Education Commons^™

Interpreting Average Effect Sizes: Never A Center Without A Spread, Thomas R. Guskey

Educational, School, and Counseling Psychology Faculty Publications

School leaders today are making important decisions regarding education innovations based on published average effect sizes, even though few understand exactly how effect sizes are calculated or what they mean. This article explains how average effect sizes are determined in meta-analyses and the importance of including measures of variability with any average effect size. By considering the variation in effect sizes among studies of the same innovation, education leaders can make better decisions about innovations and greatly increase the likelihood of achieving optimal results from implementation.

General Education Learning Outcomes And Demographic Correlates In University Students In Hong Kong, Lu Yu, Daniel T. L. Shek, Xiaoqin Zhu

Pediatrics Faculty Publications

Although there are studies showing that higher education would benefit university students, empirical research that comprehensively assesses student general education learning outcomes and related demographic correlates based on longitudinal data is minimal, especially in the Chinese context. To address the research gaps, the present study was conducted to investigate learning outcomes amongst university students in one university in Hong Kong based on a four-year longitudinal design (N = 460). Four dimensions of student general education learning outcomes were measured, including effective reasoning and problem solving, leadership, moral character, and integration of learning. Results suggested a U-shaped pattern of student …

Grades Versus Comments: Research On Student Feedback, Thomas R. Guskey

Educational, School, and Counseling Psychology Faculty Publications

Are comments on student work superior to grades? It depends.

How Traditional Grading Contribute To Student Inequities And How To Fix It, Laura J. Link, Thomas R. Guskey

Educational, School, and Counseling Psychology Faculty Publications

Grades have long been identified by those in the measurement community as prime examples of unreliable measurement (Brookhart, 1994; Stiggins, Frisbie, & Griswold, 1989). What one teacher considers in calculating students’ grades may differ greatly from another teacher (Guskey & Link, 2019; McMillan, 2001; McMillan, Myran, & Workman, 2002). A major factor contributing to the unreliability of grades is teachers’ inclusion of aspects of students’ behavior in the grades they assign. Despite the recommendation of experts to separate behavior from academic achievement in formulating students’ grades, teachers at all grade levels typically include student behavior as a contributing factor in …

Choice Without Inclusion?: Comparing The Intensity Of Racial Segregation In Charters And Public Schools At The Local, State And National Levels, Julian Vasquez Heilig, T. Jameson Brewer, Yohuru Williams

Educational Policy Studies and Evaluation Faculty Publications

We conduct descriptive and inferential analyses of publicly available Common Core of Data (CCD) to examine segregation at the local, state, and national levels. Nationally, we find that higher percentages of charter students of every race attend intensely segregated schools. The highest levels of racial isolation are at the primary level for public and middle level for charters. We find that double segregation by race and class is higher in charter schools. Charters are more likely to be segregated, even when controlling for local ethnoracial demographics. A majority of states have at least half of Blacks and a third of …

Kentucky School Districts As Educational Bright Spots, Michael T. Childress

CBER Research Report

Every year a select group of Kentucky school districts perform better than expected on measures of educational achievement. These measures include things like the percentage of elementary students who achieve proficiency or distinguished in reading, or the proportion of less‐advantaged middle school students who show a similar level of competency on the math assessment.

There are wide differences in the learning environments, finances, and student outcomes among and within Kentucky’s 173 school districts. This is not surprising given that the largest school district in the state, Jefferson County, has 97,000 students and 165 schools, while the smallest, West Point Independent …

Main And Regional Campus Assessments Of Applicants To A Rural Physician Leadership Program: A Generalizability Analysis, Terry D. Stratton, Clarence Kreiter, Carol L. Elam

Behavioral Science Faculty Publications

While the selection of qualified applicants often relies, in part, on scores generated from a medical school pre-admission interview (MSPI), the growth of regional medical campuses (RMCs) – many with specialized rural tracks, programs, or missions – has challenged schools to accommodate a wider range of stakeholder input. This study examines the reliabilities of main (urban) and regional (rural) campus interviewers’ assessments of applicants to a Rural Physician Leadership Program (RPLP) located in the southeastern United States.

Data from RPLP applicants completing MSPIs on two campuses from 2009-2017 (n = 232) were examined in a generalizability analysis. In two separate …

Developing Numeracy And Problem-Solving Skills By Overcoming Learning Bottlenecks, Anita Lee-Post

Marketing & Supply Chain Faculty Publications

Purpose The purpose of this paper is to present an educational approach to elevating problem-solving and numeracy competencies of business undergraduates to meet workplace demand. The approach is grounded in the theory of constraints following the Decoding the Discipline model. The authors investigated a cognitive bottleneck involving problem modeling and an affective bottleneck concerning low self-efficacy of numeracy and designed specific interventions to address both bottlenecks simultaneously. The authors implemented the proposed approach in an introductory level analytics course in business operations.

Design/methodology/approachThe authors use an empirical study to evaluate the effectiveness of the proposed approach in addressing deficiency in …

A Multi-Institutional Analysis Of Instructional Beliefs And Practices In Gateway Courses To The Sciences, Joseph J. Ferrare

Educational Policy Studies and Evaluation Faculty Publications

This paper builds on previous studies of instructional practice in science, technology, engineering, and mathematics courses by reporting findings from a study of the relationship between instructors’ beliefs about teaching and learning and their observed classroom practices. Data collection took place across six institutions of higher education and included in-depth interviews with 71 instructors and more than 140 hours of classroom observations using the Teaching Dimensions Observation Protocol. Thematic coding of interviews identified 31 distinct beliefs that instructors held about the ways students best learn introductory concepts and skills in these courses. Cluster analysis of the observation data suggested that …

Opportunities For Self-Evaluation Increase Student Calibration In An Introductory Biology Course, Jennifer L. Osterhage, Ellen Usher, Trisha A. Douin, William M. Bailey

Biology Faculty Publications

Accurate self-evaluation is critical for learning. Calibration describes the relationship between learners’ perception of their performance and their actual performance on a task. Here, we describe two studies aimed at assessing and improving student calibration in a first-semester introductory biology course at a 4-year public institution. Study 1 investigated students’ (n = 310) calibration (the difference between estimated and actual exam performance) across one semester. Students were significantly miscalibrated for the first exam: their predicted scores were, on average, significantly higher than their actual scores. The lowest-performing students had the most inaccurate estimates. Calibration improved with each exam. By …

Evaluation Of The Project P.A.T.H.S. In Mainland China: Findings Based On Student Diaries, Daniel T. L. Shek, Xiaoqin Zhu, Janet T. Y. Leung, Tak Yan Lee, Florence K. Y. Wu

Pediatrics Faculty Publications

Objectives: Based on 859 student diaries, the present study evaluated a positive youth development program entitled “Tin Ka Ping (TKP) Positive Adolescent Training through Holistic Social programs (P.A.T.H.S.) ” project implemented in mainland China during the 2015–2016 academic year. Method: To understand the perceived effectiveness of the students, the study analyzed quantitative as well as qualitative data derived from the student diaries. Results: The students held very positive views toward the program and the implementers. The narratives of the students also showed that they perceived improvement in the intrapersonal, interpersonal, familial, and societal domains after joining the program. Conclusion: In …

Integrative Approaches To The Undergraduate Public Health Major Curriculum: Strengths, Challenges, And Examples, Marc T. Kiviniemi, Sarahmona M. Przybyla

Health, Behavior & Society Faculty Publications

Many “first generation” undergraduate public health degree programs were designed based on “siloed” course structures centered around subunits in the discipline (e.g., Introduction to Epidemiology, Introduction to Environmental Health) that may be meaningful primarily to experts in the field. An alternative to the siloed approach is an integrative curricular design, in which courses are designed around meaningful thematic units (e.g., explaining public health problems, asking and answering scientific questions in public health), with an emphasis on drawing connections between knowledge from different but complementary disciplinary areas as a means to improve student learning and retention. The integrative approach shifts the …

Design And Investigation Of Cooperative, Scaffolded Wiki Learning Activities In An Online Graduate-Level Course, Kun Huang

Curriculum and Instruction Faculty Publications

Informed by the literature on community of inquiry, wikis in education, and scaffolding in technology-supported learning environments, this study reports the design, implementation, and investigation of wiki-supported cooperative learning activities in an online graduate-level theories class. The investigation of emerging research questions revealed students’ participation patterns in the wiki learning activities, the relationship between their participation and course performance, and the students’ experiences with the scaffolding strategies designed to support their cooperative activities. The study offers implications for designing and scaffolding wiki-based cooperative learning.

Development And Validation Of The Awareness Of Privilege And Oppression Scale-2, Michael James Mcclellan, Lori Patricia Montross-Thomas, Pamela Remer, Yoshie Nakai, Addison D. Monroe

Educational, School, and Counseling Psychology Faculty Publications

The two studies presented describe the revision process that led to the development of the Awareness of Privilege and Oppression Scale–2 (APOS-2) and efforts to evaluate the new measure’s reliability and construct validity. In Study 1, a 26-item measure was developed from data gathered from a sample of 484 undergraduate students. An exploratory factor analysis suggested a four-factor solution made up of awareness of racism, sexism, heterosexism, and classism was appropriate. In Study 2, confirmatory factor analysis suggested the proposed hierarchical four-factor solution was the best available fit of the data using a second sample of 520 undergraduate students. The …

The Forgotten Element Of Instructional Leadership: Grading, Thomas R. Guskey, Laura J. Link

Educational, School, and Counseling Psychology Faculty Publications

Getting the school team coordinated on grading and reporting policies—and the purpose of grading—is too often overlooked in instructional leadership.

Why Ask Why?, Beth Kraemer, Beth Fuchs, Jennifer Hootman, Debbie Sharp

Greater Faculties: A Review of Teaching and Learning

No abstract provided.

The Future Of The History Of Design, Patrick Lucas, Helen Turner, Trey Conatser

Greater Faculties: A Review of Teaching and Learning

No abstract provided.

Teaching Stem For The Public Good, Rita Basuray

Greater Faculties: A Review of Teaching and Learning

No abstract provided.

The Limits Of Pedagogy, Kelsey Moore

Greater Faculties: A Review of Teaching and Learning

No abstract provided.

On Rapport: Connecting With Students, Brandi Frisby

Greater Faculties: A Review of Teaching and Learning

No abstract provided.

Ten First Years, Jennifer Osterhage

Greater Faculties: A Review of Teaching and Learning

No abstract provided.

Front Matter

Greater Faculties: A Review of Teaching and Learning

No abstract provided.

Open Educational Resources And Research Data Management: A Very Brief Overview, Adrian K. Ho

Library Presentations

This is a brief overview of open educational resources and research data management. It also addresses the increasing importance of these services in academic and research libraries.

Sketch-Plan Book: A Teacher’S Planning Resource For The Secondary Classroom, Katherine M. Avra

Theses and Dissertations--Art and Visual Studies

Teacher planning is a necessary process by which educators establish, facilitate, monitor, and evaluate lessons and learning within their classroom. For art educators, sketchbooks have been a foundational pillar in art curricula. The sketchbook has a lengthy legacy of yielding common, structured assignments. However, recent considerations have reframed sketchbook practices. Contemporary analysis has produced a pedagogical shift in approaches to sketchbooks and planning for sketchbook inclusion in the classroom. The sketch-plan book offers art teachers a streamlined resource to collect and maintain lesson ideas and inclusions, track on-going lessons, and plan for future teaching and learning. The purpose of this …

Student Help-Seeking Behaviors And Teacher Instructional Practices: Examining Their Relationship With U.S. Student Mathematics Achievement, Michael C. Osborne

Theses and Dissertations--Curriculum and Instruction

Even though the United States (U.S.) spends, on average, more money per student than most Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD) countries, it continues to lag behind its international peers in mathematics achievement. This study, which responded to the call for educational reforms that improve the mathematics achievement of U.S. students, aimed to examine the issue of student help-seeking behaviors and teacher instructional practices as they interact to affect student mathematics achievement. The Programme for International Student Assessment (PISA) defines student help-seeking behaviors as the ways in which students have a propensity to depend on the knowledge and intellect …

Typical Peers’ Perceived Self-Efficacy Towards Including Students With Autism Spectrum Disorder, Elizabeth A. Caldwell

Theses and Dissertations--Educational, School, and Counseling Psychology

One in 59 children is identified as having an Autism spectrum disorder (ASD). The Individuals with Disabilities Education Act (IDEA) mandates that students with disabilities be educated in the general education setting with typical peers to the maximum extent possible. This practice of inclusion has led to increased social-isolation and peer rejection among students with ASD. Research suggests inclusion alone without implementing peer intervention training is ineffective in fostering positive interactions between students with ASD and their typical peers. Therefore, the purpose of this study is to contribute to the literature by evaluating a peer educational intervention designed to promote …

Studying The Graduate Record Examinations' Ability To Predict Student Success As Measured By Graduate Grade Point Averages, Brenton A. Floyd

MPA/MPP/MPFM Capstone Projects

The Graduate Record Examination (GRE) is the most widely used graduate level admission test in the world, yet conflicts exist across the findings of many studies of the ability of the GRE to predict the success test takers will have as graduate students or in professional life. Additionally, most of the studies that exist on the GRE’s ability to predict graduate student success use data from a previous version of the GRE that may not be applicable to the current version, thus rendering their use for policy making among makers of admission decisions limited and flawed. These studies also tend …

An Exploratory Comparison Of Kentucky Public School Districts That Primarily Select The “Compensating Rate”, Andrew J. Wells

MPA/MPP/MPFM Capstone Projects

Public school districts in the Commonwealth of Kentucky are primarily funded from federal, state, and local sources. While the proportion of each of these funding sources differs from district to district, the local property tax is one source that is within the control of locally-elected officials: the members of the local Board of Education. While some Boards of Education choose to increase local tax rates to increase local revenue, others do not. This research suggests that property value assessments and median incomes of districts that choose not to increase tax rates are similar. A majority of the counties studied are …

Advising Experiences Among First-Year International Doctoral Students, Nina Marijanović, Jungmin Lee

Educational Policy Studies and Evaluation Faculty Publications

The purpose of this qualitative study was to understand how international graduate students in their first-year of doctoral study selected their faculty advisor and how this selection process influenced their advising relationship. Our results found that a majority of students in our sample were assigned to an interim advisor and most reported a positive advising experience. However, disquieting patterns emerged from the data: low frequency of advisor-advisee interaction, occurrences of mismatching between advisor-advisee, and an unknowingness of how to engage with one’s faculty advisor. Our study adds to the literature focusing on international students by shedding a light on nuanced …

Cat In The Classroom: Understanding Instructor Behavior And Student Perceptions Through Communication Accommodation Theory, Terrell Kody Frey

Theses and Dissertations--Communication

Adjusting one’s communication is a fundamental requirement for human interaction (Gasiorek, 2016a). Individuals adapt communication behavior according to the circumstances surrounding the situation, resulting in different patterns and forms of speech relative to spouses, family members, coworkers, or friends. Yet, researchers in instructional communication have not yet substantially applied adjustment as a theoretical lens for understanding instructor-student classroom interactions (Gasiorek & Giles, 2012; Soliz & Giles, 2014; Soliz & Bergquist, 2016). Apart from overlooking this useful theoretical approach, instructional communication scholarship can also be improved by accounting for 1) shifting group identities in higher education that change how instructors and …