Education Commons^™

The Relationship Between Teacher Perceptions Of Professional Learning Communities And Student Achievement, Elmer Thomas

Online Theses and Dissertations

A significant challenge facing public schools is the need to increase student achievement while having student gains enhanced through growth models. Teaching strategies/methods have evolved over the years from an "island" approach where the teacher was alone in his/her classroom and responsible for students progressing to a broader yet more specific approach to teacher professional development in order to enhance student learning.

Districts, schools, and individual teachers have long valued professional development and professional learning. These educational professional learning opportunities collectively give the district, school, and individual teachers a community at work in which a collective focus and commitment to …

The Relationship Between Student Employment In The College Union And Student Success, Ashley Casteel Reed

Online Theses and Dissertations

The purpose of this quantitative study was to investigate the relationship between student employment in the college union and student success at public universities in the Southeastern Conference (SEC). The study focused on the success of student employees as it relates to satisfaction, persistence, student learning and personal development. The study also focused on the relationship between college union working conditions and student satisfaction. The subjects in this study were 166 student employees who work in the college union at public SEC institutions during the 2016-2017 academic year. A survey was used to collect demographic information and information on how …

Traditional Grammar For A Modern Classroom, Madison Jones

Williams Honors College, Honors Research Projects

This project explores the different methods currently being used to teach grammar in a secondary Language Arts classroom. Additionally, the research identifies the relevance of sentence parsing, a traditional grammar method. Finally, the project offers a set of materials that would tangibly allow readers to take the results of the research and apply traditional grammar practices into a modern-day classroom. While there are many different current methods being used to teach grammar, this paper ultimately makes an argument that traditional grammar still can play a powerful role in the classrooms of tomorrow.

Reaching Food Insecure College Students Through An On-Campus Interactive Education Program, Danielle Buchbinder

Williams Honors College, Honors Research Projects

Need/Purpose: Emerging research suggests food insecurity is a problem for college students. Unpublished data from our campus (a large, Midwestern public institution) suggests 36% of students struggle with food insecurity, yet the campus has no pantry or meals/swipe donation program. While little research has been conducted examining food insecurity’s impact on academic success in college, it is well established that food insecurity negatively impacts academic performance in adolescents, mental and social health, dietary choices, and overall health. Program/Participants: In order to learn more and begin to mediate this problem on our campus, a series of nutrition education classes was created …

Comparative Pairs Judgements For High-Stakes Practical Assessments, Hendrati Nastiti

Theses: Doctorates and Masters

Assessment of practical tasks, as opposed to that of theoretical tasks, has been considered to be problematic, mainly because it is usually resource intensive and the scoring is subjective. Most practical tasks need to be assessed on site or involve products that need to be collected, stored, or transported. Moreover, because practical tasks are generally open-ended, and therefore subjective, there is concern over the reliability of the scores. In high-stakes assessment, these problems are even more challenging. There is a need for an assessment method that could overcome these problems. In this study, such a method that will be referred …

Funds Of Knowledge And The College Success Of First-Generation Students, Low-Income Students, And Students Of Color: A Transformative Mixed Methods Study, Delma Margot Ramos

Electronic Theses and Dissertations

Increases in college enrollment have led to assessments of college success. These assessments consistently reveal disparities between students from historically underserved communities and students from the majority. Specifically, first-generation to college students, low-income students, and students of color continue to experience unequitable success in college. In response to these concerns, the scholarly community engages in research that expands our understanding of college success of these students and offers solutions to bolster their success. Nonetheless, much of this work engages a deficit oriented approach that centers attention on the resources that historically underrepresented communities do not possess and attributes lower college …

Assessing Research Productivity From An Institutional Effectiveness Perspective: How Universities Influence Faculty Research Productivity, Michael M. Rawls

Theses and Dissertations

Faculty research productivity studies typically focus on the scholarly performance of the individual researcher, although environmental and organizational conditions that are largely outside of the researcher’s control can significantly impact that performance. From an institutional effectiveness perspective, it is imperative for the higher education administrators and leaders who share the responsibility of managing and supporting their university’s research enterprise to understand how the institutional environment itself impacts the productivity of its research community. In this sequential mixed methods study, a quantitative framework was tested for assessing institutional effectiveness in research administration based on the assertion that this concept can be …

Secondary Student Information Literacy Self-Efficacy Vs. Performance, Jen Spisak

Theses and Dissertations

The amount of information in the world has grown exponentially in the last generation. Students often believe that growing up as digital natives means they have advanced information literacy skills. However, school librarians are not seeing evidence of this in their schools. The purpose of this study was to determine if secondary students overestimate their information literacy (IL) abilities, if relationships exist between IL self-efficacy and performance, and if grade level or self-efficacy level changes those relationships. To accomplish this, data were collected from two middle schools and three high schools from a total of 397 students in grades 6, …

Collaboratively - Led Living Learning Programs: An Exploration For How Collaboration Is Facilitated Between Student Affairs Units And Academic Affairs In Llps, Trisha Clement-Montgomery

Theses and Dissertations--Educational Leadership Studies

According to Inkelas et al. (2008), Living Learning Programs (LLPs) that are collaboratively led by academic affairs and student affairs units tend to have a significant impact on student learning, when compared to students who participate in LLPs that are operated by one unit (Inkelas et al., 2008). Despite evidence that co-authored LLPs are beneficial to enhancing the LLP student experience, there is little to no research that explores how administrators facilitate collaboration between the units used to co-author the LLP student experience. For this reason, the focus of this study was to explore how administrators facilitate collaboration between academic …

Scoring Reliability By Early Childhood Educators On A Curriculum Based Assessment, Brigid S. Taylor

Theses and Dissertations--Early Childhood, Special Education, and Counselor Education

The purpose of this study was to investigate if early childhood educators could reliably score items using a new scoring system for the Assessment, Evaluation, and Programming System for Infants and Children (AEPS; Bricker, 2002). The participants were university students completing their certification in Interdisciplinary Early Childhood Education (IECE) at the University of Kentucky (UK). The six participants completed training on implementing the AEPS and administered the AEPS to measure child outcomes. The results of this study validated the new scoring system for the AEPS by illustrating that the participants could reliably score a curriculum based assessment.

Exploring School Counselors’ Narratives Of Cacrep Accredited Online Education Programs, Rebecca Van Der Hagen

Graduate Theses and Dissertations

Online education is a growing part of academia. The number of online school-counseling programs is also increasing and beginning to include face-to-face and online programs. Little research describes online education and even less discusses online school-counseling programs. The purpose of this study was to examine and interpret participants’ experiences of being trained and graduating from a CACREP online school-counseling master’s program, as well as how their training prepared them for their current role as a school counselor. A qualitative inquiry was conducted to understand online school-counseling programs and reported how six professional school counselors perceived their online program with a …

A Causal Comparative Analysis Of A Computer Adaptive Mathematics Program Using Multilevel Propensity Score Matching, Justin Seabolt

Electronic Theses and Dissertations

The purpose of this study was to examine the effectiveness of a computer adaptive mathematics program, i-Ready® Mathematics Instruction in Central Florida School District (CFSD) using a variety of quantitative analyses. In particular, students in the fifth grade at CFSD were examined in relation to the gains made on their end-of-year statewide mathematics assessment, known as the Florida Standards Assessment (FSA Math). Per i-Ready®, students who use i-Ready® Mathematics Instruction for a minimum of 45 minutes per subject per week for at least 25 weeks show significantly greater gains than those who do not (Curriculum Associates, 2017b). Therefore, two propensity …

A Study Of Late Registration At Four Community Colleges, Meredith Courtney Nourie-Manuele

Educational Leadership & Workforce Development Theses & Dissertations

At the community college level, a debated policy is whether to keep the option for late registration. Most colleges define late registration as registration that occurs any time after the first day of the semester (O’Banion, 2012). Some community colleges have opted to eliminate late registration, believing, based on previous studies, that late registration is a barrier to students and their success (Bolt, 2013; Hale & Bray, 2011; Jones, 2015; Smith, Street, & Olivarez, 2002; Weiss, 1999). Others assert late registration remain an option maintaining that the open access designation associated with the community college demands that students not be …