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Ignatian Pedagogy For Sustainability To Support Community-Based Projects: Client-Focused Sustainable Energy Solutions, Andrew Baruth

Jesuit Higher Education: A Journal

Seeing the words of Laudato Si’ as a call to action, we are engaging students in Ignatian Pedagogy for Sustainability through a series of community-based projects with the goal of client-focused sustainable energy solutions and associated dialogue. We outline the development of a purpose-created Energy Technology undergraduate program housed in the College of Arts and Sciences at Creighton University, born from Ignatian Sensibilities, and highlight the role of client engagement to engross students in a client-focused design process to deliver sustainable energy initiatives that become practically feasible with student leadership. For the senior capstone of this program, students engage in …

The Implementation Of Ignatian Pedagogy In A Jesuit University In Indonesia: Students’ Perspectives, Monica Ella Harendita, Titik Kristiyani, Margaretha Madha Melissa, Hongki Julie

Jesuit Higher Education: A Journal

The goal of Jesuit Education is to grow a whole person through its signature Ignatian Pedagogy. When entering Indonesia, it surely has its own uniqueness. Thus, this study aims at exploring how the Ignatian Pedagogy is implemented in teaching and learning process in a Jesuit University in Indonesia. This qualitative study used questionnaires to collect the data from 613 students. The results revealed some significant findings related to each element. In Context, the lecturers have made some efforts to understand the students’ backgrounds through direct interaction in and outside the classroom as well as through social media. In Experience, the …

The Sons Report (1989-1994, Mathematical Association Of America): The Way It Was, Linda R. Sons

Numeracy

Recollections and commentary by Linda R. Sons on a 1994 national report entitled Quantitative Reasoning for College Graduates: A Complement to the Standards. Professor Sons chaired the committee which wrote the report and championed its use.

This paper traces the development of the 1994 MAA report Quantitative Reasoning for College Graduates: A Complement to the Standards--a report which is still surprisingly relevant. The paper highlights some major parts of the report, describing the context in which its conclusions were made. Additionally, it challenges and encourages those continuing the quest for QL in the nation by noting progress made …

Developing Mathematics Teachers’ Attention To Quantitative Reasoning In Task Design: A Modeling Approach, David Glassmeyer

Numeracy

This study examines how a models-and-modeling perspective affected teachers' attention to quantitative reasoning in task design. A Model-Eliciting Activity (MEA) was implemented with 21 teachers over four weeks, challenging teachers to design a quantitative reasoning task for their students. Teachers’ initial quantitative reasoning tasks did not incorporate quantities or quantitative relationships, two essential components of quantitative reasoning. As teachers revised their tasks through the MEA, most teachers began attending to these components. This article details how a modeling approach to teacher education provided a method to describe and support teachers to incorporate quantitative reasoning in their classroom tasks, though attending …

The Second Decade Of Numeracy: Entering The Seas Of Literacy, H. L. Vacher

Numeracy

This multipurpose editorial explores and tries to count the many types of literacy that are referred to by name in Wikipedia and Numeracy. Wikipedia’s Category:Literacy page identifies 44 kinds of literacy that are the subject of articles, ranging from numeracy and graphicacy to braille literacy and diaspora literacy. In addition, searching Google finds more than 30 adjective-literacy or noun-literacy collocations, including quantitative literacy, adult literacy, and document literacy, that do not have Wikipedia pages of their own but are mentioned on other Wikipedia pages. The sum puts this modest literacy count in line with the more than 70 bodies …

Numeracy And Social Justice: A Wide, Deep, And Longstanding Intersection, Kira Hamman, Victor Piercey, Samuel L. Tunstall

Numeracy

We discuss the connection between the numeracy and social justice movements both in historical context and in its modern incarnation. The intersection between numeracy and social justice encompasses a wide variety of disciplines and quantitative topics, but within that variety there are important commonalities. We examine the importance of sound quantitative measures for understanding social issues and the necessity of interdisciplinary collaboration in this work. Particular reference is made to the papers in the first part of the Numeracy special collection on social justice, which appear in this issue.

On "Icky" Data, The Political Classroom, And Towards Equity And Social Justice In Mathematics Education: A Conversation With Tonya Bartell, Samuel L. Tunstall, Oyemolade Osibodu, Tonya Gau Bartell

Numeracy

Tonya G. Bartell, ed. 2018. Towards Equity and Social Justice in Mathematics Education (Switzerland: Springer International Publishing) 341 pp. ISBN 978-3319929064.

This brief interview with Tonya Bartell introduces Towards Equity and Social Justice in Mathematics Education to the Numeracy audience. The interviewers also discuss with Tonya connections between quantitative literacy and mathematics for social justice, particularly in the context of US K-12 schooling. Tonya shares her perspective on topics ranging from the placement of quantitative literacy in K-12 mathematics education and how one might get started in incorporating a social justice lens into their teaching to paradigms for research …

Measuring, Mapping And Quantifying The Effects Of Trust And Informal Communication On Transboundary Collaboration In The Great Lakes Fisheries Policy Network, Andrew M. Song, Owen Temby, Dongkyu Kim, Angel Saavedra Cisneros, Gordon M. Hickey

School of Earth, Environmental, & Marine Sciences Faculty Publications

Ecosystem-based management of fisheries and other transboundary natural resources require a number of organizations across jurisdictions to exchange knowledge, coordinate policy goals and engage in collaborative activities. Trust, as part of social capital, is considered a key mechanism facilitating the coordination of such inter-organizational policy networks. However, our understanding of multi-dimensional trust as a theoretical construct and an operational variable in environmental and natural resource management has remained largely untested. This paper presents an empirical assessment of trust and communication measures applied to the North American Great Lakes fisheries policy network. Using a scale-based method developed for this purpose, we …

Presentations & Infographics, Quality Blended Learning Consortium

Open Educational Resources

This tutorial introduces the users to the fundamental concepts on how to create presentations and infographics, as well as provides guidance on the tools to be used, best practices, and mistakes to avoid. The tutorial includes quizzes for self-assessment.

High-Speed Distributed Data Process Of Photometric Astronomical Data, Paul Doyle

Other

Since the 1970s the CCD has been the principle method of measuring flux to calculate the apparent magnitude of celestial objects within astronomical photometry. Each CCD image must be digitally cleaned and calibrated prior to its use. As data archives increase in size to Petabytes, the data processing challenge requires image processing techniques to continue to exceed the rate of data capture.

This paper describes NIMBUS, a rapidly scalable, failure resilient distributed network architecture capable of processing CCD image data at a rate of hundreds of Terabytes per day. NIMBUS is implemented using a decentralized web queue to control the …

Two Protective Mechanisms In The Relation Of Stress And Life Satisfaction: Testing The Function Of Strength-Based Parenting And Personal Growth Initiative, Brianna Stith

Electronic Theses and Dissertations Archive

The current study examined the function of strength-based parenting and personal growth initiative in the relation between university-related stress and life satisfaction in undergraduate students. Two types of moderation models were formulated to test the relations among the main variables, including a multiple moderator model and a moderated moderation model. Six types of university-related stressors were measured, and each stressor was the predictor in separate models. Data was collected from 353 undergraduate students (age range 18-23, 73.9% female) at a public university. Analyses of the multiple moderation model found that personal growth initiative significantly moderated the relation between practical stressors …

Examining Exclusionary Discipline Practices: Utilizing Response To Instruction And Intervention For Behavior As An Innovation For Change In Attendance And Suspension Rates Within Three Rural Elementary Schools In Tennessee, Lauren Tate

Electronic Theses and Dissertations Archive

Widespread school discipline problems came to forefront in the educational arena in the 1990s (lm & Vuran, 2016). Exclusionary practices (e.g., in- or out-of-school suspension, strict rules, or punishment [Skiba & Peterson, 2000]), also known as traditional school discipline practices (TSDP) (Scheuermann & Hall, 2011) have become common behavioral practices across the American public education landscape (U.S. Department of Education, 2016). These practices remove students from instruction, often resulting in detrimental impacts to student performance (Edward & Brea, 2016), and have neither positive effects on student behavior (Ogulmus & Vuran, 2016) nor positive longevity effects (Costenbader & Markson, 1998).In support …

Applications Of Sparse Representations, Pulin Agrawal

Electronic Theses and Dissertations Archive

In this dissertation I explore the properties and uses of sparse representations. Sparse representations use high dimensional binary vectors for representing information. They have many properties which make this representation useful for applications involving pattern recognition in highly noisy and complex environments. Sparse representations have a very high capacity. A typical sparse representation vector has a capacity of 10^84 distinct vectors, which is more than the number of atoms in the universe. Sparse representations are highly noise robust. They can tolerate even up to 50% noise. A very powerful and useful property of sparse representations is that they allow us …

A Simulation-Enhanced Intraoperative Planning Tool For Robotic-Assisted Total Knee Arthroplasty, Daniel Farley

Electronic Theses and Dissertations Archive

The purpose of the present study was to investigate current methods of surgical planning used in conjunction with robotics-assisted total knee arthroplasty (raTKA) to determine if improvements could be made using advanced computational techniques. Thus, through the use of musculoskeletal multi-body dynamic simulations, an enhanced surgical planning tool was developed, which provides insight on active postoperative joint mechanics. Development of the tool relied on patient-specific simulations using single-leg and full-body models. These simulations were constructed using two publicly-available datasets (Orthoload and SimTK); in particular, joint loading data obtained from subjects during various activities. Simulation parameters were optimized using a design-of …

Active Perception By Interaction With Other Agents In A Predictive Coding Framework: Application To Internet Of Things Environment, Masoumeh Heidari Kapourchali

Electronic Theses and Dissertations Archive

Predicting the state of an agent's partially-observable environment is a problem of interest in many domains. Typically in the real world, the environment consists of multiple agents, not necessarily working towards a common goal. Though the goal and sensory observation for each agent is unique, one agent might have acquired some knowledge that may benefit the other. In essence, the knowledge base regarding the environment is distributed among the agents. An agent can sample this distributed knowledge base by communicating with other agents. Since an agent is not storing the entire knowledge base, its model can be small and its …

The Effects Of A Mobile App-Based Sky Map In Teaching College Students About Constellations, Aklilu Maasho

Electronic Theses and Dissertations Archive

The purpose of this study was to investigate the effects of using a mobile app-based sky map to teach college students about constellations, stars, nebulae, and star clusters. The name of the app was Star Chart. The setting for the study was a community college in West Tennessee. Twenty out of 60 participants were males, with 83% of all being less than 25 years old. The first effect studied was concerning students level of attitude toward astronomy after they used the mobile app to learn about sky constellations, stars, nebulae, and star clusters. The second effect investigated in the study …

Deeper Understanding Of Tutorial Dialogues And Student Assessment, Nabin Nabin Maharjan

Electronic Theses and Dissertations Archive

Bloom (1984) reported two standard deviation improvement with human tutoring which inspired many researchers to develop Intelligent Tutoring Systems (ITSs) that are as effective as human tutoring. However, recent studies suggest that the 2-sigma result was misleading and that current ITSs are as good as human tutors. Nevertheless, we can think of 2 standard deviations as the benchmark for tutoring effectiveness of ideal expert tutors. In the case of ITSs, there is still the possibility that ITSs could be better than humans.One way to improve the ITSs would be identifying, understanding, and then successfully implementing effective tutorial strategies that lead …

The Impact Of Social Justice Pedagogy On Transformational Resistance In Low-Socioeconomic, African American Students, Jalesa Parks

Electronic Theses and Dissertations Archive

This study focuses on bridging the gap in the literature as it relates to the use of social justice pedagogy as a proactive means by which to address the achievement gap, inherent biases, and deficit views of low-socioeconomic, African American students in todays schools. Research questions for the study are as follows: 1) What practices within social justice pedagogy do students find to be distinct from traditional classroom practices? 2) How do Black students perceive the impact of social justice pedagogy on their Transformative Resistance? 3) How do Black students perceive the impact of social justice pedagogy on their self-efficacy …

Teachers Meaning-Making Process Of Yoga As An Embodied Self-Regulation Tool In High School Environments: The High School Yoga Mat Study, Andrea Paige Pirkey

Electronic Theses and Dissertations Archive

In yoga-research applied to education, yoga is viewed as an embodied self-regulation (ESR) tool to benefit students and teachers thoughts, emotions, behaviors, and physiology. Yoga is being widely implemented into schools to facilitate academic and non-academic growth and development. Teachers are essential in providing yoga as an ESR tools to students and supporting ESR development. To understand yoga as a tool for teaching and learning ESR, this research explores three areas: (1) initial phase of introducing and educating teachers about school-based, yoga program implementation; (2) the complexities of teachers meaning-making (M-M) and learning process in understanding yoga as a tool; …

The Relation Among Phonological Processing, Oral And Silent Reading Fluency, And Reading Comprehension For Students With Dyslexia: A Longitudinal Investigation, Melissa Fetterer Robinson

Electronic Theses and Dissertations Archive

The purpose of this study was to examine the relations among phonological skills, oral and silent reading fluency, and reading comprehension for a longitudinal sample of students who have been diagnosed with dyslexia. Only two studies to date have modeled the relation between oral and silent reading fluency and comprehension, of which only one addressed phonological processing. No studies to date have modeled these relations in students with dyslexia. Participants in this study were 104 students in grades 2-5 with dyslexia, who were administered oral and silent reading fluency and comprehension assessments and selected phonological processing measures at the beginning …

Computational Thinking Self-Efficacy In High School Latin Language Learning, Dennis Clark Dickerson, Jr.

Electronic Theses and Dissertations Archive

Research suggests that computational thinking is a necessary skill exercised in STEM courses, non-STEM fields, and in everyday life. However, very little research has investigated the potential transfer of computational thinking self-efficacy available through classical Latin courses. This causal comparative study contrasted the computational thinking self-efficacy of computer science students with no exposure to Latin to computer science students with exposure to Latin at a Memphis all-boy high school. The independent variables were Latin language learning experience, i.e., up to 6 years total of Latin language learning (n = 33), versus 0 years of Latin language learning experience (n = …

Atomistic Models To Study Thermodynamics And Kinetics Of Solid-Liquid And Solid-Solid Transitions In Binary Metals, Seyed Alireza Alireza Etesami

Electronic Theses and Dissertations Archive

Design of novel materials and novel manufacturing process requires understandingthermophysical properties of materials during their process and working conditions.Microstructure of materials, which is usually, consists of grains, phases, and defectsdetermines the overall physical and mechanical properties of materials. Specifically inmetals, the formation of solid crystal from liquid is considered as one of the most importantfactors during the solidification, which can elucidate the final formation of microstructureof materials. The experimental study of the phenomena related to the coexistence of solidliquid phases is generally arduous, because the experiments are needed to be carried out atthe melting points of the materials. Thanks to …

The Impact Of Task Difficulty On Reading Comprehension Intervention With Computer Agents, Ying Fang

Electronic Theses and Dissertations Archive

According to Vygotskys zone of proximal development (ZPD), students benefit from tasks that are difficult but can be achieved with the guidance of a skilled partner. This concept has often been implemented during the development of intelligent tutoring systems (ITSs), but there remains a need to empirically investigate the validity of this concept in reading comprehension interventions. Individual differences need to be considered in order to assign tasks to individual students with the right level of difficulty. Mixed results have emerged from previous research that specifically investigated the potential interaction between student attributes and ITSs on learning in the domain …

The Relationship Between Student Achievement, Teacher Effectiveness, Merit Pay, And Selective Teacher Demographics In A Rural School District, Jill Webb Faulkner

Electronic Theses and Dissertations Archive

Teacher merit pay has become popular among policymakers to meet accountability mandates related teacher effectiveness and student achievement. Legislation at the federal level has provided grants and financial incentives to state and local districts to implement merit pay plans. In 2013, Tennessee required all districts to develop a differentiated compensation plan by revising an earlier differentiated compensation policy from 2008. With more rigorous standards and testing at the forefront of education reform in Tennessee, the rural school district in this study developed a strategic compensation plan with bonus pay based on student test scores as one of the components. The …

The Perception Of Online Degree Programs: An Instrumental Case Study Of Two-Year Community Colleges In Louisiana, Amy Cable

Electronic Theses and Dissertations Archive

While there may be high demand for and an increased interest in pursuing distance education, the education obtained may not translate into jobs or careers, and the inability to secure a position is related to the hiring practices within organizations. Potential employers may hold a bias towards graduates of online degree programs. The purpose of this mixed-method, instrumental case study was to understand the hiring process within higher education and to understand the impact distance education and online degree education has on the hiring process within community colleges in Louisiana. The participants included administrators who served on a hiring committee …

Assessing The Effectiveness Of The Academic Strategies Course For Students On First Academic Probation Status, Scedella Clemons

Electronic Theses and Dissertations Archive

The purpose of this quantitative, correlational study was to examine the influence that completion of course module activities in an academic strategies course have on academic probation students academic achievement (change in term GPA) and semester-to-semester retention, while considering potentially influential demographic and environmental variables. There were two research questions included in this study: How does completion of course module activities (predictor variable) predict academic achievement (criterion variable), measured by change in term GPA, of first-time academic probation students enrolled in an academic strategies course and how does completion of course module activities (predictor variable) predict semester to semester retention …

Nontraditional Students Academic Success Experiences At A Large Public University In The American South: A Phenomenological Investigation, Megan Elizabeth Russell

Electronic Theses and Dissertations Archive

This article explored the academic experiences of nontraditional students enrolled in an undergraduate degree program. For the purposes of this study students were deemed to be nontraditional if they met one of the following characteristics: had delayed enrollment into postsecondary education; attended college part-time; worked full time; were financially independent for financial aid purposes; had dependents other than a spouse; were a single parent; and/or were a GED recipient (NCES, n.d.). The researcher sought to justify the importance of gleaning additional information regarding different components of the learning processes and academic experiences in which nontraditional students were engaged in throughout …

I Am A Quiet Struggler: Conceptualizing The Identities Of Muslim American High School Students Within The Context Of Islamophobia., Wesam M. Salem

Electronic Theses and Dissertations Archive

The spread of Islamophobia in the U.S. positioned Muslims as different and inferior to American society and racialized their experiences by subjecting them to narratives of prejudices and stereotypes. This postcolonial interview study examined how Muslim American high school students conceptualized and negotiated their racialized identities within the context of Islamophobia and how the negotiation processes informed their learning in school, particularly the construction of their mathematics identity. The study built on postcolonial theorists, mathematics research, and decolonizing approaches to research to interrogate and (un)settle traditional and predetermined interviewing practices. Participants included six high school students (2 males and four …

Building Self-Efficacy And Persistence Through Stem E-Mentor Training: A Multi-Site Case Study, Kathryn Marie Sharpe

Electronic Theses and Dissertations Archive

The limited number of women persisting in STEM degree programs and pursuing STEM careers is concerning, particularly when one considers the absence of minority women in this field. One way of addressing this issue is to explore avenues that build womens STEM self-efficacy. Providing connections with other more experienced women involved in STEM through e-mentoring is one approach that could give women the support and experience they need to feel confident in their ability to succeed in STEM fields. Highly qualified mentors are a key component in the mentoring process and, therefore, need focused training that prepares them to support …

An Analysis Of Principals' Perceptions Of Their Levels Of Response To Instruction And Intervention, Kathryn King Redditt

Electronic Theses and Dissertations Archive

Recent resounding dialogue surrounding school improvement has led to reform initiatives including Response to Instruction and Intervention (RTI2). Although all 50 states have implemented some form of an RTI model, Tennessees state-wide framework to address struggling learners has placed us at the forefront of educational reform. The Response to Instruction and Intervention (RTI2) initiative in Tennessee was implemented as a framework for teaching and learning to ensure success for all learners through a model of high expectations and supports for students. The lack of research surrounding the perceptions of principals regarding RTI2 in their respective schools and districts has created …