Education Commons^™

Wellness Interventions For Social Justice Fatigue Among Student Affairs Professionals, Sara Furr

Dissertations

This project explored the construct of social justice fatigue (SJF) among student affairs professionals. Utilizing racial battle fatigue (RBF) and compassion fatigue to construct the definition of SFJ, a thirty day wellness intervention plan was created and tested amongst participants. Social justice fatigue is the physical, mental, and/or emotional toll incurred through advocating for social change while serving as an agent of an institution of higher education. Using participatory action research design we learned this definition resonates with student affairs professionals; particularly those who are engaged in equity and social justice oriented work and share the marginalized identity of the …

Counter-Narratives Of Latino Men And Machismo In Higher Education, Hiram Ramirez

Dissertations

This dissertation study addresses the gaps in research concerning the gendered experiences of successful Latino men in higher education. As Latino men in postsecondary education continue to enroll and persist in low numbers, new lenses are needed to consider their educational experiences. This study attempts to add a gendered lens, in the form of machismo, to consider ways in which successful Latino men are persisting. Machismo, a construct with both positive and negative attributes, has the potential to influence Latino men's navigation of higher education. Research documents the negative ways in which machismo has hampered Latino men in education, however …

An Exploratory Study Of Factors Influencing The Success Of Refugee Youth In College And University, Lea Tienou-Gustafson

Master's Theses

The educational needs, challenges and outcomes of refugee youth in the United States have been studied a great deal, particularly in regard to primary and secondary education. There is a dearth of research, however, on the refugee experience in higher education in the United States.

This study seeks to add to the body of literature on refugee education by exploring shared features of the refugee experience in higher education. Through an in-depth study of refugee youth in Chicago, the study seeks to understand their experiences before, while entering and during college and university, particularly how these experiences are tied to …

Exploring Community College Practitioners' Cultivation And Praxis Of Antiracist And Asset-Based Approaches To Education: A Phenomenological Study, Ester Ulibasa Sihite

Dissertations

Community colleges comprise a robust and complex sector of U.S. higher education, serving large numbers of students of color and other historically underrepresented groups. There is a dearth of literature on how antiracist and asset-based approaches to education can be utilized to promote student success and racial justice. Using an inductive, phenomenological approach, this study utilized data from interviews with a purposive sample of community college practitioner-educators (faculty, staff, and administrators) who invested in racial justice praxis€”reflection and action€”to explore (a) how their cognitive frames, abilities, and interest in racial justice were cultivated, and (b) what this praxis looks like. …

Transfer Student Success: Latinx Students Overcoming Challenges At Two- And Four-Year Institutions Towards Baccalaureate Degree Attainment, Ajani Mcarthur Byrd

Dissertations

As the largest post-secondary educational system, community colleges enroll nearly 35% of all college students (American Association for Community Colleges, 2014). However, the vast majority of students attending two-year institutions aspiring to vertically transfer (from community college to four-year institution), fall short of their academic goals and do not obtain a baccalaureate degree (Student Success Score Card, 2013). To this end, the extant literature has illustrated students of color, especially Latinx and African American students, transfer and graduate at disproportionately lower rates than their white counterparts. Qualitative researchers have explored this phenomenon; yet, often fall short of highlighting the specific …

Maintaining College Access In A Post Recession Era: A Multi-Level Competing Risks Model, Brendan Martin

Dissertations

Post-Great Recession budgets cuts and funding freezes have decreased the level of institutional resources available to recruit and retain undergraduate students. To optimize remaining expenditures in this challenging climate, new analytical approaches must be considered to evaluate and interpret pre-enrollment student data. To date, much of the higher education literature has focused on predicting enrollment using traditional fixed or mixed effects binary logistic models. While robust, these modeling approaches are constrained by standard statistical assumptions, do not account for the timing of students' enrollment decisions, and cannot efficiently incorporate censored data points or competitor information. This study applies a multi-level, …

Centering The Margins: Elevating The Voices Of Women Of Color To Critically Examine College Student Leadership, Natasha T. Turman

Dissertations

The leadership viewpoints of Women of Color (WOC), in general, and WOC collegians specifically, are not widely available or recognized. This exclusion and oversight is a disservice to all. The inadequate inclusion of WOC's perspective in leadership literature is due to the assumptions of race and gender neutrality in leadership studies. Viewing leadership as a set of universal constructs, garnered from a select few and generalized to a great many, is not adequate to understanding the leadership experiences of WOC within dominant-culture environments. To address these deficits, critical leadership scholars have proposed that leadership be (re)conceptualized from a multicultural perspective, …

Understanding The Role Of Leadership Motivation In College Student Leadership Development, Benjamin Paul Correia-Harker

Dissertations

Current scholarship situates leadership capacity, leadership self-efficacy, and motivation as core factors in predicting leadership action (Chan & Drasgow, 2001; Dugan, 2017). With relationships between leadership capacity and self-efficacy clearly established in college student leadership development literature (Dugan & Komives, 2007, 2010), this research endeavors to better understand motivation’s role in the student leadership development process. Using Dugan (2017) and Chan and Drasgow’s (2001) theoretical models as guides, this research will examine several models that test various relationships between leadership capacity, self-efficacy, and motivation. Because scholars have emphasized the importance of disaggregating data based on social identities (Kodama & Dugan, …

Improving Causal Claims In Observational Research: An Investigation Of Propensity Score Methods In Applied Educational Research, Julie Diane Wren

Dissertations

This study used existing institutional data from a large, urban, public, very high research university to compare sixteen matching schemes, built from three separate datasets, to estimate the propensity score, achieve balance between groups and test the sensitivity of the average treatment effect (ATE). For each PS model, four different conditioning strategies were applied. The first four matching schemes used commonly collected data available within a student information system (referred to as SIS dataset). The next four matching schemes combined the SIS dataset with data from an entering student survey (referred to as ESS dataset). The next four matching schemes, …

Self-Perceived Stress Of Undergraduate Students Before And After Participation In A Breathing Meditation Intervention: A Mixed Methods Study, Cindy Oneida Sloan

Dissertations

This mixed methods study examined the effects of an eight-week breathing meditation intervention on the self-perceived stress of undergraduate students. Previous research suggests meditation is an effective strategy to alleviate stress and stress-related symptomatology (Baer, 2003; Conley, Travers, & Bryant, 2013; Shapiro, Brown & Astin, 2011). Forty-one undergraduate student volunteers participated in the study and were randomized into either an intervention group or control group. The intervention group met once per week for eight weeks and participated in a nine minute guided breathing meditation. At the conclusion of eight weeks participants, when compared with the control group, reported significantly lower …

Shifting Narratives In Doctoral Admissions: Faculty Of Color Understandings Of Diversity, Equity, And Justice In A Neoliberal Context, Dian Drew Squire

Dissertations

Little is known about how faculty make decisions in the doctoral admissions process or how they conceptualize diversity, equity, and justice in those same processes. As the United States continues to diversify, understanding how students are selected into graduate programs and how faculty understand diversity, equity, and justice is increasingly important to supporting diverse leadership bodies and shaping an inclusive campus cultural context. This qualitative study utilized semi-structured interviews, focus groups, and critical discourse analysis to explore how faculty of color understand diversity, equity, and justice norms, values, and behaviors in the doctoral admissions process in Higher Education and Student …

Resipwosite, Benefis Mityel And Solidarite: A Case Study Of Global Service Learning Partnerships In Post-Earthquake Ayiti, Jessica Darnell Murphy

Dissertations

The purpose of this case study was to study select long-term successive partnerships between American universities of the Haiti Compact and various non-government organizations working in Ayiti (Haiti) despite contextual tensions of historic relations between Ayiti and the West, disparate global status of Ayiti and the United States of America, and the unprecedented impact of the 2010 earthquake in Ayiti and subsequent response from U.S. institutions of higher education. The Haiti Compact was a unique case for study due to its formation (1) as a resource of aggregated American student volunteerism and activism to be used in assistance to Ayisyen …

A Structural Model Of Leadership Self-Efficacy For Asian American Students: Examining Influences Of Collective Racial Esteem And Resilience, Corinne Maekawa Kodama

Dissertations

This study investigated the relationship between racial identity, using the constructs of collective racial esteem (CRE), and resilience on LSE for a diverse sample of 2,223 Asian American college students, using data from the Multi-Institutional Study of Leadership, a national survey of college outcomes. Structural equation modeling was used to explore the relationship between CRE and Resilience, as well as Non-Discriminatory Climate and Identity-based Experiences, on LSE. The model was tested for invariance for gender as well as for five Asian American ethnic groups (Chinese, Indian/Pakistani, Korean, Filipino, and Vietnamese).

Confirmatory factor analyses demonstrated that the 4-item CRE subscales were …

Reporting Methods And Analyses In Higher Education Research: Hierarchical Linear And Ols Regression Models, Kimberly Quandt Fath

Dissertations

This study examined the reporting practices used by higher education scholars to communicate the methods and analyses of studies using hierarchical linear and OLS regression models. The study consisted of three parts: (a) a citation analysis of sources associated with methods of hierarchical linear models, (b) a content analysis of reporting practices associated with studies that used hierarchical linear models, and (c) a content analysis of the arguments and corrections used by scholars who have used OLS regression techniques on nested data. When possible, results were compared to similar research. The data for this research was drawn from Journal of …

Examining Latino A First-Generation College Students' Educational Resilience At A Jesuit Post-Secondary Institution, Diana Chavez

Dissertations

This qualitative study focused on exploring and understanding Latino/a first-generation college students' process for drawing or enabling educational resilience to persist and achieve their postsecondary education degree. Using Bronfenbrenner's Ecological Paradigm as the framework, the study explored how interactions between individuals and their environments influenced their persistence outcomes. Using purposeful sampling, 19 juniors and seniors attending a Midwest, private, religiously-affiliated university were selected to participate. Semi-structured, in-depth interviews were conducted during one-on-one meetings.

Findings indicated that Latino first-generation college students drew on or were enabled by internal (e.g., first-generation status, self-identified academic challenges, sense of purpose) and external resources (e.g., …

The Backgrounds And Outcomes Of Allopathic Medical School Applicants: Exploring Stratification And Inequality, Sunshine Nakae

Dissertations

A career in medicine remains one of the most rigorous and arduous journeys in higher education. The time and cost to train coupled with the academic and extracurricular requirements have resulted in challenges in diversifying the profession. This study utilizes an HLM and HGLM to model the influences of individual and institutional predictors on acceptance to medical school. Full descriptive analysis of individual and institutional predictors are also included.

Master's Students' Experiences In A Graduate Preparation Program: Multicultural Competency And Social Justice Curriculum, Kristin I. Mccann

Dissertations

This dissertation study focused on master's students experiences with multicultural competency curriculum in graduate preparation programs (GPPs) and contributes to gaps in the extant literature on multicultural issues in higher education. The two overarching research questions for the study considered how, if at all, students' understanding of core concepts of the required course (privilege, oppression, and social justice) changed over time as evidenced by a primary curricular component called the photo elicitation project. Educators' experiences were also addressed, per their impact on the context in which students learned. This study employed a qualitative approach and, in line with the study's …

Exploring Predicted Vs. Actual First To-Second Year Retention Rates: A Study Of Evangelical Lutheran Church In America Colleges, Brenda Porter Poggendorf

Dissertations

Retention of students is a critical area of much needed attention on nearly every college campus. It is important to students who want to succeed in college and beyond, to institutions that desire high efficiency and prestige, and increasingly to state and federal leaders. Retention of students in college affects a broad range of stakeholders, from the self-esteem and financial stability of students to the fiscal health, well-being and leadership of our country.

Using Astin's model of inputs-environment-outputs (1993) as a guide, this study seeks to understand institutional environmental factors that may impact the retention of students from their first-to-second …

Factors In Destination Decisions For Cuban Study Abroad, Kari Beall

Master's Theses

In January of 2011, the Obama Administration loosened the regulations on academic travel to Cuba, allowing students to travel to this island nation as part of an academic program. These changes have created an ideal environment in which to study the factors that influence the institutional decision to create a new study abroad program. This is an area that has seen very little if any previous research. This study hopes to investigate the connection between the goals of education abroad as a whole and the reasons a study abroad program, in this case to Cuba, is actually created. Studying the …

Identifying Student Perspectives: Addressing The Financial Barriers Facing Low-Income Students In Study Abroad, Lauren Miranda

Master's Theses

International education today is largely concerned with improving diversity throughout study abroad but despite institutional strategies which seek to address the barriers facing underrepresented students, the overall student profile of study abroad remains unbalanced. Cost is continuously deemed the biggest barrier affecting students' ability to study abroad, a burden that is most likely heavily felt by low-income students. Therefore, the focus of this study is to identify the student perspective in relation to the financial barriers affecting low-income students' intent to study abroad. The results of this study will identify necessary student resources which institutions like Loyola University Chicago can …

African American Male Student-Athletes: Identity And Academic Performance, Kathryn Mary O'Brien

Dissertations

The purpose of the current research was to examine racial, male and athletic identities and their individual and collective impact on the academic performance of African American male Division I student-athletes (AAMSAs). Data was collected using the Multidimensional Inventory of Black Identity (MIBI), the Male Role Norms Scale (MRNS), and the Athletic Identity Measurement Scale (AIMS). The MIBI is a measure of racial identity and is comprised of seven subscales: (1) centrality, (2) private regard, (3) public regard, (4) assimilation, (5) humanist, (6) minority, and (7) nationalist. The MRNS takes status, toughness and antifemininity into account to calculate a masculinity …

The Impact Of Involvement In Mortar Board Senior Honor Society On Lifelong Views Of Civic Engagement And Leadership, Daniel James Turner

Dissertations

This study examines the impact that involvement in Mortar Board National Senior Honor Society has on lifelong views of civic engagement and leadership. Mortar Board Senior Honor Society is a collegiate honor society established in 1918 that recognizes students for their outstanding contributions to their college or university community in the areas of scholarship, leadership, and service. Involvement in campus organizations has been shown to facilitate psycho-social and cognitive development, encourage leadership involvement, and enhance students' participation in service and civic activities (Astin, 1999). This study informs the broad area of research on the impact of extracurricular involvement on college …

The Locus Of Preparation And Privilege: College Choice And Social Reproduction, Daniel Allen

Dissertations

Despite the ostensible proposition of American higher education to create a level playing field and advance an individual's life opportunities, the history of access to higher education in the United States has demonstrated a lack of equality in enrollment patterns. This enrollment inequality appears most pronounced when considering family income and socioeconomic status. These differences are particularly notable when considering enrollment patterns of students who are academically qualified to succeed at a highly selective college or university, but who come from low income families. Such variations in enrollment at highly selective colleges and universities aligned with family income and not …

An Exploration Of Current Practices In Curricular Design Of Resident Assistant Training Programs, Virginia Albaneso Koch

Dissertations

In the last 15 years there has been little research about the design of resident assistant (RA) training programs in higher education (Bowman & Bowman, 1995, 1998; Wesolowski, Bowman, & Adams, 1996). A RA is an enrolled student who is selected, trained, and supervised to serve as a part-time, paraprofessional employee for a housing and/or residential life department at a college or university. The lack of research was surprising given the time, effort, and institutional resources invested in employing, training, and supervising RAs. The purpose of this study was to explore how contemporary RA training programs were designed and the …

An Exploration Of The Experiences Of First-Generation College Students In Lasallian Higher Education, Kurt Schackmuth

Dissertations

As higher education has become more accessible to traditionally underrepresented groups, more of these types of students - such as first-generation college students - have started to matriculate on campuses across the country. Existing research on first-generation college students focuses on the characteristics common among these students and the strategies often implemented to foster their success in college. There is a lack of more detailed, personalized accounts of the college experiences of these students. This dissertation focuses on an exploration of the experiences of first-generation college students in Lasallian higher education (institutions sponsored by the De La Salle Christian Brothers.) …

A Phenomenological Study Exploring The Undergraduate Mcnair Program Experience Of Program Alumni Currently Serving As College Faculty, Lunaire D. Ford

Dissertations (2 year embargo)

Over the past two decades, government agencies and the higher education community have invested greatly in preparing undergraduate McNair Program participants for doctoral study. The expectation has been that most will complete doctoral degrees and enter into careers in college teaching and research. However, current data show that relatively few participants of color enter into the professoriate (McCoy, et al, 2008). The purpose of this qualitative study is to gather the stories of McNair Program alumni of color who succeeded in college and graduate study and went on to pursue faculty careers.

The review of the literature indicated that studies …

An Exploratory Study Of The Curricular Integration Of Ethics In Executive Mba Programs, Jaime M. Franco

Dissertations

An Exploratory Study of the Curricular Integration of Ethics in Executive MBA Programs

News headlines of corporate scandals have unleashed a contentious debate of whether or not graduate management education has contributed to corporate collapses and the resultant financial crisis. In particular, questions abound as to the willingness of Executive MBA program (EMBA) administrators and faculty to integrate ethics into the curriculum.

A sizable amount of research has been conducted and published on the curricular integration of ethics in graduate management education. Unfortunately, very little is known about the curricular integration of ethics in EMBA programs. Over time, the number …

Bystander Behavior: Understanding Undergraduate Male Involvement In Dangerous Drinking Situations, Christopher Allen Waugh

Dissertations

Problem drinking leaves a troubling wake on college campuses throughout the United States. This dissertation explores to what extent male college student bystanders involved in dangerous drinking situations intervene and to what extent information and training in specific bystander skills improves their likelihood to be effective, engaged bystanders. Many germane themes emerge in this study, including: a priority for undergraduate males on social activities, a lack of undergraduate male empathy for male peers, and absent sense of undergraduate male responsibility for self and others. Further, the study presents a new typology for the disengaged male, undergraduate bystander, including recommendations for …

Australia V. Usa: Indian Engineering Students Pursuing Graduate Degrees Abroad, An Analysis Of Factors Influencing The Choice And Location Of Institution, Louis Berends

Dissertations

The global market of higher education is growing at a rapid pace. Prospective graduate students in engineering have more options - domestically and internationally - than ever before. At this moment, the international setting of engineering graduate programs continues to shift and expand. This study analyzes the decision-making processes of students from India who pursue graduate education in Australia and the United States of America. In this setting, decision-making processes of student choice were examined after study participants selected higher education institutions in Australian and U.S. The research question is: why do graduate degree-seeking engineering students from India pursue studies …

To Advance A Race: A Historical Analysis Of The Intersection Of Personal Belief, Industrial Philanthropy And Black Liberal Arts Higher Education In Fayette Mckenzie's Presidency At Fisk University, 1915-1925, Christopher Nicholson

Dissertations

This dissertation used archival and historical methods to examine Fayette Avery McKenzie's tenure as President at Fisk University from 1915-1925. Specifically, this project investigates the influence McKenzie's work with Native Americans, industrial philanthropy, and American culture of the period played in McKenzie's administration. The research seeks to provide a more complete narrative of McKenzie's administration that is absent from current scholarship, and examine how McKenzie's work at Fisk helped advance Black liberal arts higher education. Analysis of McKenzie's personal papers and other primary and secondary sources provide a strong scholarly basis to examine his administration from multiple perspectives. Through an …