Higher Education Administration Commons^™

The Continuing Evolution Of The Research Doctorate, Bianca L. Bernstein, Barbara Evans, Jeannette Fyffe, Nelofer Halai, Fred L. Hall, Mukobe Siggaard Jensen, Kazim Papeiva, Suzanne Ortega

Book Chapters / Conference Papers

No abstract provided.

Perceptions Of Higher Education Online Learning Faculty In Lebanon, Noha Adib Haidar

Walden Dissertations and Doctoral Studies

The purpose of this case study was to explore faculty attitudes toward online learning in a Lebanese Higher Education Institution (HEI). The research problem addressed the disinterest among faculty at the Arts, Sciences, and Technology University of Lebanon (AUL) in enhancing learning using online technology. The research questions for this study explored the attitudes of the faculty toward applying online learning and the extent of the faculty readiness to adopt this technological change. A qualitative case study design was used that employed multiple sources of information including semi-structured interviews and existing literature. The target population was AUL faculty including full-time …

Healthy Work Environment Orientation Training And Psychiatric Nurse Retention, Lawanda Rollins

Walden Dissertations and Doctoral Studies

According to recent research, more than 75% of newly employed nurses leave employment within 6 months. Changes in organizational training programs are needed in order to improve psychiatric nurse retention, nationally and globally. A healthy work environment (HWE) has been described as an environment that includes mentoring for good communication skills; it is also one that explores collaborative strategies for safe practice; professional advancement; and empowerment through research, education, and skill development. Examination of the impact of this HWE psychiatric nurse orientation training program on nurse retention was done using Rogers' theory of diffusion. Study variables included the length of …

Sustainable Revenue Generation System For Nonprofit Institutions Of Higher Education, Graig Arcuri

Walden Dissertations and Doctoral Studies

Social and individual spending on higher education has outpaced social and individual economic growth, resulting in nonprofit institutions of higher education (NIHEs) growing increasingly dependent upon unsustainable governmental subsidies and tuition increases. The purpose of this study was to examine the interactions among components of the nonprofit university system, existing revenue generation methods, and sustainability of revenue generation, thereby generating a new sustainable revenue theory for nonprofit universities within the United States. This qualitative grounded theory study used a multiphase design incorporating data from the literature review, historical documents, and phone interviews from a theoretical sampling of 10 NIHEs. Participants …

An Analysis Of Current And Former Residential Student Academic Success At A Hispanic Serving Institution On The United States - Mexico Border, Rueben Moreno

Open Access Theses & Dissertations

The purpose of this research was to examine academic success and engagement among current and former residential students living at the University of Texas at El Paso's student housing facilities. UTEP is a distinctive institution of higher education because it serves a large number of first generation and minority students. The majority of the population at UTEP consists of Hispanic students, and it is located on the U.S.-Mexico border.

The population for this study included current and former residents of UTEP's student housing during the fall 2012, spring 2013, and fall 2013 semesters. Three methods were used to collect data …

Effects Of Learning Communities On Community College Students' Success: A Meta-Analysis, Keith Allen Wurtz

Walden Dissertations and Doctoral Studies

Low graduation rates are a significant issue for colleges. The majority of higher education institutions in the United States offer learning communities (LCs), which have been found to be effective for improving course success and persisting to the next semester. However, there is a gap in the literature regarding the effectiveness of LCs with different types of populations and different types of LCs. The purpose of this meta-analysis was to identify the most effective types of LCs. Research questions addressed the effects of different types of LCs on different student success outcomes for community colleges. The study was based on …

Impact Of An Online Student Bridge Program For First-Year Nontraditional Students, Lisa Rene Adkins

Walden Dissertations and Doctoral Studies

Low retention rates for first-year students plague many higher education institutions, and are even lower among online institutions of higher education. At Athena Colleges (a pseudonym), the attrition rate can be as high as 50% in students' first academic year. To address this concern, Athena Colleges has implemented an online bridge program that addresses students' academic needs and persistence. The purpose of the study was to evaluate the effectiveness of the bridge program in reducing the first-time student attrition rate and academic performance in their first term. Most of Athena Colleges students are nontraditional students and due to this, the …

Nontraditional Hispanic College Students' Perceptions Of Their Sense Of Belonging At A 2-Year College In Southwest Texas, Ronald Eugene Zawacki-Maldonado

Walden Dissertations and Doctoral Studies

The purpose of this study was to understand how a sense of belonging contributes to graduation persistence among nontraditional Hispanic college students. The collectivist culture among these adult learners often results in family and work obligations that curtail their pursuit of higher education. The voices of these students are mostly absent in the current literature and warrant the current research study. Sense of belonging and retention theory formed the conceptual framework for this phenomenological study. A purposeful sample of 16 nontraditional Hispanic students enrolled in a 2-year community college in Southwest Texas participated in interviews. Data analysis focused on themes …

A Professional Development Approach To Improve Practice At An Upstate Community College, Lisa K. Antalek

Walden Dissertations and Doctoral Studies

A federal Call to Action was mandated to reform community colleges across the nation, challenging college officials to enhance instructional methodology on college campuses towards increasing student completion rates. In addressing this mandate, college officials at the upstate NY community college identified a need for professional development that would increase student learning and enhance the instructional methodologies of facilitating faculty through improved alignment. Accordingly, this study investigated the alignment of faculty instructional effectiveness with the institution's core mission. The purpose of this study was to examine faculty perceptions of the instructional methodologies used to facilitate student learning. Informed by Knowles's …

Stakeholders' Roles In Prioritizing Technical Vocational Education And Training In Postconflict Liberia, Edward S. Forh

Walden Dissertations and Doctoral Studies

Postconflict governments and counterparts have collaborated to provide skills training to communities as a critical postconflict development strategy. In these undertakings, the role of community members remains largely undefined. The purpose of this qualitative descriptive case study was to understand the perceptions held by rural community members regarding the role they played in influencing government's policy priority for technical and vocational education and training (TVET) as a local human development strategy in postconflict Liberia. The conceptual framework was based on human capital theory and concepts of motivation and achievement. Fourteen participants were purposefully selected for the study. Data were collected …

Oral Health Knowledge, Attitudes, And Practices Among Secondary School Students In Nigeria, Johnson John Omale

Walden Dissertations and Doctoral Studies

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Individualized Consideration: Poverty Countermeasure, Lawrence Wilson

Walden Dissertations and Doctoral Studies

Despite more than $1 trillion spent annually on poverty remediation, impoverishment in the United States persists unabated. With a U.S. poverty rate greater than 10% for more than 4 decades, economics are neither poverty's cause nor cure. As such, non-economic poverty remedies require exploration and expansion. Linking greater leadership and poverty theories, this non-experimental, cross sectional, quantitative, survey-based research effort correlated individualized consideration's (IC) practice with collegiate athlete graduation rates in order to identify and isolate possible leadership based social poverty remediation measures. Leveraging a two-stage random sample, this research effort correlated student athlete Multi-Factor Leadership Questionnaire (form 5X) responses …

High School Student Athletes And Nonathletes' Disciplinary Referrals And Grade Point Averages, Jack Willard Calhoun

Walden Dissertations and Doctoral Studies

High School Student Athletes and Nonathletes'

Disciplinary Referrals and Grade Point Averages

by

Jack Calhoun

MEd, Georgia Southwestern State University, 1998

BS, Georgia Southwestern State University, 1997

Doctoral Study Submitted in Partial Fulfillment

of the Requirements for the Degree of

Doctor of Education

Walden University

December 2014

This quantitative study investigated how athletic participation in public high schools influenced students' academic achievement and positive social behavior. Disciplinary referrals are on the rise in American schools and are a cause of concern for teachers, administrators, parents, and community members. School personnel currently implement programs designed to curb discipline problems in the …

Just Ask: Using Faculty Input To Inform Communication Strategies, Krista Hoffmann Longtin, Megan M. Palmer, Julie L. Welch, Emily C. Walvoord, Mary E. Dankoski

To Improve the Academy: A Journal of Educational Development

Faculty members today are bombarded with information, yet limited in time and attention. Managing communication with faculty is an increasingly important function of faculty development offices. This study explored how communication frameworks can be paired with web design principles and attention economics to increase the effectiveness of communication with faculty members. We developed and tested communication approaches designed to enhance faculty members’ identification and involvement with our programs. The advantages, disadvantages, and effectiveness of each model are presented. Ultimately, the study reframed our understanding of communication strategies, not as static tools, but rather as opportunities to engage faculty.

Mapping Classroom Interactions: A Spatial Approach To Analyzing Patterns Of Student Participation, Sophia Abbot, Alison Cook Sather, Carola Hein

To Improve the Academy: A Journal of Educational Development

This article explores how mapping patterns of student participation in classroom discussion can both illuminate and complicate the dynamic relationships among identity, physical position in the classroom, student engagement, and course content. It draws on the perspectives of an undergraduate in the role of pedagogical consultant, a faculty member who worked in partnership with that student, and the coordinator of the program through which this collaborative exploration unfolded. The authors provide multiple angles of vision on the impetus behind, approach to, results of, and interdisciplinary possibilities of mapping classrooms and offer recommendations and cautions regarding the use of mapping.

Developing Scholarly Teachers Through An Sotl Faculty Fellowship, Beth A. Fisher, Michelle D. Repice, Carolyn L. Dufault, Denise A. Leonard, Regina F. Frey

To Improve the Academy: A Journal of Educational Development

The increasing interest in incorporating evidenced based teaching in higher education has created a pronounced need for faculty to learn the theory and practice of the Scholarship of Teaching and Learning (SoTL). This article describes a program designed to prepare faculty to (a) draw on existing SoTL studies when designing and implementing evidenced based teaching methods, (b) design SoTL studies to test the effectiveness of those methods, and (c) integrate their new knowledge of SoTL into the practice of “scholarly teaching.” This program has proven to be a successful model for incorporating evidenced based teaching into undergraduate science, technology, engineering, …

Emotion In The Classroom: An Update, Janine Bowen

To Improve the Academy: A Journal of Educational Development

Fourteen years ago, POD member Edward Vela drew attention to the role of emotion in learning. In particular he emphasized the need for faculty to express positive emotions in the classroom. Since then researchers continue to measure the effectiveness of positive emotion in student learning but the field of emotion in the classroom has expanded since Vela's essay. The purpose of this article is to not only update Vela's citations on emotion and learning but to provide a broader perspective on the topic and assist faculty developers. Ashkanasy's five level model frames the discussion.

Sequential Online Course Redesign: When “It Just Takes Time” Works No Longer, Genevieve G. Shaker, Sarah K. Nathan, Elizabeth J. Dale

To Improve the Academy: A Journal of Educational Development

Despite the increase in formats of online education, evidence suggests that the academic achievement gap could widen without iterative adaptation. This comparative case study analyzes the implementation of an online undergraduate course delivered consecutively in hybrid and fully online formats. Student feedback and instructor reflection address adaptive processes for online learning and adjustments to enhance the second course following a sequential redesign. Results include students’ challenges with technology and workload, benefits of cross course collaboration, instructor efforts to mediate challenges without sacrificing rigor, and advice for educational developers as they support online teaching through rapid adaptation by design.

Peer Collaboration: Improving Teaching Through Comprehensive Peer Review, Shelley L. Smith

To Improve the Academy: A Journal of Educational Development

This article includes a brief rationale and review of the literature on peer review of teaching (PRT). Based on that literature review, it offers a proposal for an optimal formative review process that results in a teaching portfolio that would reflect a faculty member’s efforts and successes in a critically reflective PRT process, and contributes to ongoing teaching improvement. It then looks at potential areas of faculty resistance and concern and offers a discussion of potential strategies to overcome those concerns.

Tracking Pod's Engagement With Diversity: A Content Analysis Of To Improve The Academy And Pod Network Conference Programs From 1977 To 2011, Stacy E. Grooters

To Improve the Academy: A Journal of Educational Development

This study examines the degree to which sessions from the annual Professional and Organizational Development (POD) Network Conference and articles from To Improve the Academy engage questions of diversity. The titles and abstracts of 3,946 conference sessions and 560 journal articles were coded for presence and type of diversity. A significant variation in inclusion of diversity over time was found for the conference sessions (p < 0.001) but not the journal articles. Overall, the findings suggest that the organization has been inconsistent in its scholarly engagement with diversity and should work to encourage more regular engagement with diversity by its members.

Tracing The Evolution Of Educational Development Through The Pod Network's Institute For New Faculty Developers, Michele Dipietro

To Improve the Academy: A Journal of Educational Development

Educational development is a unique professional field in that it is not defined by content taught in a single degree that qualifies individuals to be in it. The resulting heterogeneity in newcomers’ knowledge and skills is addressed in different ways by different national networks. Since 1997, the POD Network has held a biennial Institute for New Faculty Developers, geared toward socializing new professionals into the field. An analysis of the evolution of the Institute, therefore, focused on understanding how educational development has represented itself to newcomers, can chronicle the trajectory of the field and generate conversations about its future.

Measuring The Promise: A Learning Focused Syllabus Rubric, Michael Palmer, Dorothe Bach, Adriana Streifer

To Improve the Academy: A Journal of Educational Development

To enrich the resources for measuring the impact of educational development work, we have created a rubric to assess the degree to which a syllabus achieves a learning orientation. The rubric provides qualitative descriptions of components that distinguish learning focused syllabi and uses a quantitative scoring system that places syllabi on a spectrum from content focused to learning focused. It is flexible enough to accommodate a diverse range of levels, disciplines, institutions, and learning environments, yet nuanced enough to provide summative information to developers using the tool for assessment purposes and formative feedback to instructors interested in gauging the focus …

Preparing New Faculty For Leadership: Understanding And Addressing Needs, Anne Kelsch, Joan Hawthorne

To Improve the Academy: A Journal of Educational Development

A perceived decline in effective faculty participation in campus leadership and governance is well documented, both in the literature and via anecdote. Characteristics common within the culture of higher education make nurturing campus “citizenship” among junior faculty challenging. This essay describes findings from an interview based study of junior faculty in which understanding of professional responsibilities beyond teaching and research was explored. The study documented the deep sense of unpreparedness with which new faculty approach key issues in higher education, including those associated with governance and leadership. Two possible strategies for redressing that unpreparedness, both showing preliminary but positive results, …

Stereotype Threat–Based Diversity Programming: Helping Students While Empowering And Respecting Faculty, Isis Artze Vega, Leslie Richardson, Adrienne Traxler

To Improve the Academy: A Journal of Educational Development

As college student populations grow increasingly diverse, centers for teaching and learning are often charged with promoting inclusive teaching practices. Yet faculty cite many affective barriers to diversity training, and we often preach to the choir. These challenges led us to seek alternate routes for diversity programming, and stereotype threat has become the centerpiece of our endeavors. This chapter describes stereotype threat and related interventions, outlines our efforts, and offers evidence of its surprising impact. It also identifies the features of stereotype threat that appealed to faculty, led them to make pedagogical changes, and inspired them to spread the word.

Reflections On The State Of The Scholarship Of Educational Development, Deandra Little

To Improve the Academy: A Journal of Educational Development

Introduction to volume 33, number 1 of To Improve the Academy: A Journal of Educational Development from 2014 by managing editor Deandra Little of Elon University.

Education Policy And Social Justice: Exploring Possibilities Within Education Policy Context Of Pakistan, Sajid Ali

Institute for Educational Development, Karachi

One of the major purposes of education policy is to ensure social justice in a society. The social justice needs to be thought of not only in conventional sense of ‘distributional’ justice, but also in the sense of ‘relational’ justice. Looking from this perspective the policies in Pakistan have historically focused only on distributional justice, albeit with dismal progress on this front. However, they have completely ignored the attainment of ‘relational’ justice as a policy objective. As a result power differentials not only exist but worsened through educational policies such as undermining of public schooling while encouraging privatization of education …

Re-Integrating Academic Development And Academic Language And Learning: A Call To Reason, Alisa Percy

Alisa Percy, PhD

This paper argues for the re-integration of academic development (AD) and a academic language and learning (ALL) practitioners in Australian higher education. This argument is made as universities aim to develop internationally recognised, inter-disciplinary and standards-based curricula against the backdrop of international comparative education (e.g., Organisation for Economic Cooperation and Development), the Australian Qualifications Framework and a quality emphasis on English language standards (e.g., Tertiary Education Quality and Assessment Agency). Drawing on Rowland's argument that professional life in the academy has become fragmented across five fault lines ([2002]. Overcoming fragmentation in professional life: The challenge for academic development. Higher Education …

A Critical Turn In Higher Education Research: Turning The Critical Lens On The Academic Language And Learning Educator, Alisa Percy

Alisa Percy, PhD

This paper suggests that historical ontology, as one form of reflexive critique, is an instructive research design for making sense of the political and historical constitution of the Academic Language and Learning (ALL) educator in Australian higher education. The ALL educator in this paper refers to those practitioners in the field of ALL, whose ethical agency has largely been taken for granted since their slow and uneven emergence in the latter half of the twentieth century. Using the lens of governmentality, genealogical design and archaeological method, the historical ontology proposed in this paper demonstrates how the ethical remit of the …