Secondary Education Commons^™

Opportunity And Access To Informal Stem Learning Environments, Abigail Fowler, Caitlyn Yost, Margaret J. Mohr-Schroeder

Posters-at-the-Capitol Presentations

The University of Kentucky (UK) STEM Experiences is a collaboration amongst the UK Colleges of Education, Engineering, and Arts & Sciences. Our goal is to expose students to a variety positive learning experiences and career options in the STEM fields. Additionally, the summer experiences.

Reviving The Rules, Roles, And Rituals Of Resiliency, Don Offutt

Theses and Dissertations--Curriculum and Instruction

This descriptive case study of a historical period in education in the Commonwealth of Kentucky identifies the resiliency factors utilized by the first class to desegregate the Bowling Green, Kentucky, public school system. The participants in the study were members of the first African-American class to integrate the Bowling Green school system in 1965.

Critical Race Theory provided the tenets undergirding the research study. The qualitative research methods included conducting semi-structured interviews with participants; studying documents and artifacts from the era; having conversations with community members and educators; and collecting, archiving, and housing Bowling Green African-American education documents, artifacts, and …

Covid-19, Equity, And The Future Of Education: A Conversation Between Teacher Candidates, Shayna Glenn, Kadee Kall, Kate Ruebenson

Northwest Journal of Teacher Education

When public schools closed in March 2020 due to COVID-19, A1, A2, and A3 were headed into the full-time student teaching segment of their year-long teacher preparation practicum experience. While everyone has faced uncertainty during the pandemic, these beginning teachers also shared unique challenges. In April they came together for a conversation with a NWJTE editor to talk about their experiences, the obstacles and opportunities facing schools right now, and their hopes for their students and themselves. All three envision a 2020-2021 school year focused on equity, inclusivity, and the importance of access for all children.

Pandemic & Education: A Conversation Between Teacher Candidates, Jake Carlsen, Eric Jensen, Anna Krytenberg

Northwest Journal of Teacher Education

When Oregon public schools closed in March 2020 due to COVID-19, Jake, Eric, and Anna were headed into the full-time student teaching segment of their year-long teacher preparation practicum experience. While everyone has faced uncertainty during the pandemic, these beginning teachers also shared unique challenges. In April they came together for a conversation with a NWJTE editor to talk about their experiences, the obstacles and opportunities facing schools right now, and their hopes for their students and themselves. All three envision a 2020-2021 school year focused on equity, inclusivity, and the importance of access for all children.

A Phenomenological Study Of The Transition To Retirement Of P-20 Educators In The State Of Kentucky, Chanel M. Schwenck

Murray State Theses and Dissertations

This phenomenological research study explored the physical, mental, social, emotional, and financial experiences of P-20 educators in their transition from teaching into retirement. A grand tour question and three research questions guided this study. Data collected from interviews with retired educators provided a thorough understanding of the issues experienced during the transition into retirement from the Kentucky public school system. The experiences of recently retired P-20 educators showed that stress was a motivating factor for retirement but not chronic illness, disease, or other serious physical health concerns. Public educators in Kentucky may retire after 27 years of service, and many …

Enabling And Threatening Factors Affecting Persistence. A Qualitative And Quantitative Study On Rural First-Generation Stem Students’ And Stem Faculty's Perspectives., Travis A. Miller

Graduate Theses, Dissertations, and Problem Reports (ETD)

This study focuses on the factors that enable and threaten rural first-generation STEM students’ persistence. Limited empirical studies are available that focus on rural first-generation STEM majors’ persistence. Quantitative analysis was conducted using Kruskal Wallis H and Mann-Whitney U tests to determine any significant differences with the survey results. Content and thematic analysis was conducted on the student and faculty interviews to determine themes of enabling and threatening factors affecting persistence.

Enabling factors affecting persistence were found to be: Drive or Motivation, Experiences and skills, and Support. These were both faculty and student interview themes whereas a …

Curriculum Integration: Walking The Walk, Taylor Norman, Amanda Wall

Middle Grades & Secondary Education: Faculty Publications

Curriculum integration is a hallmark of middle level education. This approach to education involves blending topics across content areas as a way of studying topics and problems of interest to young adolescents. Approaches to curriculum integration and interdisciplinary curriculum overlap with concepts like democratic education, place-based learning, student agency, and student-designed curriculum. Here, two teacher educators report on a recent initiative in which we co-designed integrated curriculum along with middle level teacher candidates. We drew on place-based instruction and models of collaboration to develop this project. Candidates then developed integrated units appropriate for middle school classrooms.

2020 Viewbook, Office Of Admissions

Viewbook

IMSA fosters the discoverers. The thinkers. The problem-solvers of the future who can change the world. Our mission is to ignite and nurture creative, ethical, scientific minds that advance the human condition. We are a diverse community that promotes curiosity and exploration. We’re about more than great college prospects and great jobs, we’re about making our families proud. We’re about a better world for everyone through immersive learning experiences.

In 2017, we adopted the United Nations’ 17 Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) as a call to action that commissions us all to make the right choices now to improve life for …

Growth Vs. Fixed Mindsets In College Mathematics Education, Bryan Yaeger, Lynne Pachnowski

Williams Honors College, Honors Research Projects

The purpose of this research is to investigate the relationship between college mathematics professors and whether they have a growth or fixed mindset towards the students in their classrooms. This paper will share the results from a survey that was constructed with 38 participants - all of which are college mathematics professors in the state of Ohio. This survey focused on asking questions that would relate the professors to either having growth or fixed mindset traits. The survey also asked for the demographics of the participants, which helped classify similarities between those with growth or fixed mindset ideals. After analyzing …

High School Competitive Diving Injuries: National Athletic Treatment Injury And Outcomes Network (Nation), Susan M. Braid, Eric Schussler

Ellmer School of Nursing Faculty Publications

Purpose: Elite diving coaches and USA diving officials have become increasingly concerned about injury prevention among adolescent divers. However, little is known about such injuries. The purpose of this study was to describe the injuries among high school students who participated on high school diving teams.

Subjects: High school students who participated on the diving teams of high schools that were included in the National Athletic Treatment, Injury and Outcomes Network (NATION) for 2011–2014.

Methods: Descriptive epidemiology using injury exposure data on 56 boys' Swimming and Diving teams and 55 girls' Swimming and Diving teams from the National Athletic Treatment, …

Honors Research Project: A Textbook Analysis, Nathan Barto

Williams Honors College, Honors Research Projects

This paper attempts to look at the use of The Human Odyssey: Volume Three not only as a potential educator, but as a historian as well. This paper examines the book for inaccuracies, American and European bias, as well as potential usability for educators

Using The Enneagram As A Lens For Culturally Sustaining Pedagogy In The Ninth Grade English Language Arts Classroom, Catherine Caudle

Electronic Theses and Dissertations, 2020-2023

This study explores the relationship between student personality, student choice in novel selection in the high school language arts classroom, and student reading self-efficacy and enjoyment. Throughout a student's educational journey, from elementary school to high school, it is typical to see a decrease in student choice regarding the literature they read. In elementary grades, students learn about the parts of a book, are frequently read to with animated voices, and look forward to shelves of choice on library trips. Yet as students move into their middle and high school years, the excitement often dwindles. Choice is removed, for a …

Making Space For Writing: Makerspace Activities And Academic Language In A Middle School Science Classroom, Ashley Stewart

Graduate Theses, Dissertations, and Problem Reports (ETD)

Over recent decades, the maker movement has expanded from the private sector, libraries, and higher education institutions to K-12 schools. While many studies provide implications of STEM and maker activities and their effects on learning in informal settings, few have framed such investigations within the context of a makerspace in K-12 schools. Furthermore, few have investigated maker activities and writing, particularly in developing academic language features. Prior research suggests that secondary students struggle to apply academic language features. Meanwhile, they are motivated to engage in STEM and maker activities. This mixed methods case study attempted to make a connection between …

A Critical Examination Of Secondary Teachers’ Perceptions Of Liberatory Pd, Christine C. Moore

Theses and Dissertations

This study sought to develop an understanding of secondary teachers’ perceptions of liberatory (justice-oriented) professional development at three school sites in a single school district. As participants shared their perceptions, three significant themes emerged; they described 1) facing contextual constraints that limited their agency 2) desiring to be reframed as knowledge producers, yet 3) struggling to envision how their agency could support their liberation. These key findings led to an emergent theory of the Cycle of Professional Development Stagnation, a cycle involving barriers that perpetuate the framing of teachers as passive recipients of knowledge. As evidenced in this qualitative …

The Relationship Between Servant Leadership And Teacher Retention And Student Achievement, David Earl Murphy

College of Graduate Studies: Theses & Dissertations

This non-experimental quantitative study aimed to determine if servant leadership influenced teacher retention or student achievement and if teacher retention influenced student achievement. This study’s respondents were 145 middle and high school teachers within a contiguous rural region of the Southeastern United States. Survey responses were received and analyzed during the late summer of 2020. Three research questions guided this study: Does servant leadership [high, low] influence teacher retention intention; What is the effect of servant leadership [high, low] on student achievement by categorical population groups as identified by the GaDOE; and lastly, What is the effect of teacher retention …

From Small Beginnings To Large-Scale Harm: On Demagoguery And Misogyny In The Classroom And Writing Center, Shannon Roberson

Theses and Dissertations

My project is grounded in the rhetorical concept of aretê—excellence or virtue—as it relates to education and educational spaces within demagogic and misogynist cultural forces. The problems of demagoguery and misogyny stem from small-scale perpetuation of agonistic norms that go unaddressed in U.S. culture, a culture that is deeply identity-driven. These forces persist on social media platforms and within patriarchal systems of education.

For my project, I suggest rhetorical media literacy education of small-scale demagoguery moments on social media as a way to bring awareness to larger-scale events. On a micro-scale, social media influencers cultivate behaviors that mimic demagogic …

"Zooming In" On Robotics During Covid-19: A Preservice Teacher, An Engineering Student, And A 5th Grader Engineer Robotic Flowers Via Zoom, Jennifer Kidd, Krishna Kaipa, Kristie Gutierrez, Pilar Pazos, Orlando Ayala, Stacie Ringleb

Teaching & Learning Faculty Publications

The COVID-19 induced school shutdown dramatically decreased students’ hands-on STEM learning opportunities. An NSF-funded program partnering preservice teachers and undergraduate engineering students to teach robotics to fifth graders was adapted to a virtual format via Zoom. A case study intimately explored one team’s experience as they engineered bio-inspired robots over five weekly sessions. Zoom recordings, written reflections, and lesson slides were analyzed to describe how the virtual context shaped the lesson and influenced the preservice teacher’s experience. All three participants successfully engineered a robotic flower indicating hands-on robotics instruction is feasible in an online format. The virtual context increased the …

Effects Of Differential Instructional Time In Algebra On Standardized Assessment And Semester Grade Outcomes, Michael S. Wojtowicz

Graduate Research Theses & Dissertations

Building off of other studies that examined the effectiveness of double-dose algebra programs such as Nomi and Allensworth (2009), this dissertation compared the performance outcomes of students enrolled in one of two alternatives to traditional high school algebra, a double-dose and a single-dose algebra program. This work utilized multiple linear regression to assess the degree of association between student race/ethnicity and selected demographic characteristics, including gender, free and reduced lunch status, and IEP status, on standardized assessment and end of semester mathematics course grade outcomes, while controlling for initial mathematics placement test results. This project assessed these outcomes for students …

Exploring Hip Hop Pedagogy In The Lives Of Four African American Adolescents, Roland Steele

Graduate Research Theses & Dissertations

The purpose of this case study was to examine how participation in an after-school hip hop pedagogy program influenced the social and academic lives of four African American male adolescents. The researcher viewed this study through the conceptual framework of culturally relevant teaching that incorporated hip hop pedagogy. Hip-hop is currently one of the most popular forms of music and represents the dominant culture of today’s inner-city youth. This study centered on how hip hop pedagogy is being used to educate African American male students.

The study participants consisted of four African American male adolescents who attended an after-school hip …

Exploring Secondary Students’ Abilities In Judging The Credibility Of Digital Content On The Internet, Katie Dailey

Masters Theses

The shift from print to digital environments has created an opportunity and responsibility for educators to focus on instructional planning and practices that reflects the growing complexity of online texts students helping to ensure that their students are information literate. The purpose of this qualitative study is to explore the how 83 eleventh grade high school English students judge the credibility of information on the internet. The researcher used methodological triangulation to qualitatively analyze by comparing and aligning data from the survey results, observations of students during class discussions, responses to class assignments, and the quality ratings of students’ think-aloud …