Social and Behavioral Sciences Commons^™

Child Development Degree Program: Careers Spotlight & Panel Discussion, Amanda Chorak, Jenae Pratscher, Dajah Bibbs, Brittany Alsvig, Kayla Deubel, Margaret Landis, Savannah Vaughan, Abigail Gentry, Alexa Gonzalez, Kaitlyn Fish, Ashley Camden, Kathleen Hammerberg, Sarah O’Neal, Kenzy Mallard, Sutton Bate, Kara Vallarta

Scholar Week 2016 - present

Join session via Microsoft Teams.

The Child Development program within the School of Education has continued to grow and strengthen its identity over the recent years. Students currently seek diverse career paths working with children and families following completion and graduation from the B.S. Child Development program. A group of undergraduate students from the spring 2024 CDEV 490 Senior Seminar will facilitate a discussion with a panel of helping professionals connected to the Child Development degree program. The panel discussion will give spotlight to the variety of career paths the degree prepares individuals for and will include both ONU Child …

The Effect Of Adverse Childhood Experiences On The Self-Esteem Of College Students, Maggie J. Van Heemst

ELAIA

Background Adverse childhood experiences (ACEs) are known to predict negative health and mental health effects later in life. One in two Americans has experienced at least one ACE. This issue is prevalent across class, race, and ethnicity. However, little is known about ACEs and the young adult population. Methods A survey was conducted to measure ACEs and self-esteem in fifty college students. The hypothesis was a negative correlation between ACE and self-esteem scores. Results A small negative correlation was found between ACEs and self-esteem in college students. The average ACE score was 3.9 and the average self-esteem score was 16.78. …

Evaluating College Students’ Health Literacyand Its Effects On Their Perceptions Of Informationconcerning Mask-Wearing In The Covid-19 Pandemic, Hannah S. Ketchum

ELAIA

Background Mask-wearing was a controversial and polarizing phenomenon during the COVID-19 pandemic. Beliefs concerning mask-wearing differed depending on sources of information concerning the pandemic, levels of health literacy, political leaning, demographics, or other factors. This project attempted to connect college students’ level of health literacy to their understanding of and adherence to mask-wearing in the COVID- 19 pandemic. There is a gap in research connecting health literacy to understanding information concerning pandemics and an even bigger lack of studies conducted that relate college students’ health literacy to their perception of illnesses or pandemics. It is important to understand the impact …

A Curriculum Designed To Teach Elementary-Age Children In Diverse Settings The Kingdom Concept Of Loving One’S Neighbor, Abigail J. Flood

ELAIA

United States Census data from 2020 show that the country is becoming increasingly diverse and urbanized. Other research shows children are aware of race from an early age and can pick up biases and stereotypes by watching the adults around them. However, there are no children’s ministry curricula that specifically address how children should navigate differences from a biblical perspective. To fill this gap, a children’s ministry curriculum was written to model how children can love their neighbors like Jesus did, especially those who look different from themselves. The curriculum is comprised of an introduction for the ministry leader, five …

The Effect Of Education On Support For Tnr As A Method Of Feral Cat Management, Kaitlyn F. Bishop

ELAIA

A feral cat is a cat that is untamed and not suitable for placement in a home. Through their naturally high rate of reproduction and lack of population management, feral cat populations have grown exponentially, leading to overpopulation. Feral cats effect their communities through their impact on wildlife, financial burden, and health risk to both humans and other animals. Due to the impact feral cats place on their communities, multiple management methods have been suggested. Trap-Neuter-Return (TNR) is a humane, effective method of management; however, controversy surrounds its use. Existing studies have determined that age, gender, and past experiences with …

Kankakee In Deindustrialization: An Oral History Approach, Rachel H. Shepard

ELAIA

The City of Kankakee was an industrialized city that prospered economically for decades. Throughout the late 1970s and 1980s, economic trends shifted for Kankakee and the surrounding communities. The major factories, such as Roper Corporation and A.O. Smith, migrated their source of production from Kankakee to other regions of the United States and abroad during the 1970s and 1980s. As a result, the declining industrial economic activity led to changing community perceptions. Kankakee is an example of the “Rust Belt” region, a region in the Midwestern and Northeastern States of the United States where declining industrial activity occurred throughout the …

Impact Of Mindfulness Training On Test Anxiety In College Students, Lindsay Alcock

ELAIA

Background Mindfulness is defined as the state of giving full attention to a stimulus, internal or external, without inducing judgment or becoming reactional about the feelings experienced, positive or negative (Davis & Hayes, 2012). Previous studies have investigated the relationship between mindfulness techniques and the reduction of anxiety (Chambers et al., 2008; Macdonald & Olsen, 2020); a smaller number of studies have considered test anxiety (Cho et al., 2016; Sparks, 2017). Prior research has used multiple mindfulness techniques to measure the impact on test anxiety, but few have isolated mindfulness trainings to compare the relative impact of each type on …

History Lessons From Esther: The Leopold Von Ranke Lecture Delivered At The Phi Alpha Theta Induction Ceremony, Kent R. Olney

Scholarship – Academic Affairs Office

The German historian, Leopold Von Ranke, noted the following: “Every epoch is immediate to God, and its value is not based on what emerges from it, but on its very existence.” My assignment was to respond to Von Ranke’s thoughts. I have done so by drawing on four observations made from the OT book of Esther. These observations pertain to truth, years, obscurity, and heroes; all of them matter to God and all of them should matter to the historian. In a sense, these four elements are the raw materials, or building blocks, of history in any generation. I conclude …

Remote Learning: Impacting The Future Of Education, Jessica Hollewell

Ed.D. Dissertations

The Coronavirus-19 pandemic impacted society as well as multiple industries, including education. This qualitative research project aims to explore the perceptions of faculty in a small, Midwestern, private K-12 Christian school during the school shutdowns and subsequent remote learning time period from March 2020 to June 2020. Additionally, this research project aims to increase the awareness of the changing needs of students, educators, and families as well as facilitating the needed adjustments to trainings, planning, and resources for future remote learning sessions. The data for this case study was collected through semi-structured interviews at one school building with six faculty …

First-Generation Black Male Students’ Experiences, And Relationships That Shaped College – To - Career Transition, Regina K. Smith

Ed.D. Dissertations

First-generation, Black, male students continue to lag behind their continuing-generation peers in degree attainment, leaving them deficient in obtaining the social and financial upward mobility higher education is expected to afford. Research finds that, despite Black males entering college with higher degree aspirations than their White peers, they were 6 times less likely to achieve them, and only 5% of Black males would eventually graduate with a degree or certificate within three years of enrollment, compared with 32% of White males (Center for Community College Student Engagement, 2014). To close this persistent gap, this research sought to understand the activities, …

[Phi Delta Lambda Sponsored Session] "Scholar Adventures": Bibliographic Detective Work As An Academic Librarian, Emily Spunaugle, Karen Knudson

Scholar Week 2016 - present

Academic librarians support the research of their college or university community, but also conduct their own research. This presentation focuses on the intersection of the two, featuring the presenter's experience solving bibliographic mysteries of unique 18th century pamphlets and tracking down books heisted from her library 30 years ago.

Emily D. Spunaugle is Assistant Professor, Humanities and Rare Books Librarian at Oakland University in Rochester, MI. Her research is at the intersection of book history and women's writings of the long eighteenth century and appears in Papers of the Bibliographical Society of America, Romantic Circles, Libraries: Culture, History, and …

Strategies For Supporting College Students Experiencing Grief, Rachel A. Guimond

Scholar Week 2016 - present

Grief and loss are a shared human experience. However, lacking cultural awareness of the impact of grief and insufficient social support can make managing the loss of a loved one very challenging for students. One strategy to support students who experience loss during college is the development of a course that addresses content related to the experience within supportive academic relationships. This presentation will explore research findings about student experiences of grief on college campuses and evidence-based practices for the development and implementation of an academic course on grief.

Advocating For The Middle Man: An Explication Of Chair Perceptions On Overcoming Emotion At Work, Brittany Armstrong

Ed.D. Dissertations

The researcher’s study aimed to understand the perceptions of private university department chairs when engaging with emotional intelligence (EQ) at work. The qualitative approach provided the boundaries for the voice and the experience of the participants as the researcher collected interviews, department meeting minutes, and department program reviews from a sample of five department chairs across three, private universities. The following departments served as the study’s population: mathematics, family and consumer science, business, education, and modern languages. Findings revealed participants perceived job satisfaction through the mediator of emotion. Participants identified the emotional challenges of department chair and perceived emotion within …

A Curriculum Designed To Teach Elementary-Age Children In Diverse Settings The Kingdom Concept Of Loving One's Neighbor, Abigail J. Flood

Honors Program Projects

United States Census data from 2020 show that the country is becoming increasingly diverse and urbanized. Other research shows children are aware of race from an early age and can pick up biases and stereotypes by watching the adults around them. However, there are no children’s ministry curricula that specifically address how children should navigate differences from a biblical perspective. To fill this gap, a children’s ministry curriculum was written to model how children can love their neighbors like Jesus did, especially those who look different from themselves. The curriculum is comprised of an introduction for the ministry leader, five …

Quality Of Life Disparities For The Rural Economically Disadvantaged, April Westerfield-Jackson

Scholar Week 2016 - present

Families who reside in rural communities and live in poverty often experience a lack of quality of life supports, which impacts their mental health and exasperates any special needs they may have. Research in regards to these concerns, has historically focused on southern states and or the impacts of poverty in urban settings. This phenomenological qualitative research study reveals quality of life supports that impoverished families living in rural communities in Central Illinois often do without. This study further examines the families’ perceived barriers to those supports. The following research questions guided this study: (1) What quality-of-life supports (employment, food …

What Are We Teaching In Spirituality And Social Work Elective Courses? A Qualitative Content Analysis Of Bsw Syllabi, Hillary Cole

Scholar Week 2016 - present

Religion and spirituality (RS) are vital aspects of client identity and well-being, yet social work professionals are often ill-equipped to address these in practice due to a lack of specialized training. The National Association of Social Work (NASW) and Council on Social Work Education (CSWE) support spirituality integration, but existing research focuses on Master of Social Work (MSW)-level elective courses. This qualitative study addresses Bachelor of Social Work (BSW)-level integration by (a) exploring how many accredited BSW programs offer an elective course on RS and (b) analyzing syllabi from these courses to determine pedagogical best practices. BSW programs can use …

Recent Empirical Evidence On The Perceived Impact Of Covid 19 On Faculty And Students From 391 Faculty From 37 Cccu And Cic Institutions June-September 2021, Don Daake

Scholar Week 2016 - present

The presentation provides very recent data on the impact of COVID 19 from 391 Professors from 37 CCCU or CIC institutions. The data was gathered from June to September 2021- right at the height of COVID impacts. (This add-on set of scales was attached to the dissertation written by Dr. John Langenderfer, DBA, J.D. “The Role of an Academic Institution’s Organizational Culture in Retaining Employees during an Industry Downturn.”) Because of the time of the data gathering from June through September 2021, Dr. Daake saw this as a unique opportunity to study the impact of a BLACK–SWAN event …

Adults Perspectives On Past Youth Program Experiences, India Blakely

Ed.D. Dissertations

The study of youth development is a massive field that encompasses admirable literature and notable research. However, investigating past youth experiences through a work setting that promoted advancement in education, experience, and character through elevated youth roles and responsibilities provided a unique lens that could enlarge the field of youth development. This study, which focused on 12 former staff experiences in Thornton Township youth programs, addressed a literature gap. Although the literature on youth development, youth employment, mentoring, community, and positive youth development (PYD) was reviewed, the combined concepts of work and matriculation through adulthood could not be identified. A …

An Examination Of Clergy Preparation In The Church Of The Nazarene, Thomas D. Taylor

Ed.D. Dissertations

This study explored the influence of the evolution of post-secondary educational delivery modes on the preparation of ministers in the Church of the Nazarene. The purpose of this study was to examine the trends, outcomes, and efficacy of multiple educational delivery modes for ministerial students in the Church of the Nazarene in order to recommend strategies to enhance the preparedness of clergy for ordination and ministry. The study examined the relationship of the multiple educational delivery modes to student attitudes and perceptions about preparation for ordination, perceived competencies of the formational objectives and curricular objectives, and ministry (career) outcomes of …

Student-Athletes’ Religious Beliefs, Religious Behaviors, And Religious Identity At A Christian University, Daniel M. Allen, Sean Strehlow, Audrey M. Chisum, Kevin D. Dougherty, Perry L. Glazner, Sarah A. Schnitker

Faculty Scholarship – Sociology

Athletics occupies an ambiguous place within the greater university mission, particularly at religious institutions. Intercollegiate sports programs may purport to reinforce the university’s aim to develop the whole person, but the nature of athletics can compromise student-athlete religiosity and well-being. Little research has focused on the religiosity of student-athletes and the potential implications for religious institutions. Our analysis features data from 884 senior students at a private, religiously affiliated, NCAA Division I university. Comparing student-athletes to non-athletes, we found that student-athletes scored higher than non-athletes on religious beliefs, religious behaviors, and sense of religious identity.

Correlational Study Exploring The Relationship Between The Teaching Of Ethics In Business Schools And The Ethical Behavior Of College Students In Those Schools, Jeffrey P. Horwitz

Ed.D. Dissertations

The purpose of this quantitative, correlational study was to discover how colleges and universities impact the moral development of their undergraduate school of business students through the method by which they teach ethics in their curricula. To address the stated problem of understanding the impact of ethics and its effect on the moral development of students, the research question that drove this study involved discovering if there was a relationship between the ethical decisions undergraduate college business students make (like deciding whether to cheat on exams and/or assignments) and the way ethics content was delivered. In answering the research question, …

The Relationship Between Leadership Behaviors, Trust In Leadership And Teacher Organizational Citizenship Behavior, Tonia Y. Havard-Dew

Ed.D. Dissertations

As greater accountability is placed on school districts, in response to the increased demands of federal and state policies and mandates, teacher workloads and responsibilities have been increased to meet those demands. School districts rely on teachers’ commitment to students’ educational pursuits and their willingness to demonstrate behaviors that exceed their formal role expectations to facilitate student success. These behaviors, known as organizational citizenship behaviors (OCB), cannot be required, but play a critical role in ensuring a district’s success. The purpose of this quantitative study was to examine the relationship between teachers’ trust in their administrator and teachers’ OCB through …

The Effects Of Parent Training And Information Centers On Parent Empowerment, Hayden A. O. Lewis

Ed.D. Dissertations

Parents of children who receive special education services from the public school are considered equal partners in their child’s education with school professionals on the Individual Education Program team. Each state has a Parent Training and Information Center (PTIC) that seeks to empower parents to fulfill their right as an equal partner. The current study compared the advocacy, knowledge, competence, self-efficacy, and empowerment of two groups of parents of children with disabilities who received special education services in Tennessee. The experimental group of parents (n=36) had attended a workshop provided by a PTIC and the control group (n=21) had not …

A Self-Study Of Frn Olivet: A Student-Led Food Recovery Model On A University Campus, Madeira Sherwood

Scholar Week 2016 - present

Presentation Location: Weber Center, Room 101

Abstract

An alarming amount of unserved food is thrown away daily on university campuses, which emits carbon dioxide into the atmosphere. In those same college communities, there is likely a large food insecure population that is going to bed hungry every night. The Food Recovery Network (FRN) is a network of colleges/universities across the United States that seeks to bridge this gap. The FRN chapter at Olivet Nazarene University, established in October 2017, encountered challenges in its first couple years of operation because there were not yet many resources that laid out best practices …

What’S Your Natural Next Question? The Inquiry Approach To Learning Economics, Paul R. Koch, Rachel Carlassare

Scholar Week 2016 - present

During the current academic year, both introductory and upper-division economics courses at Olivet have used an app in Canvas, developed by Beagle Learning, for the purpose of engaging students in critical thinking using an inquiry learning process. Students iteratively cycle through: 1) posing a goal question, 2) finding a resource which provides an answer to that question, at least in part, which then 3) prompts an additional question whose answer increases the degree of certainty regarding the original goal question.

This presentation will concentrate on how this process has been incorporated into the Principles of Economics class, which is a …

An Exploratory Study Of Emotional Intelligence Characteristics Between Disciplines In Higher Education And Suggested Curriculum Adjustments, Brad Thomas

Scholar Week 2016 - present

Emotional Intelligence (EI) may be more important to the success of college students than cognitive intelligence and technical skills combined. Recent research has primarily focused on EI in the workplace. However, implications for improving EI skills of college undergraduate students before they enter the workforce appears to be lacking. This quantitative research examined the Emotional Intelligence levels of five different majors to identify differences based on area of study, gender, or other demographic factors. Subsequently, the study aimed to provide suggestions for curriculum development with a goal to better expose students to EI themes. An online survey was offered to …

Embodying Integration: A Sociological Study Of Graduate Student Religiosity In Christian Higher Education, Daniel Allen

Faculty Scholarship – Sociology

Social science research has historically posited an inverse relationship between higher education levels and spirituality, but recent research has nuanced this assumption. Faith formation is a celebrated part of Christian higher education in particular, and graduate programs have grown among Protestant Christian institutions in recent years. However, little research addresses graduate student perceptions of the spiritual quality of their experience. This study asks what program-level features correlate with a high-quality spiritual experience for graduate students studying in a Protestant Christian context. Using data collected between 2014-2020 from 3,274 graduate students at a private, not-for-profit Christian university, we find that students …

The Impact Of Wellness Training On Resilience, Depression, And Anxiety In College Age Students, Jamie S. Myrtle

Ed.D. Dissertations

Data suggests that mental health disorders in college students are increasing. University personnel seek to help students better manage their mental health through access to campus counseling centers. Slow enrollment growth has placed pressure on university budgets making it difficult to fully fund counseling centers. Therefore, university personnel seek cost-effective interventions to meet the need. Increasing resilience has shown promise in reducing the overall impact of depression and anxiety. The purpose of the current study was to explore the impact of wellness training on resilience, depression, and anxiety to determine the effectiveness of the intervention in improving resilience and reducing …

Community College Student Organizations And Hispanic Students' Gpa, Retention, And Graduation Rates, Joanne Alvarez

Ed.D. Dissertations

Although the Hispanic population continues to grow throughout the United States, Hispanic students still have some of the lowest college retention and graduation rates. Administrators at post-secondary institutions need evidence for effective strategies to recruit, retain, and graduate Hispanic students. The current study was created to determine if there was a difference in grade point averages (GPA), retention, and graduation rates between two specific groups. The first group consisted of 506 self-identified Hispanic students engaged in at least one community college student organization versus 506 self-identified Hispanic students not engaged in any campus organization. A quantitative study was conducted to …

The Impact Of Teacher Methodology Training For Higher Education Faculty Members, Nicole Baker

Ed.D. Dissertations

Many college programs are designed to graduate individuals who are experts in their field of study, but not necessarily individuals who are trained in how to teach. This quantitative, quasi-experiment study examined college faculty member’s level of training in the area of teaching practices and methodology. The relation to student satisfaction, current course performance, attendance, the belief in the need for training, and faculty member’s sense of efficacy in teaching was explored. The Statistical Package for the Social Sciences (SPSS) was used to organize the data using a one-way ANCOVA to analyze the impact the level of training had on …