Education Commons^™

Following The "Iron Lady" And Finding A University: A Phenomenological Study Of Organizational Identity, Erin Pearson

College of Education and Human Sciences: Dissertations, Theses, and Student Research

Higher education culture is steeped in institutional identity and ties to history. But what happens when that history is challenged, and an institution must change its name? While a merger was not initially intended for Kearney State College, merging into the University of Nebraska system was the only way to reflect the change and growth that emulated the type of institution it had become. By interviewing sixteen participants that lived the experience of the merge, a concise and collective history of the events that led to the creation of the University of Nebraska at Kearney was obtained and studied. Through …

Examining Admission Policy Change At A Private, Tuition-Dependent, Baccalaureate Institution In An Urban Setting: A Qualitative Case Study, Christopher B. Gage

College of Education and Human Sciences: Dissertations, Theses, and Student Research

Higher education in America is resilient; in the face of seemingly insurmountable challenges, higher education manages to weather the storm of change, pressure, doubt, and criticism. Consider the following challenges: shifting demographics, escalating tuition, decreased state funding, retention and graduation rates, flat tuition revenue, competition for students, student preparedness, and student loan debt. Enrollment managers navigate these formidable impediments through innovative policy change, leadership and faithfulness to institutional mission (Eckel & Kezar, 2003b; Hector, 2016). Test-optional admission policies are changing the landscape of the enrollment management profession. Critics say some institutions adopt test-optional admissions to improve their national rankings by …

The Impact Of Academic Advising On The Retention Of First-Year Students In A Gulf-Arab University, Selma Hagahmed

College of Education and Human Sciences: Dissertations, Theses, and Student Research

This study investigated academic advising and retention in a Gulf-Arab university. Quantitative and qualitative data were gathered in order to understand how academic advising could have potentially contributed to the improvement of student retention. The focus of the study was on first-year students in the College of Business and Economics and the College of Law in a Gulf-Arab national four-year institution. The study compared the Grade Point Average (GPA) and the number of credit hours in two groups of first-year students: 1) a treatment group of students who utilized academic advising services and (2) the control group of students who …

Structures And Relationships Between The Business Executive And Information Technology Executive At The University: A Mixed Methods Study, Angela K. Hollman

College of Education and Human Sciences: Dissertations, Theses, and Student Research

This study uses an explanatory mixed methods methodology to attempt to determine the reporting relationships between business and IT executives within the university. The study also explores IT and business executives thoughts on these relationships. Supporting research from organizational studies and business-IT alignmfent is combined in order to enhance the study. In the first quantitative phase, an exploratory factor analysis is used to determine organizational dimension factors while simple response and frequency analysis are used to model the top occurring organizational structures between IT and business executives. The second qualitative phase used semi-structured interviews with 12 random CIOs and CFOs …

Does Being Rural Matter?: The Roles Of Rurality, Social Support, And Social Self-Efficacy In First-Year College Student Adjustment, Allison L. Bitz Phd

College of Education and Human Sciences: Dissertations, Theses, and Student Research

One out of every three first-year college students will not return for a second year of college (Postsecondary Education Opportunity, 2010). Due to a variety of factors, minority students are at an even higher risk of dropping out of college. Rural youth, comprising approximately 22% of the nation’s total youth, form a significant minority population; yet the rural student experience in college has not yet been widely considered in research. The purpose of this quantitative study was to explore college adjustment and its predictors among first-year students, with an emphasis on the role of rurality in college adjustment. Social self-efficacy, …

An Investigation Of The Potential Use Of Advanced Placement Examination Scores In The College Admission Of Transfer Students, Andrew Callahan Dwyer

College of Education and Human Sciences: Dissertations, Theses, and Student Research

Faced with making college admission decisions on an increasingly large number of applicants, many higher education institutions have begun to consider using additional information to assist with those decisions. Unlike college admissions practices for the population of first-time freshmen, however, admission practices for the population of transfer students have been largely ignored in the literature. There is evidence that the transfer student population is growing and will likely continue to grow for the foreseeable future, which emphasizes the need for colleges and universities to find additional suitable information to use in transfer student admission. Using data from the University of …

A Correlational Study On Parental Attachment And Moral Judgment Competence Of Millennial Generation College Students, Deidra Graves Stephens

College of Education and Human Sciences: Dissertations, Theses, and Student Research

Theorists and observers have speculated that Millennial Generation college students may progress through cognitive-structural models differently than previous generations. These models, such as Lawrence Kohlberg’s theory of moral development, require individuals to shift from accepting authoritarian views to making their own meaning of the world. Millennials are deferential to the role of parents in their lives, accepting authority, convention, and structure, and acquiescing to rules, order, and expectations. On the other hand, some have predicted that Millennials’ unique view of the world and their place within it may generate more advanced levels of cognitive development than previous generations.

This quantitative …

A Correlational Study On Parental Attachment And Spiritual Development Of College Students, Mary-Ellen Madigan

College of Education and Human Sciences: Dissertations, Theses, and Student Research

During college, students search for meaning in their lives and question their beliefs, behavior, and mortality (Garber, 1996). One way that students search for meaning is through their spiritual lives. Spirituality is “the personal quest for understanding of ultimate questions about life, about meaning, and about relationship to the sacred or transcendent” (Koenig, McCullough & Larson, 2001, p. 18). Parental attachment theory explains that students who have developed a secure attachment with their parents see their parents as a secure base from which to explore their environment (Kenny & Donaldson, 1991, p. 480). This environment may be internal or external. …