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Equity In Gifted Education: Examining District Practices And Strategies To Identify Underrepresented Students Through Renzulli's Three-Ring Conception Of Giftedness, Kenneth M. Jackson

Doctor of Education Dissertations

This mixed methods study explored the effectiveness of a large South Carolina school district’s gifted identification practices, with particular attention to how well these practices support the identification of students from underrepresented populations. Framed by Renzulli’s (1978) Three-Ring Conception of Giftedness, the research investigated the extent to which the district’s procedures identify students using the model’s core indicators: above-average ability, creativity, and task commitment. Seven district practitioners, including teachers and administrators, participated in quantitative surveys, follow-up qualitative interviews, and a focus group. Findings revealed significant concerns about the overreliance on standardized academic measures, the exclusion of creativity and task commitment …

Teacher And Parent Perspectives Of Young Children's Development Since The Covid-19 Pandemic In A Rural Public School District, Regina L. Lineback

Doctor of Education Dissertations

Face to face education for young children was interrupted in March of 2020 due to mandatory school closures precipitated by the COVID-19 pandemic. Virtual learning was forced upon teachers and students at a time when many families and teachers had limited or no access to internet. When face to face learning resumed, teachers and students were required to wear facial masks and maintain social distancing protocols. This study sought to explore teacher and parent perspectives of young children’s development in a rural public school district since the COVID-19 pandemic. A qualitative study was completed using teacher interviews, a teacher focus …

Cræft-Ing The Assembly: Political Vision In The Age Of Alfred, Megan Renz Perry

Yale Graduate School of Arts and Sciences Dissertations

This dissertation presents an early medieval vision of pastoral education and its desired political effects through analysis of the Old English Pastoral Care, which was translated from Latin in the ninth-century Alfredian educational revival. My study is grounded in the educational formation of the clerics whom Alfred recruited in the decade prior to the initiative: men of letters from neighboring Wales, Mercia, and Francia. These grammarian-translators envisioned forming vernacular readers in prudentia, that is, practical wisdom. I read Latin and Old English sources in light of the educational (chs. I- III), linguistic (ch. IV), philosophical (ch. V), and political (ch. …

The Influence Of Letrs Volume 1 On Elementary Teachers’ Perceptions And Practices Around Systematic Phonics Instruction In A Rural School In North Carolina, Katherine P. Wise

Doctor of Education Dissertations

This dissertation is a mixed methods study that examined the influence Language Essentials for Teachers of Reading and Spelling (LETRS) Volume 1 had on elementary educators’ perceptions and practices around systematic phonics instruction in a rural, Title I elementary school in North Carolina. Adult learning theory was the theoretical framework used to ground this study. A sequential explanatory design was used: Quantitative data were collected through surveys, and qualitative data gathered through interviews were used to help frame and explain the quantitative data. Both data sources overwhelmingly supported that the completion of this professional learning positively influenced teachers’ perceptions of …

Deus Absconditus: Revelation Of The Hidden And Incomprehensible God As Seen In The Theologies Of Martin Luther And Karl Barth, Kylan A. Kracher

Theology Projects & Theses

The term Deus absconditus comes from the Latin Vulgate translation of Isaiah 45:15. “Truly, you are a God who hides himself [ESV],” wrote the prophet. The history of understanding God’s hiddenness traces back to antiquity and is a theme frequented in the Bible. The scriptures repeatedly indicate that God’s presence is not entirely comprehensible. The early church explored the inaccessible attributes of God, and many church fathers wrote of the properties of God out of their meditations on His incomprehensibility. However, by the time of the medieval church, powerful Aristotelian logic had become the core tool of church theology, which …

African-American Perceptions On The Importance Of Racially-Concordant Care, John Moya

Nursing | Senior Theses

Racial concordance is defined as a relationship in which a healthcare provider and patient share the same race. Racially concordant care has been, in previous research, associated with improved health outcomes, particularly in minority populations such as African-Americans Despite this, little is known about how African-American patients perceive racial concordance, and how important it is to their care. The focus of this research proposal is to determine the perceptions of African-American patients on racial concordance and racially concordant care, and how important they deem it to be to their care. The literature review delves into racial concordance and its presence …

Evaluating Pulmonary Tuberculosis Knowledge Deficits Among Nursing Students In The United States, Jamie Lynn Woo

Nursing | Senior Theses

The healthcare field consistently faces patients with a wide range of diseases and illnesses. Pulmonary Tuberculosis is an infectious lung disease with established tools to prevent, detect, and treat it. Yet, there has been a significant rise in cases within the past year. Amidst this troubling situation, it is crucial that all healthcare workers, nursing students, and nurses in particular, are properly educated on caring for TB patients. This research proposal aims to determine if there are TB treatment knowledge gaps among nursing students in the United States by conducting a 20-question survey utilizing the Likert Scale. If results show …

The Impact Of A Educational Program On Depression And Anxiety For Low Socioeconomic Latina Postpartum Mothers, Lizbeth Valdez Duran

Nursing | Senior Theses

Postpartum depression (PPD) and anxiety are significant mental health challenges that affect many mothers, especially Latina women with low socioeconomic backgrounds. These mothers often face barriers to care, health literacy, and access to healthcare resources. The problem is compounded by a lack of culturally competent care, which can contribute to mistrust of healthcare providers and discourage Latina mothers from seeking help. The literature review articles highlight that health literacy plays a crucial role in managing mental health, with effective education potentially reducing negative outcomes by improving coping strategies and bringing awareness to symptoms that are associated with postpartum. This research …

Seeking Safety And Losing The Self: Affirmative Action Bans And The Whitening Of Mexican American Identity, Bella Bennett

Indiana Journal of Law and Social Equality

No abstract provided.

Vamos A Pláticar Sobre Nuestra Historia: De Mi Relación Con Mi Familia Al Éxito, Ana K. Pizano

Dissertations of Practice

This plática qualitative study explored how family engagement influences the college experiences of Latino/a/x students at a two-year public community college in the Midwest. This research was guided by Yosso’s Community Cultural Wealth Model to help provide insights into how familial capital assists in navigating the college journey for Latino/a/x students using an asset-based perspective. This research aimed to help better understand the lived experiences of Latino/a/x students and their families at the 2-year Midwest public community college and to challenge the deficit-oriented views of Latino/a/x family engagement in Western culture through the sharing of Latino/a/x students' and families’ stories. …

Political Cults On College Campuses: How Universities Designed To Challenge Totalitarian Thinking May Now Enable It, Ellie Lerner

CMC Senior Theses

Cults are typically associated with fringe religious or spiritual movements rather than political causes. Yet as American politics increasingly supplants religion as a central source of identity and belonging, our political culture has taken on more cult-like characteristics. This thesis develops a framework for identifying political cults by synthesizing scholarly work on ideological totalism, psychological manipulation, and group dynamics. It then applies this framework to assess the rise of anti-Israel protests on U.S. college campuses in the wake of the October 7th terrorist attack. While this thesis finds that this movement should not be classified as a political cult outright, …

Ethnic Politics And Fiscal Dominance: Implications For Currency Union Formation In Sub-Saharan Africa, Benjamin D. Keen, Christine O. Strong

Economics Faculty Publications

Numerous currency unions have been proposed in Africa over the past 50 years, but none have succeeded. This paper asserts ethnic favouritism is a crucial yet often overlooked feature that strongly influences an African government’s willingness to join a currency union. We use a Barro and Gordon (1983) style model that incorporates fiscal dominance, political business cycles and ethnic favouritism to assess the benefits and costs to African households and governments of joining a currency union. Our results show that ethnic alignment between the head of state and central bank governor amplifies fiscal dominance, which reduces an African government’s desire …

After Identity: Reverse Discrimination, Anti-Essentialism, And The Future Of Title Vii, Maayan Sudai, Lihi Yona

SMU Law Review

This Article argues that the Supreme Court’s unanimous decision in Ames v. Ohio Department of Youth Services marks a turning point in Title VII’s long-standing struggle with identity. By striking down the “background circumstances” rule, a doctrine that required majority-group plaintiffs to meet a heightened evidentiary burden, the Court appeared at first glance to reaffirm its steady march toward strict anticlassification. We offer a different reading. We contend that Ames gestures toward a third, overlooked normative framework within antidiscrimination law: anti-essentialism. This framework, rooted in feminist, critical race, and queer theory, rejects both the rigidity of anticlassification and the categorical …

Disorienting "Western" Viewers With Nacer Khemir's Desert Trilogy, Kristian Peterson

Philosophy Faculty Publications

In this essay, I explore tensions that arise when creating alternative cinematic visions of Muslim life, specifically frictions emerging from the goal of shifting public perception of the community and patterns of self-orientalization. Here, I complicate assumptions about the representation of Islam by looking at a self-articulated presentation of Muslims through the narrative feature series the Desert Trilogy, by Tunisian director Nacer Khemir (born 1948). I argue that Khemir is ensnared by ahistorical Islamic nostalgia and largely reinforces romantic orientalist aesthetics in his films. While his portrait of Muslims is much more “positive” than those in the broader archive, it …

Application Of Fuzzy Logic For Evaluation Of Student Performance, M. Tomovic, C. Tomovic, V. Jovanovic, S. Bawab

Engineering Technology Faculty Publications

The evaluation of student performance is a multifaceted process that traditionally relies on rigid grading systems, often failing to capture the complexity of student abilities and learning dynamics. This paper explores the application of fuzzy logic to enhance the accuracy and adaptability of student performance evaluation. By leveraging fuzzy logic principles, such as membership functions and linguistic variables, we model and assess the various factors influencing student performance—ranging from academic grades to engagement, participation, and personal learning styles. The approach allows for the representation of imprecise, uncertain, and subjective data, offering a more holistic view of a student’s progress. We …

Analysis Of Pre-Service Teachers’ Personal Metaphors About Foreign Language Teaching, Juan Luis De La Montaña Conchiña, Guadalupe De La Maya Retamar, Magdalena López-Pérez

Australian Journal of Teacher Education

This study analyses the characterisation and evolution of the personal metaphors of a sample of 34 trainee foreign language teachers, through a questionnaire of open-ended questions that included asking the participants to make drawings representing the roles of the teacher. Four categories of metaphors were considered for the analysis: behaviourist/transmissive, cognitivist/constructivist, situated, and self-referential. The results indicate that most participants were able to conceptualise their image of the teacher in the form of metaphors. The pre-service teachers’ metaphors represented are mainly cognitivist/constructivist and behaviourist/transmissive. When comparing them before and after the internship in the primary schools, most of them did …

Unveiling Raciolinguistic Ideologies: Pre-Service Teachers’ Insights On Refugee Integration In Schools, Tuba Yilmaz, Rosanna Ellis

Australian Journal of Teacher Education

This study investigates pre-service teachers' ideologies about refugee students' belonging and integration in Türkiye and examines how these ideologies shape their anticipated pedagogical practices. Using the framework of raciolinguistic ideologies, the study highlights how linguistic and cultural hierarchies influence educational practices, often perpetuating systemic exclusion. Data were collected through in-depth interviews with 13 pre-service teachers from various educational programs, utilizing a qualitative, phenomenological design. The findings reveal a predominant reliance on deficit-based perspectives, with refugee students framed as linguistically deficient and culturally "othered." While participants expressed professional commitments to inclusivity, their approaches often emphasized assimilation into Turkish norms, reflecting cultural …

Teacher Training For Diversity: Analyzing Inclusive And Intercultural Education In Early Childhood Degrees Of Three Universities Located In Spain, France And Columbia, Odet Moliner, Aida Sanahuja, Daniel Niclot, Mariaangelica Yazzo

Australian Journal of Teacher Education

This study examines the integration of inclusive and intercultural education principles in the Bachelor’s Degree in Early Childhood Education at three Universities located in Spain, France and Colombia. An analysis of 116 course syllabi is conducted to identify the specific references to Universal Design for Learning, accessibility, inclusion, diversity and interculturality. A second content analysis was conducted to categorize the units of meaning into four categories and determine the predominant underlying approach to the use of the term 'inclusion' in each degree program. The results indicate that the concepts of accessibility and UDL are the least represented, followed by …

Harmonising The Rhythm Of Drumming With The Silence Of Meditation: An Autoethnography Of Initial Teacher Education (Ite), Elly S. Thomson

Australian Journal of Teacher Education

This article presents an autoethnographic examination of how my professional experiences inform and resist the cultural swing towards over standardisation in Initial Teacher Education (ITE) over the past twenty years. This has been articulated through five ‘turning point moments’ as reflective narratives from my professional journey. Drawing on epistemic reflexivity, this study highlights the risks of homogenising the teaching profession, arguing for an equity-focused approach that values diverse pathways and fosters inclusive classrooms. From this perspective, the paper critiques the current trends towards standardised, one-size-fits-all ITE entry requirements and conforming curriculum. The findings suggest the potential risks of such …

"I Always Thought That I Could Be Both Gay And Religious, But I Am Not So Sure Anymore": A Conversation Of The Lived Experiences Of Gay Men At Religious Institutions, Christopher Smith

Dissertations of Practice

This Dissertation of Practice explores how gay men navigate their identities while attending religiously conservative colleges and universities. These institutions often create conflict between students’ sexual identities and their faith before college life. Rather than focus on the voids or deficit, this study focused on how students are able to feel a sense of belonging through each other, even when support form Faculty and Staff is not always present. Guided by Bronfenbrenner’s Ecological Systems Theory, this study examines how interactions at multiple levels—from peers and faculty to institutional policies and broader society—play an impact in their college experience.

Using a …

Grading Ecosystems And The Work Of Teaching: Educator Perspectives On Implementing And Sustaining Ungraded Learning Practices, Aliaa Kamara-Ibrahim

Dissertations of Practice

This qualitative study examined the perceptions of ungraded learning environments and their implications for student motivation, equity, and assessment practice. A qualitative interview methodology was utilized. Semi-structured interviews were conducted with fifteen K–12 educators from the Chicagoland and North Shore regions. Data were analyzed using reflexive thematic analysis to identify convergent and divergent patterns in practice and belief.

Findings indicate that ungraded environments reposition accountability around evidence of learning, feedback cycles, and student reflection. At the classroom level, feedback routines, portfolio curation, and teacher moderation served as the backbone of rigor and coherence. Participants described increased persistence and metacognition when …

Apoyando A Nuestra Gente: Latino/A/É Staff Testimonios Of Mentorship, Cultural Wealth, And Resistance At Hispanic-Serving Institutions, Alex Torres

Dissertations of Practice

APOYANDO A NUESTRA GENTE: LATINO/A/É STAFF TESTIMONIOS OF MENTORSHIP, CULTURAL WEALTH, AND RESISTANCE AT HISPANIC-SERVING INSTITUTIONS

Alex Torres, Ed.D. Department of Counseling and Higher Education Northern Illinois University, 2025 Quortne R. Hutchings, Director

Latino/a/é students are one of the fastest-growing student populations across universities and colleges in the United States. Understanding the experiences of the Latino/a/é support staff who work with these students, as well as the challenges they face at Hispanic-Serving Institutions (HSIs), can be beneficial in finding where they can best be supported to fully serve students. This study explored the testimonios of Latino/a/é staff at HSIs in …

How Do First-Generation Latinx Students At An Hsi Community College Navigate Financial Aid Barriers?, Gema M. Mariscal

Dissertations of Practice

ABSTRACT

HOW DO FIRST-GENERATION LATINX STUDENTS AT AN HIS COMMUNITY COLLEGE NAVIGATE FINANCIAL AID BARRIERS?

Gema M. Mariscal, Ed.D.

Department of Counseling and Higher Education

Northern Illinois University, 2025

Gudrun Nyunt, Director

This dissertation looks at how first-generation Latinx students at a Hispanic-Serving Institution (HSI) community college navigate financial aid barriers. While there has been plenty of research on HSIs around enrollment and persistence, much less has been said about the daily struggles students face with financial aid; the forms, the systems, and the policies that often feel overwhelming. Guided by critical race theory (CRT), Latino critical theory (LatCrit), and …

Maine State Franco-American Hall Of Fame Inductees, State Of Maine, Franco-American Collection, University Of Southern Maine

Maine State Franco-American Hall of Fame

A list of Maine State Franco-American Hall of Fame recipients, 2002-2025.

The document features inductee bios and relevant links.

Voices Of High School Writers: Exploring Perceptions And Experiences In Secondary Writing Education, Emily Wisniewski

West Chester University Doctoral Projects

This study explores how high school writers develop their writing identities and how their writing identities impact students' writing self-efficacy. This study emphasized how high school writers’ experiences with academic and creative writing, teacher and peer feedback, and personal beliefs about writing shape how they view themselves as writers and their abilities to create and complete a writing task. Utilizing a hybrid methodology through hermeneutic phenomenology and social cognitive theory, this study examines the lived experiences of eight participants in southeastern Pennsylvania. Through journals, interviews, and artifact collection, this study identified key themes such as writing identity development, influences in …

Bridging Language Barriers: How Secondary Teachers Support English Language Learners In The Classroom, Mason Daniel Smith

West Chester University Doctoral Projects

English Language Learners (ELLs) represent a growing student population in U.S. secondary schools, yet many educators feel underprepared to support their unique needs effectively. This mixed-methods study examines how Pennsylvania high school teachers approach the teaching of ELLs, focusing on their self-efficacy, instructional decision-making, and strategies for fostering an inclusive classroom community. Using an exploratory sequential mixed methods design, data was collected through surveys from a limited group of 40 high school educators followed by in-depth interviews with three participants. Findings revealed that while teachers express a strong desire to support ELLs, they often experience uncertainty and frustration due to …

Flags As Symbols Of Place: Unpacking Geographic Meaning And Identity In Student Flag Designs, Carlos A. Morales-Ramirez

West Chester University Doctoral Projects

Flags have been around for centuries; however, vexillology, the study of flags, was not officially coined until the 1960s. Despite this, there is still a need for more scientific and empirical research. Using qualitative arts-based research (ABR) methodology, this study investigates the creative journey of students in an undergraduate geography course as they design a flag for a place of their choosing. Students were asked to interpret the concept of ‘place’ through their flag designs while also incorporating flag design principles. The results showed that participants selected places tied to themes such as hometown, family, love, memories, and culture often …

Exploring Slp & Special Education Clinicians' Readiness For Diversity, Amiya Carreras

Brehm Scholars Research

No abstract provided.

Eng 110: Narrative Essay, Justine Matias

Open Educational Resources

This assignment asks students to compose a reflective narrative essay examining a significant moment in their language and literacy development. Drawing from literacy studies and linguistic justice frameworks, the assignment positions students' diverse language experiences—including multilingualism, code-switching, and various communication modes—as valuable resources for meaning-making rather than deficits requiring correction. Students select a meaningful personal moment related to language or literacy, develop it through rich sensory detail and narrative techniques, and analyze its broader social significance by connecting individual experience to larger cultural, educational, or societal patterns. The assignment incorporates Universal Design for Learning principles through multiple pathways for success: …

Eng 110 Language And Literacy Narrative And Rhetorical Analysis, Catrina E. Vininski, Missy Watson

Open Educational Resources

The assignment gives students the option to either write a narrative based on their own experience with language and literacy, utilizing aspects of the rhetorical situation, or write a rhetorical analysis based on a text of their choice while applying the rhetorical situation. Both options include an overview of the assignment, along with requirements and a rubric. This is intended to be taught in the middle of the semester, after the instructor has already thoroughly explained the rhetorical situation and students have been given the opportunity to apply their learning.