Education Commons^™

Examining The Impact Of K-5 Literacy Coaches On Teachers' Implementation Of Literacy Practices And The Role Of Leadership In Maintaining High Literacy Expectations Supported By Instructional Coaches, Jenny Bushman

Culminating Projects in Education Administration and Leadership

Teaching matters and research shows school-based coaching responds to the national priority of improving instruction (Bright &Hensley, 2010). Research confirms the importance of developing strong, collaborative work environments such as a long-standing potential for change that positively impacts teachers' facilitation of student learning (Dixon & Palmer, 2002; Fullen, 2008; Guskey, 2003). The goal of instructional coaching is to foster and support professional development. What's more, the coach can help guide teacher learning experiences into purposeful instructional targets and goals (Brown, 2016). Literacy coaching can support the goal of developing a collaborative work environment where teachers have sustained support in meeting …

A Quantitative Analysis Of Emergency Grant Persistence Rates, Rachel Sherlock

Culminating Projects in Higher Education Administration

I conducted a correlational quantitative study to determine whether an emergency grant program at a four-year public institution is correlated with increased student persistence, and if students’ socioeconomic status and race are correlated with their likelihood to persist after receiving an emergency grant. I studied how students’ demographics influenced persistence rates based on race, socioeconomic status, gender, first-generation status, age and grade level. I found that Black or African students, students 24 years and older, and first-year students had significantly lower persistence rates than other categories of students after receiving the emergency grant. In comparison, white students, students 23 years …

The Effectiveness Of Trauma-Informed Practices And Resilience For Students Impacted By Adverse Childhood Experiences, Alison Kutter

Culminating Projects in Special Education

In 1998, a groundbreaking medical research study was published that created widespread interest in what researchers were calling adverse childhood experiences (ACEs). Felitti et al.’s (1998) research highlighted the prevalence of adverse incidents and the correlation with future health morbidity. The study established that more than 50% of adults in the study experienced at least one traumatic event during childhood, allowing the research to become a powerful tool to identify and intervene with children. It became apparent that the effects of traumatic events in the lives of children had a huge impact on biological, physiological, and psychological development. An evolution …

Leading From The Middle – How Gen X Leaders Are Navigating Their Leadership Experience With Baby Boomers And Millennials, Paul Drange

Culminating Projects in Higher Education Administration

Leadership in higher education is often evaluated and scrutinized. As with many other professional settings, good leadership often defines the success of the organization. This is also true in higher education. In order to help define what success looks like in the area of leadership, one evaluation point is to examine the age and generational position of the leaders within an institution. Looking at these relationships and connections can open a pathway of understanding in relation to quality of leadership and strength of relationships between leader and worker. Other studies and evaluations exist on the Greatest generation, the Baby Boomer …

Welcome To The Profession: Exploring Perceptions Of New Teacher Retention Supports, Amy Christensen, Michele Barron-Albers

Educational Administration and Leadership Faculty Publications

Numerous studies have identified a research to practice gap regarding teacher retention (Hagaman & Casey, 2018; Carver, 2003; CCSESA, 2016). In Minnesota, teacher retention is a concern as 51.32% of professional licensed teachers were not working as a public or charter school teacher during the 2019-2020 school year. (PELSB, 2021). The objective of our ongoing phenomenological study is to identify and address what common themes exist across multiple groups of educational professionals regarding retention rates of Minnesota teachers new to the profession. Our study employs grounded theory to analyze educational professionals’ reflective writings to expand insights regarding why half of …

K-5 Social Studies Content Standards: Investigating Critical Thinking For Informed Action, Oluseyi Matthew Odebiyi

Teacher Development Faculty Publications

Reform efforts in social studies education such as the College Career, and Civic Life (C3) framework encourage students to consider civic engagement and action based on the understanding of real-life social issues. Few studies have, however, systematically examined the foundational documents representing the official state stance on content selection. Fewer studies have sought to understand the affordances and constraints in the depth of reasoning expected from young students in social studies elementary education. This study explored the dynamics of context-based critical thinking within the frame of states’ Kindergarten-5 social studies content standards in the U.S.A. Employing a quantitative content analysis …

Narrative Study: The Impact Of Food Insecurity On Student Health And Persistence, Deborah Allen

Culminating Projects in Higher Education Administration

The current study collected and evaluated students’ firsthand stories to learn whether their stress from nutritional intake or lack thereof impacts students’ health, well-being, coursework, sense of belonging and mattering, and persistence. Additionally, this narrative study investigated students’ experiences with a college pantry on their campus. The students were invited to share personal narratives about their engagement with the campus food pantry and their feelings about any perceived effects of this institutional support in such areas as health, self-esteem, community support, academics, motivation, and future plans.

The research question presented in this study utilizing a qualitative narrative-inquiry approach was the …

Enhancing Job Performance For Students With High-Incidence Disabilities, Randa Arvold

Culminating Projects in Special Education

Not submitted

Covid Disruption Requires More Than Providing A Device: How Districts Are Engaging Students And Families Online, Jennifer Hill, Tracy Reimer

Teacher Development Faculty Publications

As school districts pivoted to online delivery in the spring of 2020, the urgent need for each student to have a device in hand and internet connectivity was a remarkable challenge. Immediate action was taken, incredible financial investments were made, and creative problem solving peaked to provide students access to the tools needed for online learning. Despite this laudable feat, districts are entering the third school year disrupted by COVID and confronted with the Delta surge, disheartening student learning loss, and an emerging reality that hybrid and online learning models are not going away. Truancy issues, unresponsive home supports, and …

The Impact Of Covid-19 On Early Childhood Reading Practices, Deborah L. Wheeler, Jennifer Hill

Teacher Development Faculty Publications

COVID-19 has changed the daily lives of families, impacted work, social interactions, and mental health. Since spring 2020, parents have been working from home and children have been home from daycare and school. Parents are experiencing stress in an attempt to satisfy the demands of work, family, and COVID-19 concerns. Due to the fact that children have been home from daycare and school, parents have the sole responsibility of caring for and teaching their children until schools are able to fully and effectively meet the needs of educating students in an adapted format. Research provides a wealth of information documenting …

Community Partners’ Satisfaction With Community-Based Learning Collaborations, Rona Karasik, Elena S. Hafner

Gerontology Faculty Publications

Community-university partnerships offer the potential for a number of mutual benefits, yet working with institutions of higher education can pose unique challenges for community participants. To better understand the community perspective, this paper explores community partners’ satisfaction with their involvement in various forms of community-based learning (e.g., service-learning, internships, community-based research). Drawn from a larger, mixed-methods study of community partners across 13 states, the current analysis assesses community agency representatives’ (N = 201) satisfaction with their community-university partnerships in general as well their satisfaction with specific elements of these collaborations. While the findings reflect generally positive levels of satisfaction overall, …

Supporting Students On The Autism Spectrum And Gender Identity Spectrum, Kelly Steinke

Culminating Projects in Special Education

Three issues guided this review. First, factors that increase the incidence of gender dysphoria among DHRC is examined. Second, the change in the generational view of gender identity will be reviewed and contrasted. Finally, school and community-based programs will be reviewed. Issues related to gender dysphoria among the population diagnosed with ASD is a specific focus. By identifying and defining Gender Identity, educators will be more equipped to support all students and create a gender inclusive classroom.

Effective Social Skills Training Intervention For Young People With Challenging Behaviors: Implementing A Video Self-Modeling, Minyeob Noh

Culminating Projects in Special Education

Not required

Developing Instructional Methods In Science Class For Students With Learning Disabilities, Hoonseok Oh

Culminating Projects in Special Education

Not required

What Covid-19 Taught Us About The Blended Model, Deborah L. Wheeler, Jennifer Hill

Teacher Development Faculty Working Papers

Initially, many faculty in higher education were apprehensive when courses went online in Spring 2020, but they eventually learned a lot about how to effectively teach online. The need for well-designed online courses for faculty in higher education is more prominent than ever-before in the wake of the COVID-19. As reluctant or apprehensive as faculty members were, the move to an online platform offered an opportunity to learn about diverse tools, resources, and innovative ways to teach both in the blended synchronous model and the asynchronous online model. Faculty and students encountered issues, but quickly learned to overcome these challenges. …

Engagement Theory Based Interpretative Phenomenological Analysis Of Computer Science Students’ Perceptions Of Their Learning Engagement Using Mobile Devices, Aleksandar Tomović

Culminating Projects in Higher Education Administration

The use of mobile devices in the college classroom can enhance learning engagement, leading to enhanced learning outcomes. There is scant research on college student perceptions of learning engagement using mobile devices in the classroom. The purpose of this qualitative research was to explores upper-class undergraduate computer science college students’ perceptions about their use of mobile devices in the classroom. Research questions were designed to explore how college students believe their classroom engagement is impacted by mobile device technology use. The theory of engagement, including intellectual, social, and behavioral components, served as the theoretical framework. This research applies interpretative phenomenological …

Level Of Preparedness For Conducting Teacher Evaluations As Reported By Minnesota School Principals, Zachary Dingmann

Culminating Projects in Education Administration and Leadership

The significance of a principal as an instructional leader became a concept over 40 years ago (Jenkins, 2009). Edmonds (1982) noted one of the top five effective school characteristics was a “principal’s leadership and attention to the quality of instruction” (p. 4). Part of being an instructional leader for a principal is performing teacher evaluations by observing teachers’ instruction.

The process in which principals conduct teacher evaluations and observe most teachers is useless, unproductive, and a waste of a principal’s time (Marshall, 2005). According to Marshall (2005), principals need to improve in how they observe, support, and evaluate teachers to …

American Miseducation: Myths, Distortions, And Illusions, Luke S. Tripp

Ethnic and Women's Studies Working Papers

Unfortunately, most Americans are woefully miseducated about their country. Their beliefs about America are erroneously based on myths, lies, and slick propaganda. Moreover, their miseducation begins very early in their lives and continues throughout their lifetime. They are conditioned early in their preschool years to accept a fictional image of America through fairy tales, which portray imaginary heroes. The great myths in American history are an obstacle to racial harmony. To the detriment of Black people, the reality that the myths about the United States are more widely known and believed than the historical truths point to the crucial problem …

Monarch Butterfly., Bermudez J. Ferrell

ESL for Academic Purposes

This unit covers the migration of the monarch butterflies from Michoacan, Mexico, to the Northern parts of America. This Monarch Butterfly unit is geared toward WIDA level 3: developing or CEFR B2 English language learners in middle school or high school. The primary focus of this unit is reading and writing; however, the last day has a speaking activity. The scaffolding for reading included in this unit are pre-readings, during-reading activities, and vocabulary acquisition worksheets. The unit’s content goes over an introductory section, followed by an article, finally wrapping up with a cause and effect activity and tips students can …

Emperor Penguins, Dan Wu

ESL for Academic Purposes

The purpose of this unit is to develop students’ English skills and familiarize them with emperor penguins. The topic of the unit is about emperor penguins. Students will be able to learn the basic information of the species and its huddle behavior, incubating and parenting, as well as human impact on the species. The unit is designed for intermediate level ESL or EFL pre-academic students on the A2-B1 level of the CEFR scale. The assessments involve pair work, group work and individual tasks, through which students will be able to develop listening, speaking, reading, and writing skills.

Exploring Chinese International Undergraduate Students’ Cross-Cultural Adjustment To American Universities, Ningsheng Huang

Culminating Projects in Higher Education Administration

The rapid economic development in China has enabled an increasing number of Chinese students to pursue higher education in countries abroad. Since 2009, the largest group of international students in the United States has been Chinese students (Open Doors, 2020). Chinese international undergraduate students face various challenges during their cross-cultural adjustment in American universities, such as a language barrier, a lack of learning skill, an unfamiliarity with American educational systems and school facilities, a lack of ability to interact with native instructors and students, and psychological adaptation (Sun & Chen, 1999). These changes can create multiple acculturation stressors for Chinese …

Perspectives From Female Athletic Trainers In Men's Professional Sports: How Their Athletic Training Programs Set Them Up For Success, Caitlyn Champ

Culminating Projects in Higher Education Administration

Female athletic trainers working in male professional sports are represented at a number strongly disproportionate to the number of female athletic trainers making up the profession. This research study works to focus on how athletic training education programs (ATP) have successfully set up the female athletic trainers who have made it to professional sports. The goal was to focus on what these education programs were doing to set their students apart from other athletic training programs. Three female athletic trainers currently working in male professional sports were interviewed for this qualitative research study by utilizing semi-structured interviewing. The data was …

Supporting Students Through Online Learning, Kristen M. Carlson

Teacher Development Faculty Publications

With the onset of a pandemic, there were opportunities and challenges for supporting learners. Schools and universities were physically closed while interaction shifted to a distance learning modality. In some instances, courses became asynchronous, while other courses met synchronously using video conferencing. Educators were adaptable when the pandemic occurred, quickly setting up home offices to meet their learners’ needs. This occurrence showed that it was in educators’ best interest to understand distance best practices. Distance learning has been utilized at institutions in the United States for the past two decades. However, it has not been widely adopted as mainstream because …

Effective Interventions For Secondary Students With Disabilities To Be Successful In Mathematics, Garret Atteberry

Culminating Projects in Special Education

This Starred Paper provides article summaries and data of different types of effective math interventions to secondary students with disabilities. This research is broken down into three main interventions: Concrete-Representational-Abstract, Explicit Teaching, and Cognitive Strategies.

School Resource Officers And Special Education Roles, Presence And Training, Jill Kofler

Culminating Projects in Special Education

A number of theoretical and applied outcomes may emerge from the findings of this paper. First, better specialized training for SROs when engaging with students with disabilities may be developed. Second, school personnel may understand the efficacy of SROs when student behaviors escalate. Third, ways for improving the actions of SROs during severe behavioral episodes may be identified. Finally, positive behavioral interventions for SROs may be identified.

I work closely with SROs in our building, and they have brought up concerns about when to intervene, specifically with students who are diagnosed with ASD who are non-verbal. Additional training for all …

Morphological Awareness As An Intervention For Struggling Readers: A Review Of The Literature, Jill Batman

Culminating Projects in Special Education

Literacy is essential for academic success, but many students read below grade level. The purpose of this article is to determine if morphological awareness--the ability to recognize word parts and their meanings--is an effective intervention for struggling readers. I analyzed data from twelve research studies and found that students who learned morphology made reading comprehension gains 75 percent of the time; in addition, potential design flaws in the remaining three studies may have contributed to lower performance from the experimental groups. These results have promising implications for teachers and their students with reading disabilities, language impoverishment, and alternate language constructs.

Effective Teaching Approaches To Combat Learned Helplessness For Students In High School Special Education, Lindsay Wurm

Culminating Projects in Special Education

The starred paper consists of a literature review of twelve studies related to learned helplessness and provides strategies to combat learned helplessness in students in high school special education.

Postsecondary Transition Planning For Students With Autism Spectrum Disorders, Bobbie Tews

Culminating Projects in Special Education

Transitioning from student to adulthood with Autism Spectrum Disorder. What services or programs are available for those students after they have aged out of the educational setting and what is done to prepare them prior to transitioning into their post-secondary education or employment? With more than 76,000 students transitioning into adulthood with Autism Spectrum Disorder, and the 1.27 million adults what are the success rates of obtaining a job for students transitioning into adulthood with Autism Spectrum Disorder.

Restorative Justice; An Alternative To Traditional Discipline, Diane Dukowitz

Culminating Projects in Special Education

Not required.

The Impact Of Behavior Specific Praise On Students With Emotional Or Behavior Disorders, Jeff Stang

Culminating Projects in Special Education

The main focus of this paper was to identify the impact behavior-specific praise has on students with emotional or behavioral disorders and their engagement in the classroom.