Higher Education and Teaching Commons^™

Teaching With Technology: Using A Virtual Learning Community And Peer Mentoring To Create An Interdisciplinary Intervention, Rebecca Mazumdar, Nadia Benakli, Pamela Brown

Publications and Research

This paper describes the development and implementation of engaging and supportive experiences to promote student engagement, persistence and success at a commuter, open enrollment, public, minority serving institution. Project components included faculty development at the SENCER Summer Institute (SSI) 2016, attended by a team comprised of an academic administrator, full-time faculty from English and math, and part-time faculty in chemistry; creation of a virtual learning community of freshmen enrolled in chemistry, English, and math linked by the specific theme of the environmental impacts of deicing roads with salt and the overarching theme of the impacts of human activities on the …

Student Perceptions And Grade Comparisons After Exposure To Instructor-Made Skills Videos In A Kinesiology Course, Pamela Karp, Robert G. Gallagher

Journal of Occupational Therapy Education

The purpose of this mixed method, descriptive case study was to determine whether the use of pre-recorded instructor-made videos (PRIMVs) in a kinesiology course, along with curricular design changes, facilitated increased conceptual and practical student learning. The study examined three student cohorts in one occupational therapy program. Two of the student cohorts had unrestricted access to the PRIMVs designed to support student learning of bone and muscle palpation and joint actions. Students from the two cohorts completed a survey about their experience of having access to the videos. Exam data from the student cohorts who had access to the videos …

Theorizing The Experiences Of Chicana Faculty At A Hispanic-Serving Institution, Karina Chantal Canaba

Open Access Theses & Dissertations

Hiring and retaining a diverse faculty has demonstrated to have positive outcomes on student success. However, different forces have made it difficult for universities to have a diverse make-up that reflect their student populations, making it particularly important to investigate how faculty engage with the university. This study seeks to better understand how Chicana faculty engage with the university through the tenure and promotion process. Situated in a Hispanic-Serving Institution (HSI), this study looks to better understand how Chicana faculty navigate the complex, political environment of academia through their testimonios as faculty at the university.

The importance of retaining Chicanas …

Innovation In Higher Education: Three Sites In Haiti, Lucas Endicott

Open Access Theses & Dissertations

Recent decades have brought seismic changes to global higher education. Educational leaders labor to sharpen administration, funding, teaching and learning practices in response to an increasingly globalized and technological world. The possibilities that this changing landscape may provide are perhaps most exciting for those currently economically disadvantaged and historically underserved by higher education. The advent of a knowledge economy and the need to train hundreds and thousands of new students paired with technological developments may help correct inequalities in access and excellence in education. This study asks the question: What, however, is the lived reality on the ground? Are university …

Using Spanish In English-Language Spaces: Identifying Bilingual Composition Students' Translanguaging Practices, Maria Isela Maier

Open Access Theses & Dissertations

This Dissertation is a qualitative study that uses ethnographic research methods to examine the translanguaging practices of bilingual students in first-year composition at a university along the U.S.-Mexico border. Specifically, I observe how and why bilingual students employ translanguaging practices, as they are encouraged or invited by their instructors, in contexts where English Standard Language policies exist. The results of this qualitative project demonstrate bilingual students' use of translation as part of their translanguaging practices, as well as a tool that uncovers students' writing processes which also demonstrates their language negotiation. Furthermore, the students' translanguaging practices reveal the rhetorical use …

Advising As Literacy: A Cultural Capital Approach To Academic Advising In An Hispanic Serving Institution, Heather Smith

Open Access Theses & Dissertations

This Dissertation examines academic advising through the lenses of cultural capital and sociocultural literacy. I reframe advising as a literacy practice that facilitates opportunities for students to access and acquire the navigational and cultural capital required to navigate the complex structures of higher education. I describe an advising as literacy model that was designed specifically for and has been implemented at the University of Texas at El Paso (UTEP), a large, four-year, Research I Hispanic-Serving Institution (HSI) situated on the US-Mexico border, whose student demographic reflects the bi-national region from which UTEP draws the majority of its students.

The advising …

Inside Mentor-Mentee Meetings In Pre-Service Teacher School-Based Teaching Practice In Zimbabwe., Tabitha Grace Mukeredzi, Lilian Manwa

Australian Journal of Teacher Education

Mentor-mentee meetings are a critical aspect of student teacher mentoring during teaching practice (TP)as they significantly contribute to the success of the whole mentoring process and consequently to the positive accomplishment of the entire practicum. This study contributes to debates on mentor-mentee meetings given the limited research on this phenomenon. By investigating the kinds of knowledge student teachers gain from such meetings, the findings may influence researchers to investigate other aspects of mentor-mentee meetings.

The study sought to explore from the student teachers’ perspectives, the domains of knowledge that they gain from mentoring meetings during residential TP. A qualitative approach …

Designing University Courses To Improve Pre-Service Teachers' Pedagogical Content Knowledge Of Evidence-Based Inclusive Practice., Julie Lancaster, Alan Bain

Australian Journal of Teacher Education

: The study described here is part of a program of research investigating the application of a theoretical course design approach to pre-service teacher education. In this study the focus was to establish the effects of the design approach on pre-service teachers' mastery of pedagogical content knowledge about inclusive education. A quasi-experimental comparison group design was employed to establish the differential effects of two course designs, one based on the theoretical principle of embedded design derived from self-organization and the other based on classroom instruction and practicum-type experience. The results indicated statistically significant findings in favour of the embedded design …

“Learning The Ropes”: Pre-Service Arts Teachers Navigating The Extracurricular Terrain, Christina C. Gray, Geoffrey M. Lowe

Australian Journal of Teacher Education

Arts teachers undertake a multitude of extracurricular activities. Yet, while these activities consume considerable time and require specific expertise, little attention is afforded to developing these skills and expertise during pre-service training. This article presents findings from a study into the value of a pre-service teacher production as a form of professional development, from both the technical and personal development perspectives. Thirty pre-service secondary Arts teachers participated in the production. Through focus-group interviews, participants indicated the benefits of building technical understanding as well as personal benefits of engaging in an ensemble experience. All spoke of the potential transferability of what …

A Comparative Investigation Of First And Fourth Year Pre-Service Teachers’ Expectations And Perceptions Of Emotional Intelligence, Marcela Gallardo, Hazel Tan, Maria Gindidis

Australian Journal of Teacher Education

This article reports on the perceptions and expectations of pre-service teachers (PSTs) on the role of Emotional Intelligence (EI) taught as part of a teacher preparation course. The research was conducted across core units in first and fourth years of an undergraduate education degree in an Australian university. The researchers used a mixed method study. Online survey data from 208 students were analysed, using descriptive statistics for quantitative data and thematic analysis for open-ended responses. Results indicate that PSTs’ understandings of EI included awareness and management of emotions in oneself and others. They perceived EI as highly important to teachers …

Introducing An Eportfolio Into Practicum-Based Units: Pre-Service Teachers’ Perceptions Of Effective Support, Pauline Roberts, Gillian Kirk

Australian Journal of Teacher Education

ePortfolios are gaining momentum as a preferred way for graduates to demonstrate current and developing capabilities against industry standards. Effective training is essential for new graduates to produce quality and competitive ePortfolios. This research focused on the perspective of pre-service teachers on the effectiveness of learning opportunities provided to increase confidence and skills in developing an ePortfolio in an Australian four-year undergraduate degree. The initial phase of this research employed a survey to examine the perspective of 132 second-year and 105 third-year pre-service teachers. Results indicated that for the second-year cohort there was a minimal increase in the levels of …

Does A “Science, Technology And Social Change” Course Improve Scientific Habits Of Mind And Attitudes Towards Socioscientific Issues?, Muammer Çalik, Faik Özgür Karataş

Australian Journal of Teacher Education

The study aimed at exploring whether a “Science-Technology-Social Change” course improved pre-service social studies teachers’ (PST) scientific habits of mind and attitudes towards socio-scientific issues. Within a pre- and post-course experimental design, the study was conducted with 135 second-year PST (68 males and 67 females) from two classes at Department of Social Studies Teacher Education in a large-size university, Turkey. Two different Likert type scales, Scientific Habits of Mind Scale and Attitudes towards Socioscientific Issues Scale, were employed to collect data before and after the course. The data were imported to SPSS 15^TM for descriptive and inferential statistics in …

The Use Of Blog Activities To Promote Reflection In An Elt Practicum, Esra Bener, Senem Yıldız

Australian Journal of Teacher Education

Informed by the theories of critical reflection and community of practice, this study aimed to explore the integration of blogs to promote reflection among eighteen pre-service English language teachers registered in a practicum course at a public university in Turkey. Fourteen blog activities were designed and implemented to guide the reflective process of student teachers. Data were collected through archival documents of participants’ blog entries, two focus group interviews and two surveys. A total of 457 entries were analysed in terms of depth of reflection and the analysis revealed evidence of medium or high level reflection in most (61%) of …

Exploring Intersections Of Work Intensity And Professional Learning: Female Teachers’ Responses To Research Engagement As Professional Learning, Jennifer Mitton-Kukner

Australian Journal of Teacher Education

Much research has focused upon the promise of teacher research engagement as a form of professional learning. Yet, little scholarship has looked closely at how female teachers juggle research engagement alongside personal and professional responsibilities. This inquiry into the research experiences of two mid-career teachers provides an up-close look at the ways they attempted to sustain engagement over a three-year period. Attending closely to participants’ accounts of time use, as they engaged in research activities, sheds light upon the presence of socio-cultural expectations, in these instances, constraining their efforts and, arguably, impacting the depth of their professional learning.

Employee Resistance To Disruptive Technological Change In Higher Education, Barbara Ann Miller

Walden Dissertations and Doctoral Studies

Employees can be resistant to work-based change, specifically when the change is due to disruptive or new technology. The purpose of this descriptive phenomenological study was to explore the lived experiences of 20 Swiss-based educational employees adapting to online technologies introduced in their workplaces. Disruptive innovation theory provided the conceptual framework for the study. Data were collected using semistructured interviews with 20 purposely selected participants from 3 Swiss-based higher education campuses. The modified Van Kaam method was used to organize and analyze the data. Four themes from participants' responses were identified: educational employees are not resistant to technology-based change, educational …

At The Heart Of Policies And Programs: Community College Faculty Members And Peer Mentors As Human Levers Of Retention, Kimberly Russell

Theses and Dissertations--Educational Policy Studies and Evaluation

Student attrition prior to the completion of a credential is an issue that has increasingly demanded the attention of stakeholders in higher education, particularly in the community college sector, in which less than half of all students complete a credential after six years. The costs of student attrition are high and widespread, ranging from the financial costs for institutions and federal and state governments to the personal and monetary costs paid by those students whose personal and professional goals are not achieved. With the ever-increasing focus on accountability for institutions of higher education and the growing movement toward performance-based funding, …

Unity As The Primary Principle In A New Approach To Professional Development: Aligning Programming Through Milestone Events To Create Faculty Learning, Russell Carpenter, Charlie Sweet, Hal Blythe, Carolyn Grace

Journal of Excellence in College Teaching and Learning

Authors offer a model for unifying professional development of faculty through aligning programming based on core-learning threads. This approach allows participants to embed new knowledge into a “larger context,” which Brown, Roediger, and McDaniel (2014) argued “helps learning” (p. 6). Our Center for Teaching and Learning (CTL) unifies all events—Teaching & Learning Innovation (TLI) series sessions, Professional Learning Communities (PLCs), and faculty institutes—around these core-learning threads. This unified programming is supported by online experiences offered within the Developing Excellence in Eastern’s Professors (DEEP) system (Carpenter, 2017). Through this approach, authors use milestone events as opportunities to reinforce core-learning threads and …

Emotional Intelligence Instruction For Millennials In Undergraduate Education, Jason M. Pollett

College of Graduate Studies: Theses & Dissertations

The purpose of this study was to examine the improvement, if any, of emotional intelligence scores of students who participated in and completed the specified professional development seminar. In addition, this study aimed to examine the relationship between emotional intelligence subscales of students enrolled in a professional development seminar that focuses on enhancing the emotional intelligence. The research design for this study was an ex post facto, quasi-experimental correlational quantitative research design. Data from the 371 students who enrolled in the Professional Development Seminar course during academic years 2015-2017 served as the sample for this study.

This study focused on …

Exploring Alumni Valuation Of An Undergraduate Leadership Program, John D. Egan

College of Graduate Studies: Theses & Dissertations

This study explored alumni’ valuation of an undergraduate leadership program by gaining an understanding of what leadership learning and leadership behaviors transferred into their work environments. The alumni graduated from the same university in the southeastern United States, and while enrolled completed a four-year, co-curricular leadership program. In this mixed methods study, eight participant alumni engaged in semi-structured interviews as well as completed the Leadership Practices Inventory. Alumni perceived that leadership experiences, learning community, classroom learning, peer coaching, and intentional reflection were the most valuable attributes of the program. The leadership learning that effectively transferred to work environments included collaboration, …

The Important Role Of The Faculty Advisor In Credit-Bearing Internship Opportunities, Allison Goossens

Dissertations, Theses, and Projects

Much of the research that surrounds internships and other student experiential learning focuses on the student and the inherent benefits that they reap from such experiences. Much of this research is viewed through a developmental lens, examining how students benefit and in what conditions are conducive to the learning taking place. What is not widely noted is the work that the faculty advisors do to help facilitate that learning, ensuring that the experience is held to a high level of academic integrity. Here, the literature around this topic is explored and the importance of the faculty advisor and the role …