Education Commons^™

Theatre As An Intervention For Empathy Development Among Undergraduate Students, Jonathan Stewart

Dissertations, 2014-2019

Empathy is the ability feel into, or put oneself in the place of another. It is the ability to walk in someone else’s shoes. Studies have shown that this ability is decreasing among today’s college students and on the rise as a desired trait for today’s leaders. This dilemma provides an interesting opportunity to explore how institutions of higher education can help develop the leaders of tomorrow by increasing empathy among students. Specifically, this research explores theatre as an intervention for empathy development among college students.

Theatre, as a program of study, is unique within the college experience in that …

Failure To Launch?: Advancing The Case For Financial Literacy Interventions In Postsecondary Education, Cathleen Snyder

Dissertations, 2014-2019

For college undergraduates, the thought of managing money is often new, exciting, and terrifying in the same breath. Some students have learned well from their parental and prior academic influences, and yet others may be overwhelmed by a lack of those same resources. As postsecondary institutions endeavor to level the proverbial playing field, helping college graduates launch into meaningful, financially independent lives, it begs additional consideration on the intervention methods that might be most impactful.

This study examined a for-credit, curriculum-based intervention specific to personal finance topics. It attempted to answer several key questions: How knowledgeable are students relative to …

Building Teachers’ Emotional Competence: A Transactional Training Model, Caroline Fulton

Dissertations, 2014-2019

Classrooms are complex entities, where the emotions of students and teachers interact to influence learning, relationships, and students’ social emotional development. Teachers’ understanding of emotional processes within the classroom is critical to effective teaching, promotion of healthy child development, and attaining desired learning outcomes. Further, emotions have powerful consequences for teachers themselves. They affect teachers’ well-being, self-efficacy, and ultimately whether teachers remain in the profession or not. Therefore, teachers need skills to recognize and respond to emotional experiences in the classroom. In the present research project a set of emotional competences relevant to educational practices were developed. These competencies include …

Simultaneous Parent-Child Interaction Therapy (Pcit) And Teacher-Child Interaction Training (Tcit) Interventions Using Distance Coaching: A Pilot Study, Kirstin Drucker

Dissertations, 2014-2019

When providing intervention to children with emotional and behavioral difficulties, it is important to consider how to best address the child’s behaviors across a number of contexts. Parent-Child Interaction Therapy (PCIT) and Teacher-Child Interaction Training (TCIT) have been shown effective at reducing a child’s behavioral difficulties by improving the relationship between the child and their caregiver (parent or teacher). This feasibility study adds to the research on interventions for young children with emotional and behavioral difficulties by addressing parent and teacher interaction techniques simultaneously. Using HIPAA-compliant software, a coach provided instruction to a parent and a teacher, to implement a …

Perceived Principal Servant Leadership And Teacher Stress, Donald Harris

Dissertations, 2014-2019

Stress is one of the major factors in teacher attrition, a continuing problem in education. Further contributing to teacher stress are state and federal accountability measures, which put added pressure on schools and teachers to increase student performance. School leaders must navigate not only how to keep pace with these accountability practices, but how to do so in a manner that does not increase the stress on their teachers. To seek answers in how this might be accomplished, this paper investigates the relationship between perceived principal servant leadership characteristics and occupational stress in teachers. Data was collected using the Wilson …

The Effects Of An Interprofessional Emergent Writing Intervention For Preschoolers, Danika L. Pfeiffer

Dissertations, 2014-2019

This pre-post design study explored the effects of an emergent writing interprofessional education (IPE) experience for preprofessional speech-language pathology (SLPs) and occupational therapy (OT) students. Six preprofessional SLP students and three preprofessional OT students participated in the study, which had two conditions: (a) unpaired SLPs, and (b) SLP and OT pairs. The preprofessional students delivered 8-10 emergent writing interventions to preschoolers in small groups. The preprofessional students’ learning about emergent writing concepts and interprofessional collaborative practice (IPP) was supported through structured debriefs with their clinical supervisors after each session, as well as facilitated discussions to discuss supplemental readings and their …

The Influence Of Engaging Centralized Student Support On The Academic Achievement Of Student Veterans, Paul Morgan

Dissertations, 2014-2019

As more veterans and service members enroll in higher education, institutions are investing greater resources in the establishment and enhancement of centers to support them. However, little is known about the outcomes associated with utilization of the centers. Furthermore, researchers have consistently aggregated veterans and service members under “student veterans” with little regard for potential differences. Using regression analyses and analysis of variance, this case study explored the effect of visits to a veterans center on grade point average (GPA), the effect of academic need on frequency of visits, and differences in academic achievement for different types of military-affiliated students. …

Effectiveness Of High-Fidelity Human Patient Simulation In Learning To Manage Medically-Complex Infants, Erin Clinard

Dissertations, 2014-2019

Survival of preterm and medically-complex infants has dramatically increased over the past thirty years due to significant advances in medical care and technology, however the developmental costs of survival are substantial. Comprehensive care of premature babies is critical and there is a need for more neonatal therapists, including speech-language pathologists (SLPs), with the knowledge and confidence to provide that care.

Students in graduate SLP programs often receive little clinical experience or dedicated coursework in pediatric feeding and swallowing, especially with medically-complex infants. However, hands-on and experiential learning can support the development of the necessary foundational knowledge and confidence of students …

A New Paradigm For Improvement: Student-Faculty Partnership In Learning Outcomes Assessment, Nicholas A. Curtis

Dissertations, 2014-2019

In the United States, higher education institutions assess the impact of program-level educational experiences through the process of program-level student learning outcomes assessment. The final step of the assessment cycle is to use assessment interpretations to make changes to educational programming. Nevertheless, few programs can demonstrate the use of assessment results in this way. Perhaps assessment work is missing a key perspective: that of the students it assesses. Cook-Sather, Bovill, and Felton (2014) define student-faculty partnership as “a collaborative, reciprocal process through which all participants have the opportunity to contribute equally, although not necessarily in the same ways, to curricular …

The Impact Of Student Leadership Engagement On Meaning In Life And Work During College, Heather Janel Strine-Patterson

Dissertations, 2014-2019

The rising need, cost, and debt for postsecondary education has increased attention and scrutiny on its value, and colleges and universities must underscore outcomes beyond employment of graduates. Psychological well-being is a promising area to expand the value of postsecondary education. Using correlations, multiple regression, and multivariate analysis of variance (MANOVA), this study seeks to contribute to an emergent body of empirical knowledge about the impact of postsecondary education on students’ well-being by specifically examining the relationship between participation in cocurricular and extracurricular experiences and students’ well-being defined by their sense of meaning in life and work. To this end, …

Student Engagement And Post-College Outcomes: A Comparison Of Formative And Reflective Models, Courtney Sanders

Dissertations, 2014-2019

Student engagement is a complex construct that is thought to be related to positive outcomes during and after college. Previous research has defined engagement in diverse ways and there are inconsistencies in the models that are used to measure this construct. Many studies have used a reflective measurement model (i.e., exploratory or confirmatory factor analysis), wherein changes in a latent construct are thought to precede and in some sense, explain variation in observed variables. Others have argued that engagement is best measured using a formative model in which the relationship flows in the opposite direction. In other words, within formative …

Integrating Implementation Fidelity And Learning Improvement To Enhance Students’ Ethical Reasoning Abilities, Kristen L. Smith

Dissertations, 2014-2019

Examples of demonstrable student learning improvement in higher education are rare (Banta, Jones, & Black, 2009; Banta & Blaich, 2011). Perhaps because outcomes assessment practices are disconnected from pedagogy, curriculum, and learning improvement. Through partnership with the Madison Collaborative, the current study aimed to bridge this disconnect. Specifically, researchers applied implementation fidelity methodologies (O’Donnell, 2008) to an academic program, under the guiding framework of the Simple Model for Learning Improvement (Fulcher, Good, Coleman, & Smith, 2014). In doing so, researchers helped faculty create and elucidate an ethical reasoning educational intervention and accompanying fidelity checklist. Both were well-aligned with a University-level …

You Only Live Up To The Standards You Set: An Evaluation Of Different Approaches To Standard Setting, Scott N. Strickman

Dissertations, 2014-2019

Interpretation of performance in reference to a standard can provide nuanced, finely-tuned information regarding examinee abilities beyond that of just a total score. However, there is a multitude of ways to set performance standards yet little guidance regarding which method operates best and under what circumstances. Traditional methods are the most common approach adopted in practice and heavily involve subject matter experts (SMEs). Two other approaches have been suggested in the literature as alternative ways to set performance standards, although they have yet to be implemented in practice. Data-driven approaches do not involve SMEs but rather rely solely upon statistical …

Buying Equal Student Achievement Opportunities, Abbott W. Keesee

Dissertations, 2014-2019

The majority of a school system’s budget is spent on personnel. In order to use this tremendous amount of money efficiently it is important educators understand the impact different spending priorities, specifically total per-pupil expenditures, teacher salary, principal salary, pupil/teacher ratio, and pupil/support personnel ratio have on student achievement and how these inputs are moderated by a district’s population density and wealth. Spending data from all the school divisions in Virginia were examined using public spending data from the Virginia Department of Education, and population density and wealth statistics from the Office of Budget Management, US Census Bureau, and Commonwealth …

The Power Of Feedback: An Indicator Of Mentor Effectiveness During Student Teaching, Dara M. Hall

Dissertations, 2014-2019

Mentorship programs have become increasingly prevalent in multiple organizations, particularly due to a large number of positive outcomes for the mentees such as improved performance, attitudes, and retention (e.g. Eby et al., 2013). Likewise, research suggests that there are potential benefits of training mentors to work with student teachers, leading many teacher preparation programs to devote human and financial resources to develop trained mentor teachers, known as clinical faculty, to provide pre-service support. Findings have shown that student teachers feel most supported when given concrete and meaningful feedback to improve their instructional practices (Sayeski & Paulsen, 2012), therefore, clinical faculty …

Argument Education In Higher Education: A Validation Study, Paul E. Mabrey Iii

Dissertations, 2014-2019

Argument education can play an important role in higher education for leadership development and responding to increasing calls for post-secondary accountability. But to do so, argumentation teachers, scholars, and practitioners need to develop a clearer definition and research agenda for the purposes of teaching and assessing argumentation. The research conducted here contributes to this project by first establishing a definitional construct and observable behaviors associated with learning and practicing argumentation. Second, an argument education assessment instrument was created based off of the literature-supported definition of argumentation. Third, debate and argument education subject matter experts reviewed the definition, behaviors, and assessment …

Evaluating The Performance Of Propensity Score Matching Methods: A Simulation Study, Jessica N. Jacovidis

Dissertations, 2014-2019

In education, researchers and evaluators are interested in assessing the impact of programs or interventions. Unfortunately, most education programs do not lend themselves to random assignment; participants generally self-select into programs. Lack of random assignment limits the claims that researchers can make about the impact of the program because individuals who self-select into the program may be qualitatively different from individuals who do not self-select into the program. Propensity score matching allows researchers to mimic random assignment by creating a matched comparison group that is similar to the treatment group on researcher-identified variables.

There are a number of matching methods …

Predictors Of Private School Sustainability Using Irs Form 990, Paul G. Leaman

Dissertations, 2014-2019

Private school leaders face financial sustainability challenges as competition for students and money increases. This study aims to identify financial metrics which school leaders can use for monitoring and guiding their school’s financial health. IRS Form 990 provided the financial data for calculating predictors of interest. The study evaluated data from 2009–2013 for five groupings of schools, as measured by operational size. The study included 1029 private schools after removing outliers and cases with missing data. Private school leaders helped define the dependent variable as the ratio of total revenue/total expense. Sustainable schools carried an averaged five-year ratio of greater …

The Achievement Gap And Students Living In Poverty: The Role Of Core Self-Evaluation And Transformational Leadership In Teachers, India Harris

Dissertations, 2014-2019

Research has shown that the combination of locus of control, self-efficacy, self-confidence, and emotional stability is a good predictor of life success. Until now, this second order factor, called core self-evaluations (CSE) has only been studied in adults. Findings from this study, showed levels of CSE were significantly and positively connected with academic achievement for middle and elementary aged students. CSE appears to play to a similar role between students and academic achievement as it plays with adults and job performance. In this study, the dimensions of transformational leadership were applied to teacher behaviors and students were grouped based on …

Improving Student Learning In Higher Education: A Mixed Methods Study, Megan R. Good

Dissertations, 2014-2019

To improve quality, higher education must be able to demonstrate learning improvement. To do so, academic degree program leaders must assess learning, intervene, and then re-assess to determine if the intervention was indeed an improvement (Fulcher, Good, Coleman, and Smith, 2014). This seemingly “simple model” is rarely enacted in higher education (Blaich & Wise, 2011). The purpose of this embedded mixed methods study was to investigate the effectiveness and experience of a faculty development program focused on a specific programmatic learning outcome. Specifically, the intervention was intended to increase students’ ethical reasoning skills aligned with a university-wide program. The results …

The Effects Of A Planned Missingness Design On Examinee Motivation And Psychometric Quality, Matthew S. Swain

Dissertations, 2014-2019

Assessment practitioners in higher education face increasing demands to collect assessment and accountability data to make important inferences about student learning and institutional quality. The validity of these high-stakes decisions is jeopardized, particularly in low-stakes testing contexts, when examinees do not expend sufficient motivation to perform well on the test. This study introduced planned missingness as a potential solution. In planned missingness designs, data on all items are collected but each examinee only completes a subset of items, thus increasing data collection efficiency, reducing examinee burden, and potentially increasing data quality. The current scientific reasoning test served as the Long …

Teachers’ Beliefs And Practices Related To Student Self-Regulation In The Classroom, Marlana L. Webster

Dissertations, 2014-2019

Self-regulation serves as a pivotal skill for children to acquire early in life. Mastery of the skill leads to high academic achievement and increased sense of self-efficacy. Teachers play a major role in developing self-regulation in children. Consequently, the beliefs and practices that teachers hold regarding poor self-regulation (i.e. inattention and impulsivity) are to be understood and taken into account. The Self-Regulation Survey was created to capture teachers’ attributions for inattention and impulsivity along with subsequent chosen interventions in 52 participants. The results indicated that teachers attribute impulsivity to organic factors and family origin to a greater degree than classroom …

Extending An Irt Mixture Model To Detect Random Responders On Non-Cognitive Polytomously Scored Assessments, Mandalyn R. Swanson

Dissertations, 2014-2019

This study represents an attempt to distinguish two classes of examinees – random responders and valid responders – on non-cognitive assessments in low-stakes testing. The majority of existing literature regarding the detection of random responders in low-stakes settings exists in regard to cognitive tests that are dichotomously scored. However, evidence suggests that random responding occurs on non-cognitive assessments, and as with cognitive measures, the data derived from such measures are used to inform practice. Thus, a threat to test score validity exists if examinees’ response selections do not accurately reflect their underlying level on the construct being assessed. As with …

The Nature And Etiology Of Religious Certitude: Implications Of The Ei Framework And Beliefs, Events, And Values Inventory, Timothy W. Brearly

Dissertations, 2014-2019

Religious certitude is often associated with conflict between individuals and groups, though the nature of this relationship is still not clear. To further clarify these dynamics, the historical psychology of religion is reviewed and contrasted with current perspectives from social psychology and neuroscience, with an eye towards better understanding the variance within religious expressions and their associated relationships with intergroup conflict. It is hypothesized that religious certainty is related to a difficulty in engaging with contradictory religious perspectives, and that the pull towards certainty is tied to an individual’s unique psychological structure, much of which is developed through the interaction …

The Effect Of Examinee Motivation On Value-Added Estimates, Laura M. Williams

Dissertations, 2014-2019

Questions regarding the quality of education, both in K-12 systems and higher education, are common. Methods for measuring quality in education have been developed in the past decades, with value-added estimates emerging as one of the most well-known methods. Value-added methods purport to indicate how much students learn over time as a result of their attendance at a particular school. Controversy has surrounded the algorithms used to generate value-added estimates as well as the uses of the estimates to make decisions about school and teacher quality. In higher education, most institutions used cross-sectional rather than longitudinal data to estimate value-added. …

Examining The Performance Of The Metropolis-Hastings Robbins-Monro Algorithm In The Estimation Of Multilevel Multidimensional Irt Models, Bozhidar M. Bashkov

Dissertations, 2014-2019

The purpose of this study was to review the challenges that exist in the estimation of complex (multidimensional) models applied to complex (multilevel) data and to examine the performance of the recently developed Metropolis-Hastings Robbins-Monro (MH-RM) algorithm (Cai, 2010a, 2010b), designed to overcome these challenges and implemented in both commercial and open-source software programs. Unlike other methods, which either rely on high-dimensional numerical integration or approximation of the entire multidimensional response surface, MH-RM makes use of Fisher’s Identity to employ stochastic imputation (i.e., data augmentation) via the Metropolis-Hastings sampler and then apply the stochastic approximation method of Robbins and Monro …

The Effects Of Academic Libraries’ Resource, Expenditure, And Service Decisions On Library Use: An Analysis Of Acrl And Nces Data, Jody C. Fagan

Dissertations, 2014-2019

Academic libraries are key contributors to the instructional and research missions of their parent institutions, but often struggle to demonstrate specifically what they do and how that affects institutional outcomes. High-impact educational practices are one area where libraries make a difference, but where explicit connections between activities and outcomes are not always articulated. Faculty and graduate student research is another area where libraries’ contribution makes logical sense, but specific relationships are not necessarily drawn. Libraries may place different emphasis on these two areas, effectively choosing different business strategies, to support their institutions’ missions. Two national surveys collect data about library …