Education Commons^™

Passion To Purpose: An Autobiographical Narrative Inquiry Into The Development Of The Summer Ace Program, Owen Hooper

USF Tampa Graduate Theses and Dissertations

Students transitioning from high school to college are met with many challenges beyond academics including social acclimation, campus culture integration, and holistic wellness. Researchers agree that a successful and purposeful transition for incoming college students requires involvement and engagement with peers to help students adapt and increase their likelihood to graduate (Astin, 1999; Kuh, 2009; Tinto, 1998). This autobiographical narrative inquiry reflects on past experiences in assessing the needs of transitioning students at the University of South Florida and developing a purposeful programming model to support students. I aim to help the reader understand my personal commitment to these programs …

Do I Belong? What Students Teach Us About Belonging To A New University, Jennifer Ann Scaia

USF Tampa Graduate Theses and Dissertations

Foundational to this evaluation study, the participating institution aspired to improve its retention rate. Students’ perceived sense of belonging has been identified as an important variable related to student retention and persistence (Bean & Eaton, 2000; Strayhorn 2012; Strayhorn 2019; Tinto, 2017). For students to succeed beyond their first year in college, it is fundamentally important that they view themselves as valued members of the university community (Bean & Eaton, 2000; Bollen & Hoyle, 1990; Murphy, 2016).

The purpose of this study was to evaluate how undergraduate students, predicted as less likely to retain into their second year, described their …

Leader Self-Renewal: Mind, Body, Spirit Connection Inherent In Sustainable Leadership, Lasonja Roberts

USF Tampa Graduate Theses and Dissertations

This dissertation builds upon stress and burnout research on school leaders by exploring the beliefs and practices regarding well-being and self-renewal of principals identified as successful. This study utilized a 3-fold framework that consisted of mind, body, and spirit, falling under the all-encompassing umbrella of thriving, asserting the three domains work together to support the optimal well-being of the leader. The research questions were as follows: (1) In what ways are principals' well-being and self-renewal supported by principals' personal beliefs and practices, district policies and practices, and educational programs and organizations? (2) To what extent does attentiveness to well-being and …

Graduate Nursing Student Persistence To Graduation, Tyler C. Dean

USF Tampa Graduate Theses and Dissertations

The purpose of this study was to investigate whether certain student-entry characteristics collected from an admissions application from one nursing school’s graduate (master’s degree) programs had a statistically significant relationship with student persistence. Specifically, the study determined if the variables sex, age at matriculation, U.S. citizenship, state residency status, most recent schooling year, last statistics course taken and grade, graduate-level program of study, and credit hours identified on the graduate nursing admissions application and school transcripts, had a statistically significant relationship in predicting student persistence to graduation. If a relationship existed, it would contribute to graduate student persistence literature and …

Motivation Of Adult, Auditioned Community Choirs: Implications Toward Lifelong Learning, David James Redman

USF Tampa Graduate Theses and Dissertations

Knowledge of motivation factors can assist conductors and music educators at all levels in planning and implementation of musical goals. The purpose of this study was to identify motivational factors to join the choir and maintain membership in the choir as well as the role of stress/anxiety in maintaining choral membership. In addition, the role of musicianship was evaluated in terms of music aptitude and vocal ability. Participants (N=135) from four adult, auditioned community choirs participated in this study. Data was collected using Advanced Measures of Music Audiation, Singing Coach, measure of vocal ability and a questionnaire relating to topics …

Swirling: An Examination Of Time-To-Degree, Reasons, And Outcomes Associated With Multi-Institutional Transfers, Alytrice Robinson Brown

USF Tampa Graduate Theses and Dissertations

Swirling is an emergent transfer pattern among college students. Swirlers are students who may have participated in a combination of reverse transfer, lateral transfer, or traditional transfer patterns. The available research on swirling has been predominately quantitative in nature. This study was designed to obtain qualitative data on multi-institutional transfers from a qualitative perspective.

A heuristic phenomenological approach grounded in the transformational learning theory method was used to obtain data. The data were obtained via an online blog-based interview. The interview revealed six themes in regards to why students swirl. This study also addressed time-to-degree and outcomes associated with students …