Education Commons^™

Unfamiliar Territory: A Preliminary Exploration Of The Experiences Of International Junior Transfer Students, Nicole Mcintyre

Master's Theses

Over one million international students attend American institutions of higher education each year. For many of these students, community colleges are an accessible and increasingly popular enrollment option because they offer small class sizes, intensive English language courses, and affordable tuition costs. Many international students enrolled in community college seek to transfer to a four-year university and complete a Bachelor’s degree. To date, the experiences of international students who successfully complete this transfer pathway have gone largely unstudied. As a result, very little is known about the international junior transfer population. This qualitative study utilizes a phenomenology methodology to explore …

Perceptions On The Effectiveness Of Diversity And Inclusion Hiring: Are We Really Getting Ahead? [2019], Deidre D. Pierson

Master's Theses

Diversity and inclusion hiring in NCAA Division III athletic departments has seen some improvement over the last two decades, but questions remain on whether we are really getting ahead. There continues to be a lack of diversity, particularly in private Northeast institutions. The purpose of this study was to determine the perceived effectiveness of hiring practices and initiatives utilized by athletics departments. The study utilized tenants of critical theory which supported the in-depth questioning and centering of the lived experiences of participants. This study used semi-structured interviews of nine Division III female head coaches of women’s sports to examine their …

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 …

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 …

Indigenous Intercultural Universities In Latin America: Interpreting Interculturalism In Mexico And Bolivia, Luciano Pedota

Master's Theses

The newly created Indigenous Intercultural Universities in Latin America challenge the conventional conception of universities and their "universal" quality. Such universities seek to decolonize knowledge by generating knowledge that is relevant to the communities in which they are located. These intentions, however, do not necessarily exclude the knowledge and research methods imparted by long-established Western universities. Instead, they have been conceived as Intercultural institutions designed to train indigenous community leaders capable of hybridizing or carrying out a "dialogue of knowledges"(Mato, 2007) and research methods of what are ultimately two different, and often times, opposing and contentious paradigms, one stemming from …

Recruitment Initiatives In Higher Education: A Comparison Of Study Abroad And Enrollment Management Procedures, Carla Joy Ruffer

Master's Theses

There is a disparity of minority students' participation in study abroad, and establishing best practices for successful recruitment would assist in closing this gap. This project will look to add research toward reaching such best practices by analyzing the methods of recruiting minority students into higher education study abroad programs. What methods are universities using to recruit minority students into study abroad, and how do these compare to the methods used by enrollment management to recruit minority students into an institution? In order to answer these questions, I will use a qualitative analysis through interviews of study abroad and enrollment …

Short-Term Study Abroad Programs And The Development Of Intercultural Sensitivity, Barbara Elizabeth Zarnick

Master's Theses

This study focuses on the growing popularity of short-term study abroad programs and aims to determine the impact of such programs on producing intercultural sensitivity. A pre and post-departure survey were administered to undergraduate and graduate students to analyze students' perceptions of their own intercultural sensitivity prior to a short-term study abroad experience and after. This study uses the Intercultural Sensitivity Index developed by Christa Lee Olson and Kent R. Kroger in 2001 to assess the students' levels of intercultural sensitivity. The study reveals that this particular short-term experience had minimal impact on participants' levels of intercultural sensitivity, but illustrates …

Comprehensive U.S. Higher Education Internationalization: Exploring Study Abroad As An Indicator, Candace Brzoska Matta

Master's Theses

Increasing undergraduate study abroad participation is a popular response embraced by both higher education institutions and the U.S. government to internationalize college campuses and to meet the demands of globalization. Yet the nature of the internationalization phenomenon in higher education is much more complex in spite of its ambiguous definition and lackluster theoretical indicators. The purpose of this study was to examine whether one indicator of internationalization, that of study abroad, had any predictive bearing on an institutions' level of comprehensive internationalization. Six institutions were examined--three that consistently held a high study abroad participation percentage or SAPP, and three that …