Education Commons^™

Factors Impacting Students’ Perceptions Of Mathematics, Amber Souza

Honors Program Theses and Projects

I want to be able to present math in a positive light to all of my future students, regardless of race, gender, and math background. However, for teachers as a whole to be able to take this important step, they must first develop a deeper understanding of why math is a sore spot for many students.

The Flipped Mastery Model In Secondary Mathematics Classroom: A Mixed Study To Determine The Effects On Student Satisfaction, Engagement, And Learning Achievement, Ziniah Beasley

Education Graduate Research

Although many studies are on the flipped classroom, they are currently gaps and limited research conducted on flipped-mastery models. This mixed study implemented the repeated-measures design with few qualitative and quantitative studies on flipped-mastery in the secondary mathematics classroom. The purpose of the study aimed to examine the flipped mastery model’s effects on student satisfaction, engagement, and learning achievement. The study site was the researcher’s private school with purposive sampling of twenty-one high school Algebra II students. Pre-posttest unit tests and weekly quizzes assessed student learning achievement. The independent-samples t test results yielded no significant differences between achievement performance for …

Struggling Student Teachers: Interventions For Support And Success, Sheree Moser

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

Teacher shortages in K-12 schools have created unique challenges for teacher preparation programs. University instructors face the task requirements of supporting candidates from a wide variety of backgrounds at the undergraduate and graduate level. While some of these candidates enter higher education programs skilled, eager, and committed, others are less prepared, requiring significant attention to make it through the program. Exams required by state departments of education and minimum grade point averages influence each candidate’s ability to move forward within the program, causing some students to experience additional struggles related to mental health and financial burdens.

The problem of practice …

How Alumnae Of A Feminist Organization During Middle-High School Perceive Their Involvement As Related To Their Academic Self-Concept, Miranda R. Snyder

Honors College

Research has found that youth involvement in activism can benefit sense of self and belief in one’s abilities to make positive change for those involved through unique communication with people who are passionate about the same issue, a sense of personal empowerment, and a deepened sociopolitical consciousness to understand the complexities of social-justice issues.

This qualitative study provided greater understanding of how youth perceive their involvement in a feminist organization related to their academic self-concept in middle- high school. Six alumnae of the Girls Advisory Board (G.A.B.) of Hardy Girls Healthy Women, a Maine-based nonprofit that focuses on the empowerment …

Struggling Student Teachers: Interventions For Support And Success, Sheree Moser

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

Teacher shortages in K-12 schools have created unique challenges for teacher preparation programs. University instructors face the task requirements of supporting candidates from a wide variety of backgrounds at the undergraduate and graduate level. While some of these candidates enter higher education programs skilled, eager, and committed, others are less prepared, requiring significant attention to make it through the program. Exams required by state departments of education and minimum grade point averages influence each candidate’s ability to move forward within the program, causing some students to experience additional struggles related to mental health and financial burdens.

The problem of practice …

Arts Education: Benefits, Disparities, And Reaching For Equal Access, Madelaine Shreeman

Senior Honors Theses

Arts education is a unique way to engage students. The arts include, but are not limited to, music, theatre, visual/studio arts, poetry, and dance; they are powerful bridges for students to knowledge and classroom contribution. They assist students with lower academic achievement, problematic behavior, or those who have a likelihood of dropping out of school. While there are plenty of resources displaying the student benefits, there remain inequalities in access to arts education among students across America. Often, areas and schools that generally receive fewer opportunities or less arts funding are ones with more at-risk youth. Disproportionate arts access negatively …

Advanced Placement Course-Taking And Act Test Outcomes In Arkansas, Sarah Mckenzie, Josh B. Mcgee, Charlene A. Reid, Jessica S. Goldstein

Policy Briefs

Since 2008, Arkansas has sought to dramatically increase the number of students participating in Advanced Placement (AP) classes. This program, which allows students to access college -level content while still enrolled in high school, has been linked to higher student achievement and attainment. This brief shares recent research from the Office for Education Policy investigating whether students who take AP courses demonstrate better college readiness and examines how these trends vary for different demographic and socioeconomic groups in the state.

Advanced Placement Course-Taking And Act Testing Outcomes In Arkansas, Jessica S. Goldstein, Sarah C. Mckenzie

Arkansas Education Reports

This report examines trends in Advanced Placement (AP) course-taking in Arkansas. The AP program allows students to access college-level content while still enrolled in high school. Using de-identified student-level data from 2015-16 to 2017-18 from the Arkansas Department of Education, this research investigates whether students who take AP courses demonstrate better college readiness and examines how these trends vary for different demographic and socioeconomic groups throughout the state. While we cannot estimate the causal effect of AP coursework on student outcomes, this study presents key findings related to the Advanced Placement program which are relevant to policymakers and educators in …

2019 Pulaski County Education Report Card, Sarah Mckenzie

Education Report Card

Our goal is to help parents, school personnel, community members, and policy makers understand how effectively the students in their community are being served.

Pulaski students are demonstrating similar growth in achievement on the ACT Aspire as students in the state overall, but in achievement, graduation rates, and School Quality and Student Success, Pulaski County schools are performing below the state average.

This report card presents information about these key performance indicators for the districts in Pulaski counties. The Growth, Achievement, School Quality, and Overall scores of the four traditional districts are compared to the average for that group, and …

Perspective—Not Objective: The Role Of The Media In U.S. Electoral Politics, Jamie Watson

Debate Essay Winners

1st Place Winner - High School Division

Jamie Watson

Hume-Fogg Academic Magnet High School

Untitled, Dean C. Abernathy

Debate Essay Winners

1st Place Winner - Middle School Division

Dean "Trane" Abernathy

Rose Park Middle School

Method Of Joints: Theory And Practice Of Designing, Building, And Testing Trusses, Andrew J. Hughes, Chris Merrill

Educational Leadership & Technology Faculty Publications

The authors of this article, like many of us, are proponents of engineering education but are also proponents of shop skills, craftsmanship, technological literacy, and the tacit knowledge and skills developed through applying sound theories during practical hands-on learning. The authors believe that engineering is an important aspect of our discipline, but so are the application of thinking, tool skills, measurement, geometric construction, manufacturing, instrumentation, testing and analysis, mathematical and scientific theories, and many other hands-on, minds-on skillsets that all need to maintain association with our discipline. As the authors are proponents for engineering education that is done well, they …

Truly, Madly, Deeply: Adverbs And Ells, Kristin Lems

Faculty Publications

In this issue’s column focusing on adverbs and English language learners, columnist Kristin Lems explores some of the basic but not-so-obvious features about adverbs that readers and writers need to learn in order to take advantage of these powerful levers of language. The odds are very good that your native English speakers will also benefit from this information—and you might learn a thing or two as well.

Esc 433 / 533: Teaching World History In Middle And High School, Sherry L. Deckman

Open Educational Resources

This course is designed to introduce students to the methods of teaching world history to urban middle and high school students. This course will help prepare candidates to become effective social studies educators capable of teaching students the content knowledge, the intellectual skills, and the civic values necessary for fulfilling the responsibilities of citizenship in a participatory democracy. Special attention is given to effective teaching strategies and to addressing the individual and cultural diversity of all learners. We will examine methods for teaching world history and developing curriculum in an urban classroom.

This syllabus was designed to be zero-cost for …

An Investigation Of How Environmental Science Textbooks Link Human Environmental Impact To Ecology And Daily Life, Yael Wyner, Rob Desalle

Publications and Research

Making direct connections between humanity and the environment is of ever-increasing importance in the context of today’s environmental crisis. We used qualitative content analysis of precollege- and college-level introductory environmental science textbook case studies to study how they portray humanity’s link to the environment. We assessed case studies for how specific and data rich they are and for how they link together daily life, human impact, and ecological interactions. We found that, for many textbooks, case study stories were vaguely drawn and included few data. We also found that, for all textbooks, case studies almost always described human impacts without …

Cultivating Intrinsic Motivation In The Family And Consumer Science Classroom, Jordan Meland

Master's Theses & Capstone Projects

The purpose of this action research project was to examine the effects of intrinsic motivation strategies in the Family and Consumer Science classroom. Data was collected that examined pretest and posttest results of high school students in grades 9-12. The data gathered determined that there was a positive effect of the implemented intrinsic motivation strategies on the learners in General Foods, but it is unclear which strategy is more efficient than the others. Research shows that students struggle to stay motivated in middle school and high school. Creating opportunities for students to build intrinsic motivation may increase quality of work. …

Pisa 2018: Reporting Australia’S Results. Volume Ii Student And School Characteristics, Sue Thomson, Lisa De Bortoli, Catherine Underwood, Marina Schmid

OECD Programme for International Student Assessment (PISA) Australia

The Programme for International Student Assessment (PISA) is an international study that measures the knowledge and skills of 15-year-old students and how prepared they are to use these to meet real-life opportunities and challenges. Volume II is an examination of Australia’s PISA results in relation to student and school background characteristics, and how these are related to student performance. Each chapter focuses on different indicators that cover the school community, the school learning environment, students’ attitudes and beliefs, and the role teachers play in shaping students’ learning. Together, the different indicators of student and school life provide an illustration of …

Solving Concurrent And Nonconcurrent Coplanar Force Systems: Balancing Theory And Practice In The Technology And Engineering Education Classroom, Andrew J. Hughes, Chris Merrill

Educational Leadership & Technology Faculty Publications

The basic concepts inherent to statics, including unbalanced and balanced forces and instability and stability of physical systems, have traditionally been covered in middle and high school physical science courses (Physical Science as indicated in Next Generation Science Standards). Yet, these concepts are covered using a physical science approach that has minor but significant differences in terminology, structure, and focus when compared with an engineering approach. Since a robust understanding of statics is considered an essential component for most engineering disciplines, Technology and Engineering Education’s (T&EE) implementation of statics with an engineering approach could promote students’ ability to transfer learning …

Earning And Learning Research Project: Report To The Department For Education, South Australia, Julie Mcmillan, Shani Sniedze, Rachel Felgate, Petra Lietz

Transition and Post-School Education and Training

The aim of the Earning and Learning Research Partnership was to explore the reasons why a substantial proportion of successive cohorts of students in South Australia had not completed the South Australian Certificate of Education (SACE) or were identified as potential non-completers. The project officially commenced in September 2019 and was completed in August 2020.The research particularly aimed to capture the student voice behind young people’s earning and learning pathway choices, specifically identifying: why students in Years 10, 11, or 12 leave school without a documented “valid” reason (leavers); and why some Year 12 students remain enrolled in high school …

“But Aren’T We Extinct?”: Inhabited Reform And Instructional Visibility In An Open Space School Forty Years Later, Jeremy T. Murphy

Education Department Faculty Scholarship

The 1960s open space school removed partitions between classrooms in part to alleviate teacher isolation. The model was long ago deemed a failure. Years later, teachers in surviving open space facilities continue to navigate the reform. Despite wide dismissal of the model, components of teachers’ work that open space schools sought to normalize (collaboration, informality, proximity) are increasingly valued for improving teachers’ professional communities. In addition “open” designs are resurfacing in new school models. Picking up where earlier scholars left off, this article elevates perspectives of teachers working in a surviving open space school today using a conceptual framework of …

Usu Stars! Gear Up: Fall 2018 To Spring 2019, Erik Dickamore, Amanda M. Hagman, Doug Reiter, Jim Dorward, Mitchell Colver

Publications

Gaining Early Awareness and Readiness for Undergraduate Programs (GEAR UP) is a federally funded program designed to prepared secondary students for college. USU has received several of these competitive grants to work with middle and high school students throughout Utah. This analysis explores how GEAR Up students utilized services. Use patterns were regressed on college enrollment. METHODS: Latent profile analysis (LPA) is a powerful tool for uncovering common response patterns across multiple continuous variables. Following the LPA, the common response patterns were regressed on post-secondary enrollment. FINDINGS: The latent profile analysis exposed 4 well-defined use patterns across the GEAR UP …

Improving Secondary Teaching In Indonesia Through Whole Brain Teaching, Fnu Arisandy

English Language Institute

Whole Brain Teaching is one of the ways to improve the quality of teaching secondary students in Indonesia. The research was done for the simple present tense topic through quasi experimental design and indicated a satisfactory improvement in students’ interest and understanding.

2019 Northwest Arkansas Education Report Card, Sarah C. Mckenzie

Education Report Card

Northwest Arkansas students are demonstrating greater growth in achievement and earning higher scores on the ACT Aspire than are the students in the state overall. Schools in NWA also have higher School Quality and Student Success scores, higher graduation rates, and are more likely to receive an “A” or “B” rating than are other schools across the state. . . This report card presents information about these key performance indicators for the districts in Benton and Washington counties. The Growth, Achievement, School Quality, and Overall scores of each 15 traditional districts are compared to the average scores of the regional …

Partners, Not Adversaries: Higher Education And Diverse Schools, Edmund T. Hamann

Department of Teaching, Learning, and Teacher Education: Faculty Publications

Often education researchers enter schools only to depict inequity and weak practice, but the same empirical skills that illuminate challenges can, under a different premise, illuminate excellence. This chapter describes how graduate students enrolled in an “Effecting High School Improvement” course helped a diverse public high school document its excellence and win National Education Policy Center (NEPC) recognition as a 'School of Opportunity'. Although this case is unique in specific detail, other school/higher education partnerships could clearly function like this one did. Good schools may not have staff to document their multifaceted responsiveness to diverse enrollments, but, with university assistance, …

The Effects Of Social-Emotional Learning At The Secondary Level, Karmen Keltner

Master's Theses & Capstone Projects

This literature review aims to examine social-emotional learning in schools, and more specifically, at the secondary level. The review explains the importance of SEL at the secondary level and its continuation from preschool through high school. Evidence-based secondary SEL programs are presented, and research, including several meta-analyses, are shared that outline the benefits and disadvantages of social-emotional learning programs. Mandated SEL standards at the federal and state levels are covered, as well as policies and laws that enforce and support SEL. An analysis of the published literature on SEL programs at the secondary level suggests they lead to improved academics, …

National Summer Transportation Institute: Increasing Career Awareness In Civil Engineering For Underserved High School Students, Melanie L. Villatoro, Janet Liou-Mark

Publications and Research

Our nation needs to increase the number of students pursuing degrees in the fields of Science, Technology, Engineering, and Mathematics (STEM) and those leading to transportation-related careers. In order to meet the demand for qualified graduates in transportation, it is necessary to diversify the pool of students entering college with an interest in these fields. The National Summer Transportation Institute (NSTI) is an educational initiative developed by the Federal Highway Administration (FHWA) and Department of Transportation (DOT). The NSTI at City Tech was designed to increase awareness of transportation-related careers among New York City high school students. The structure of …

Resourcesmart Schools And Wellbeing. Main Study, Katherine Dix, Toby Carslake, Syeda Kashfee Ahmed, Shani Sniedze

Wellbeing

This report presents the findings of a study into the wellbeing impacts of the ResourceSmart Schools (RSS) program in Victoria, Australia. The findings are based on a literature review and a state-wide survey of program schools to inform the development of the ResourceSmart Schools wellbeing evaluation framework, as a first step in the ongoing monitoring of the program’s wellbeing impacts in RSS schools.

Teachers' Instructional Decisions And Student Agency In New Purposefully Designed Learning Spaces, Yanira Oliveras Ortiz, Dalane Bouillion, Lizzy Asbury

Education Faculty Publications and Presentations

Learning that promotes student agency and active, cognitive student engagement has a positive impact on students’ self-efficacy, learning, and achievement. When designing lessons that foster student agency and active engagement, educators must consider multiple variables, including the space where learning will take place. In order to understand how students perceive the impact of spaces in learning and how designed areas are being used by teachers, a qualitative study was conducted at a newly designed energy industry-focused high school. This manuscript presents the students' perspectives related to student agency, the value of learning, students' role in their learning, and how cognitively …

Advocating For Culturally Responsive Practices In The Ib Diploma Programme: Tapping In The Potential Of Acid Tests To Foster Coherence Between The Ib Principles And Teaching Practices, Timizay Ruiz Pineda

Critical and Creative Thinking Capstones Collection

International education programs, like the one proposed by the IB Organization, offer students across the world education for global, internationally-minded citizens. Nonetheless, the definition and often, the use of these terms are vague and, for the most part, refers to education and practices of Western countries that are Eurocentric in nature. It is necessary to develop coherence between the principles expressed in many international education frameworks and the reality of their practices. For this, it is fundamental that explicit guidance on culturally responsive teaching practices is acknowledged and provided by organizations like the IB. This paper provides theoretical support explaining …

Faith And Experience In Education: Essays From Quaker Perspectives (Book Review), Linda Samek

Faculty Publications - College of Education

"In Faith and Experience in Education: Essays from Quaker Perspectives, we find essays emerging from conversations conducted by the Quaker Values in Education Group in Britain."