Social and Behavioral Sciences Commons^™

Orienting New International College Students During A Global Pandemic: Spatiality’S Contributions To Staff Work Practices, Thomas W. Teague Jr.

Theses and Dissertations--Educational Policy Studies and Evaluation

U.S. colleges must increasingly respond to a wide range of complex forces and simultaneously fulfill their missions and support students. To address many of these forces, some have turned to internationalization efforts like recruiting and enrolling international students. In light of these efforts, critics have called for institutions to better, more appropriately support these students, given their challenges and needs. This call has amplified during the recent COVID-19 global health pandemic.

Traditional student support services tend to center around Tinto’s Theory of Student Departure. Examples of support programming are frequently shared, yet rarely detail how institutional staff actually perform them …

Communication Strategies’ Impact On Finances At Kentucky Higher Education Institutions During The Covid-19 Pandemic, Jacob Most

MPA/MPP/MPFM Capstone Projects

Kentucky public higher education institutions faced a financial cliff with the onset of the COVID-19 pandemic (Capilouto, 2021 Jan.). Campuses across the state closed in spring 2020, with the list of unknowns outnumbering the knowns by a significant margin (Monday, E., Blanton, J., and Kiser, K., 2021). In the face of an unknown future, administrations at Kentucky institutes of higher education relied upon communication strategies more than ever to outline Universities’ plans for reopening, reinvented operational plans, outlining contingencies, and fulfilling an invaluable role in efforts to test, contact trace and eventually vaccinate campus and broader community populations. This project …

Integrating Persuasive Messaging Strategies Into Higher Education Early Alert Interventions To Improve Student Academic Behaviors, Joseph Gayheart

Theses and Dissertations--Communication

Higher Education is at a critical juncture as both public and private institutions seek to attract, retain, and graduate students. Institutions of higher education have traditionally developed communication and engagement strategies that become part of early warning/alert systems intended to increase student positive academic behaviors and improve student success. Persuasion can be a powerful tool in improving communication—especially when persuasive messages are deployed within the complex and ever-changing media landscape. Communication and persuasion scholars, for example, have applied persuasive messaging interventions in a variety of contexts but have yet to substantially apply these persuasive tactics in a higher education setting. …