Retention In A Selected South Carolina School District: Perspectives Of Administrators And Teachers, Alvilda Graham

All Dissertations

In this qualitative descriptive case study, I explored the issue of teacher retention, a growing concern within public K-12 education systems in the United States, particularly in South Carolina. I aimed to understand the unique organizational factors within individual school districts that influence retention decisions from the perspectives of teachers and administrators at the middle school level. I focused on a selected South Carolina school district (SSD) and explored the viewpoints of teachers and administrators regarding teacher retention. To better understand their lived experiences, I conducted semi-structured interviews and surveys with middle school teachers and administrators. Using an improvement science …

The Cost Of Student Mandatory Fees: An Examination Of The Longitudinal Growth In Student Mandatory Fees At Four-Year Public Universities In Texas And Their Impact On Student Retention Rates, Charles Matthew Crouse

Open Access Theses & Dissertations

The ever-increasing costs and debt incurred by US college students is a hotly contested issue. In March 2022, the Texas Higher Education Coordinating Board (THECB) released a refreshed strategic plan for the stateâ??s higher education: Building a Talent Strong Texas. The refreshed plan concentrated on access for minority populations, enhanced student completion goals, and expanded the focus on reducing student debt. Texas set out to lead the nation in the least college student debt reported. One of the least examined or understood college costs is student mandatory fees (Arnott, 2012; Black & Taylor, 2018; Kelchen, 2016; Reinagel & Cooper, 2020). …

A Systematic Review Of Practices Utilized By Administrators To Support Teachers With Classroom Management, Ciara Waggoner

Masters Theses & Specialist Projects

An administrator’s role in supporting teachers has been a topic often discussed in literature. A less mentioned administrative function is their role in supporting teachers in classroom management strategies related to teaching and setting expectations. Problem behaviors in the classroom have a negative impact on student outcomes. Administrators can help address problem behaviors through the use of four effective administrator practices areas identified by Grissom et. al. (2021): (a) instructionally focused interactions (b) building a productive school climate (b) facilitating collaboration, and (c) managing personnel and resources. The purpose of this systematic review was to identify: (1) Which of the …

Refining The Goals Of Public Education In The United States: An Exploratory Single-Case Embedded Study Of A Student-Centered Path-Goals Setting, Tuan Pham

Masters Theses & Specialist Projects

The public higher education system in the United States has inherited a multitude of aims and missions in order to fulfill its social and educational objectives. As a result, many higher education institutions suffer from unclear goals. Nevertheless, the researcher identified the student's goal-oriented process as the fundamental aspect of this educational system from its inception until the present. The exploratory single-case embedded study conducted at a regional comprehensive institution highlighted the differences, difficulties, and issues faced by students, administrators, and the institution itself in its pursuit of specific goals in higher education. Indepth interviews were employed to investigate the …