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Full-Text Articles in Higher Education

Best Practices For Edd Comprehensive Exams And Capstone Projects: Students' Attitudes And Perspectives Of Outcomes In An Online Program, Masha Krsmanovic, Holly A. Foster Aug 2023

Best Practices For Edd Comprehensive Exams And Capstone Projects: Students' Attitudes And Perspectives Of Outcomes In An Online Program, Masha Krsmanovic, Holly A. Foster

Faculty Publications

This research was guided by a problem of practice experienced by an EdD program, which transitioned to a fully online modality during the pandemic and rapidly grew in enrollment. The problem evaluated was ensuring the redesigned program milestones – capstone and comprehensive exam – are feasible given the size of the program. The current study utilized descriptive research design to provide a comprehensive description of educational phenomena. The study was conducted at a large, public research university in the South. A total of 316 students enrolled in the program and were invited to complete the survey, of which 131 responses …


Review-From Educational Experiment To Standard Bearer: University 101 At The University Of South Carolina, Blake Denton Jul 2023

Review-From Educational Experiment To Standard Bearer: University 101 At The University Of South Carolina, Blake Denton

Faculty Publications

In 2022, the University of South Carolina observed the fiftieth anniversary of its innovative “University 101” experiment and the course’s legacy as the leading model of the “first-year experience” movement in higher education. Simply stated, University 101 is an extended orientation seminar designed to facilitate new students’ transition to college and campus life at the flagship. In this commemorative edited volume, eleven contributors affiliated with South Carolina collectively document the history, evolution, and impact of the institution’s renowned University 101 Programs (now a multifaceted enterprise that oversees and fosters every aspect of the campus’s first-year experience) on generations of the …


Empowerment Agents: How Student Affairs Professionals Facilitate The Persistence Of Undocumented Students, Tiffany Paige May 2023

Empowerment Agents: How Student Affairs Professionals Facilitate The Persistence Of Undocumented Students, Tiffany Paige

Dissertations

This qualitative study investigated how student affairs professionals (SAPs) assist undocumented students in their designated institutional roles, and how their support empowers undocumented students to persist. This research sought to document and assess how student affairs professionals—who interact with undocumented students— identify and respond to the issues they face in their work. Built on the theoretical frame of social capital, and using a thematic analysis design set forth by Braun and Clarke (2012), the researcher interviewed seven SAPs and used a phenomenological approach to design the study and to collect and analyze the data.

Two findings and five corresponding themes …


Troubled Past, Golden Opportunity: Public Memory And Memorialization At The University Of Southern Mississippi, Hannah E. Arnold May 2023

Troubled Past, Golden Opportunity: Public Memory And Memorialization At The University Of Southern Mississippi, Hannah E. Arnold

Honors Theses

This thesis argues that The University of Southern Mississippi (USM) consciously chooses to present historical narratives in its history in ways that best enhance the university’s image. Examining the narratives of M.M. Roberts and Oseola McCarty using the theoretical frameworks of public memory and collective memory study reveals that the way they are memorialized within university history include both conscious and subconscious silences that impact how they are remembered by the public. This thesis identifies gaps within these two historical narratives and shows how these gaps were influenced by factors designed to enhance the university’s public image. Overall, the public …


The Effectiveness Of The University Of Southern Mississippi's Marketing And Branding Efforts Among Prospective Students, Amy Clevenger Apr 2023

The Effectiveness Of The University Of Southern Mississippi's Marketing And Branding Efforts Among Prospective Students, Amy Clevenger

Honors Theses

With enrollment rates expected to surge over the next decade, the competition

between institutions of higher learning will also increase. Because of this, marketing

material produced by all institutions will need to adjust to become more effective at

establishing brand identity to attract the attention of prospective students. Using Aaker’s

brand identity model as a framework to understand branding methods, this research aims

to identify marketing communication strategies that are more effective in a prospective

student’s decision-making process. The thesis also investigates prospective students’

recall and perception of marketing material produced by USM to determine its overall

effectiveness and differences …


Differentiating The Edd And The Phd In Higher Education: A Survey Of Characteristics And Trends, Holly A. Foster, Steven Chesnut, James Thomas, Courtney Robinson Feb 2023

Differentiating The Edd And The Phd In Higher Education: A Survey Of Characteristics And Trends, Holly A. Foster, Steven Chesnut, James Thomas, Courtney Robinson

Faculty Publications

Purpose: Higher education, as a field of study, is one of the few programmatic areas that offer two doctoral degrees: The Doctor of Education (EdD) and the Doctor of Philosophy (PhD). In the United States, the two degrees are often conflated. Conversations, to this point, have done more to contribute to the theoretical debate than to operationally distinguish between the two degree paths.

Method: The current study analyzed data collected from a review of the 188 doctoral programs at 145 institutions listed with the Association for the Study of Higher Education (ASHE). Results: Results suggest that while there …


Exploring The Relationships Between Student Perceptions And Educational Technology Utilization In Higher Education, Ana-Paula Correia, Karly Good Jan 2023

Exploring The Relationships Between Student Perceptions And Educational Technology Utilization In Higher Education, Ana-Paula Correia, Karly Good

Journal of Educational Technology Development and Exchange (JETDE)

This study examines the perceptions of educational technology use among college students at a small liberal arts university in the United States. Using institutional data analytics, 34,480 survey responses were analyzed to understand how students perceive the use of technology in the classroom and its relationship with teaching methods, progress on learning objectives, and course features. Descriptive and inferential statistical analyses were conducted, revealing a positive correlation between the use of educational technology and effective teaching methods, progress on learning objectives, and overall satisfaction with instructors and courses. However, it is important to note that the study is correlational in …


Factors Influencing Learning Intention Of Advanced Placement Moocs: Insights From An Investigation Into Information Technology Adoption, Kuo-Liang Ou, Wen-Chi Fong Jan 2023

Factors Influencing Learning Intention Of Advanced Placement Moocs: Insights From An Investigation Into Information Technology Adoption, Kuo-Liang Ou, Wen-Chi Fong

Journal of Educational Technology Development and Exchange (JETDE)

Massive open online courses (MOOCs) have attracted recent scholarly attention, mainly because MOOCs have effectively made higher education accessible. However, MOOCs tend to have low completion rates, and many scholars have attempted to remedy this by investigating the psychological, cognitive, physiological, and demographic factors affecting completion rates. Nevertheless, most studies have rarely investigated the student’s information technology (IT) background, focusing instead on self-awareness, self-recognition, intrinsic motivation, or external factors. Thus, this study adopted the technology acceptance model (TAM) to explore factors affecting MOOC learning intention, specifically in advanced placement (AP) MOOCs. This study also recruited 435 student participants from a …