Higher Education Commons^™

Addressing Extremism Through Literature: An Online Cross-Cultural Conversation On Mahi Binebine's Horses Of God, Habiba Boumlik, Phyllis E. Vanslyck

Publications and Research

In the Fall of 2017, first year liberal arts students at Community College and second year Masters’ Students in literature at a university in Morocco collaborated in an online and live conversation focusing on the novel Horses of God (Les Etoiles de Sidi Moumen) written by Mahi Binebine. The novel describes the lives of four childhood friends growing up in a slum near Casablanca, navigating poverty and purposelessness and being drawn to religious fundamentalism. Students in the two colleges engaged in an online discussion on Facebook and live Google Hangouts exchange in which they shared questions about the …

Cybersecurity-Beyond Data Protection, Amy J. Ramson, Ez Tech Assist

Open Educational Resources

No abstract provided.

Create A Revolution In Undergraduates' Understanding Of Science: Teach Through Close Analysis Of Scientific Literature, Sally G. Hoskins

Publications and Research

The teaching of science to undergraduates aligns poorly with the practice of science, leading many students to conclude that research is boring and researchers themselves are antisocial geniuses. Creativity, a key driver of scientific progress, is underemphasized or ignored altogether in many classrooms, as teaching focuses on the complex integrated concepts and voluminous amounts of information typical of STEM curricula. Faculty, largely untrained in science education per se, teach largely as they were taught, through lectures based in textbooks. This situation could change, and students' understanding of research practice could be fostered relatively easily, if faculty began teaching classes focused …

“Our Stories”: First-Year Learning Communities Students Reflections On The Transition To College, Karen Goodlad, Sandra Cheng, Jennifer Sears, Mery Diaz, Ashwin Satyanarayana, Phil Freniske

Publications and Research

Analysis of diverse first-year and first-generation learning communities students’ reflective narratives shows this population of students at an urban commuter college of technology face significant challenges in the transition into college. Designed to assist in this transition, the “Our Stories” digital writing project incorporates reflective writing in the long established, yet recently revitalized, learning communities program. Through analysis of the “Our Stories” project, we examine how the structure of our learning communities program, together with writing on an open digital platform, builds community and has the potential to positively influence students as they identify, and begin to make sense, of …

Developing Open Practices In Teacher Education: An Example Of Integrating Oer And Developing Renewable Assignments, Jennifer Van Allen, Stacy Katz

Publications and Research

This manuscript offers a reasoning for and example of integrating Open Educational Resources (OER) and open pedagogy within a teacher education course. We highlight a collaborative partnership between library faculty and education faculty and the decision points and processes we used when redesigning this course to provide an example of adopting OER and our considerations for developing a renewable assignment. The benefits of using OER for K-12 teachers include increasing awareness of and providing opportunities to develop open practices. The transition to a renewable assignment creates a space for teaching candidates to meaningfully contribute to the profession and engage in …

The Mere Mention Of Asians In Affirmative Action, Jennifer Lee, Van C. Tran

Publications and Research

Presumed competent, U.S. Asians evince exceptional educational outcomes but lack the cultural pedigree of elite whites that safeguard them from bias in the labor market. In spite of their nonwhite minority status, Asians also lack the legacy of disadvantage of blacks that make them eligible beneficiaries of affirmative action. Their labor market disadvantage coupled with their exclusion from affirmative action programs place Asians in a unique bind: do they support policies that give preferences to blacks but exclude them? Given their self- and group interests, this bind should make Asians unlikely to do so. We assess whether this is the …

“Don’T Make Me Feel Dumb”: Transfer Students, The Library, And Acclimating To A New Campus, Matthew Harrick, Lee Ann Fullington

Publications and Research

Objective – This qualitative study sought to delineate and understand the role of the library in addressing the barriers transfer students experience upon acclimating to their new campus.

Methods – A screening survey was used to recruit transfer students in their first semester at Brooklyn College (BC) to participate in focus groups. The participants discussed the issues they encountered by answering open-ended questions about their experiences on campus, and with the library specifically.

Results – Transfer students desired current information about campus procedures, services, and academic support. They often had to find this information on their own, wasting valuable time. …

Teaching Students To Critically Evaluate Textbooks, Christopher Mchale, Ian Mcdermott, Steven Ovadia

Publications and Research

This chapter is a case study describing how library faculty combined service learning and information literacy to help students evaluate textbooks, comparing commercial ones to Open Education Resources. The underlying idea was to give students not only a scholarly grounding that would help them as they move through their academic careers but also a practical vocational orientation to help them succeed in the workforce and, hopefully, become future contributors to the free culture movement.

Towards A Pedagogy Of Life Purposes, Manny Lopez

Dissertations, Theses, and Capstone Projects

College students who understand how the courses that they are enrolled in connect with their broader life goals are more likely to apply an approach of task perseverance with academic endeavors. Yet, nearly three million adolescent community college students in the United States may not have developed clear purposes in life. Relatedly, overtime the lack of lucid life purposes contributes to maladaptive behavior.

This dissertation is a compilation of three interrelated studies that took place in two public community colleges in the City University of New York. Guided by authentic inquiry and framed by sociocultural theory, central to each study …

Class Matters: School Affluence And Other Predictors Of Attainment For Wealthy And Poor Students, Alison Brockhouse

Dissertations, Theses, and Capstone Projects

Public schools in the United States are becoming increasingly segregated by socioeconomic status. Though the educational consequences of socioeconomic segregation are well researched, segregation is often ignored or exacerbated by education reform. To learn more about the wider implications of socioeconomic segregation, this study utilizes theoretical frameworks derived from Max Weber’s theory of social stratification to analyze over 10,000 students’ experiences from the National Center for Education Statistics (NCES) Education Longitudinal Study (ELS) 2002, 2004, and 2012 waves of data collection. More specifically, this research explores the impact of attending an affluent high school on long-term educational attainment. It finds …

Components Of Fluency-Based Instruction In The College Classroom, Jennifer Kourassanis Velasquez

Dissertations, Theses, and Capstone Projects

The current research regarding the use of fluency-based instruction (FBI) to teach academic skills suggests the addition of FBI to traditional instruction produces better learning outcomes than traditional instruction alone. However, there is a lack of comparative research of the addition of FBI to traditional instruction vs. traditional instruction alone on student performance outcomes with college students. The present study was composed of two experiments to examine the effects of the addition of a component of FBI using a modified SAFMEDS (Say All Fast Minute Every Day Shuffled) strategy to traditional instruction within the course’s existing curriculum on quiz and …

Reimagining The Flute Masterclass: Case Studies Exploring Artistry, Authority, And Embodiment, Sarah Carrier

Dissertations, Theses, and Capstone Projects

This work explores the flute masterclass as an aesthetic, ritualized, and historically reimagined cultural practice. Based on fieldwork that took place between 2017 and 2019 in the United States, in Italy, and on the social media platforms Instagram, Facebook, and YouTube, I argue that the masterclass—an extension of the master/apprentice system that dominates learning in the classical music tradition—is characterized by embodied qualities of artistry and authority. These qualities are not inherent, but are perceived through subjective, social, familied, and affective bodies.

Chapter One outlines the main themes and the research design. Chapter Two is a case study that analyzes …

Place-Making By Black And Latinx Students In Predominantly White Institutions: Participatory Design And Meaning Making Through A Social Enterprise, Joshua P.H. Livingston

Dissertations, Theses, and Capstone Projects

Black and Latinx male retention in post-secondary institutions, particularly predominantly white institutions (PWI), remains a critical social problem. Even though many PWIs set up structures to welcome and support Black and Latinx males, those structures are defined and created through dominant cultural norms. They have been challenged to mitigate the individualized facets of disengagement. A social innovation, proof of concept model was conceptualized, designed, and developed alongside Black and Latinx males in college. Social innovation is defined as a new way of approaching long standing and complex problems. Proof of concept (PoC) helps to validate that processes and designs are …

Cruzar Fronteras Em Espaços Acadêmicos: Transgressing “The Limits Of Translanguaging”, Brendan H. O’Connor, Katherine S. Mortimer, Lesley Bartlett, María Teresa De La Piedra, Ana Maria Rabelo Gomes, Ariana Mangual Figueroa, Gabriela Novaro, Marjorie Faulstich Orellana, Char Ullman

Publications and Research

Scholarship on translanguaging and related concepts has challenged traditional assumptions about how people use their multiple languages, urging us to move beyond the boundaries of named linguistic codes and toward conceptualizations of multilingual language use as flexible use of a speaker’s whole linguistic repertoire. Critiques of this theoretical shift have included assertions of translanguaging’s conceptual and practical limits—limits to its transformative potential as well as limits to its practical use. This paper takes up, in particular, the question of why we academics may assert the value of translanguaging in schools and communities while still largely failing to move beyond monoglossic …

Academic Assessment: Best Practices For Successful Outcomes With Accreditation Evaluation Teams, Tammie Cumming, M. David Miller

Publications and Research

This chapter describes the role of faculty in conducting quality assessment and includes suggestions for preparing for successful meetings with reviewers on accreditation teams.

One-Year Research Experience For Associate’S Degree Students Impacts Graduation, Stem Retention, And Transfer Patterns, Ron Nerio, Althea Webber, Effie Maclachlan, David Lopatto, Avrom J. Caplan

Publications and Research

The CUNY Research Scholars Program (CRSP) provides a yearlong faculty-mentored research experience to associate’s degree students. The program takes place at all 10 associate’s degree–granting colleges within the City University of New York system. We report on a mixed-methods study of 500 students who participated in the program during its initial 3 years. Quantitative longitudinal assessments revealed that students who en-gaged in CRSP were more likely to be retained in a science, technology, engineering, and mathematics (STEM) discipline or to graduate with a STEM degree than their counterparts in a matched comparison group. Furthermore, students who participated in CRSP demon-strated …

Re-Visioning Ralph Ellison’S Invisible Man For A Class Of Urban Immigrant Youth, Camille Goodison

Publications and Research

In this essay, I will explore Ralph Ellison’s 1952 classic novel, Invisible Man, as a text that has contemporary and relatable themes for a modern-day classroom of mostly urban youth. This essay is also a personal journey into how Ellison’s inventive approaches to form helped create a work that lends itself to contemporary reimagining. It asks the question, can Ellison’s interest in creating a living Afro-American literary tradition rooted in the lore of the ‘peasant’ or common folk have contemporary applications? How does Ellison’s belief that everyday folk expression has value hold up for today’s readers? I try to …

Study Of Healthcare-Associated Infections And Multi-Drug Resistance In Brooklyn: An Integrative Approach, Liana Tsenova, Urmi Ghosh-Dastidar, Arnavaz Taraporevala, Pamela Brown, Aionga Pereira-Edwards

Publications and Research

One SENCER ideal is to connect science education and civic engagement by student learning through complex, unresolved public issues. Using this approach, we established a collaborative interdisciplinary project involving faculty and undergraduate students at NYC College of Technology. Over several semesters, students conducted literature search and discovered the complex factors contributing to the occurrence and transmission of healthcare-associated infections (HAIs). Using microbiology data from 15 hospitals in Brooklyn, NY, they applied statistical analyses, studied the antibiotic resistance, and developed a campaign to bring more awareness of this problem. The results of the project highlight the importance of immediate action in …

Closing Thoughts On The Implications Of #Metoo Movement For Academia, Nicole Elias, Maria J. D'Agostino

Publications and Research

No abstract provided.

Advanced Design And Fabrication Of Prosthetic And Medical Devices, Gaffar Gailani, Andy S. Zhang, Yu Wang, Sidi Berri

Publications and Research

The department of Mechanical Engineering and Industrial Design Technology (MEIDT) at City Tech is seeking to strengthening the skills of its students in manufacturing and design to respond to the urgent needs of the manufacturing industry in general and the prosthetic and medical devices (P&MD) industry in particular to high-skilled engineers and technicians and to provide a national model for advanced technology education. Medical Devices will include: (a) Surgical and Medical Instruments; (b) Surgical Appliances and Supplies; and (c) Dental Equipment and Supplies. The educational merit of the project is that it motivates students to do engineering rather than studying …

"To Be Honest I’M Not Sure If We Have A Textbook:" Undergraduate Access To Course Reading, Maura A. Smale

Publications and Research

No abstract provided.

Accelerating Systemic Change Network (Ascn): Demonstrating Impact, David Bressoud, Pamela Brown, Archie Holmes, Kate White

Publications and Research

The goals of this presentation for participants was:

•Learn about the Accelerating Systemic Change Network (ASCN), why it is important, what it can do for you, and how you can get involved. •Learn about work done by ASCN on demonstrating impact and how measurement and communication can be used to promote change. •Learn about areas where educational research is needed and you can contribute.

Finding Connections: Making An Existing Biology Course Interdisciplinary And Using The Experience For The Traditional Course And Oers, Tatiana Voza

Publications and Research

Adapting an existing introductory biology course to make it interdisciplinary and successful is an interesting experience and process. With imperatives such as lecture and lab components, a dense curriculum, preexisting learning outcomes and students with different levels of interest, adding material to provide relevant context show how both scientific and social knowledge relate to broader aspects of the human experience, can be challenging. However, once achieved such a course provides epistemological value, real-world context and a rewarding and enriching experience for both students and faculty. In this presentation, the steps involved in designing and implementing an interdisciplinary biology course (Biology …

"Our Stories" Developing A Virtual Community Of First-Year Voices, Sandra Cheng, Jennifer Sears, Karen Goodlad, Ashwin Satyanarayana, Mery Diaz, Philip Kreniske

Publications and Research

First Year Learning Communities (FYLC) at City Tech is structured to provide first-year students in linked courses an interdisciplinary learning experience. This approach creates opportunities for students to form bonds within the college community. A shared belief among faculty leaders in the potential for writing to transform the student experience led to the development of the “Our Stories” digital writing project. “Our Stories” offers FYLC students the opportunity to express their experiences in classes, seminars, lectures, study groups, and labs on the OpenLab, a digital platform for teaching, learning, and sharing. Through this project, students shared their stories and revealed …

Exploration Of The Lessons Learned By Students Attending Peer-Led Workshops, Fahmida Akhter

Publications and Research

The study is conducted with students attending an additional one-hour a week peer-led workshop associated with their Pre-Calculus class. The study focuses on the following research questions: Do peer-led workshops help students become better at problem solving? What are the lessons learned from peer-led workshops that can be useful and applicable in future courses? Data will be collected through administrating surveys to the students in the peer-led workshop. The data will be organized, analyzed and presented at the poster session.

The Impact Of Peer-Led Workshops In An Intermediate Algebra Course For Women, Minorities, And First-Generation College Students, Malika Ikramova

Publications and Research

The implementation of the Peer-Led Team Learning (PLTL) instructional model have shown to increase student pass rates and decrease failure and withdrawal rates in foundational mathematics courses. New York City College of Technology has implemented mandatory PLTL workshops in selected sections of MAT 1275: Intermediate Algebra and Trigonometry. Students spend an hour working collaboratively with their classmates guided by peer leader. Results from this study showed gender, ethnicity, and first-generation college student differences in their responses on the effectiveness of peer supported groups in this fundamental mathematics course.

Corequisite Mathematics Remediation: Results Over Time And In Different Contexts, Alexandra W. Logue, Daniel Douglas, Mari Watanabe-Rose

Publications and Research

Traditional mathematics remediation is based on the theory that traditional mathematics remedial courses increase students’ subsequent academic performance. However, most students assigned to these courses do not pass them, and thus cannot graduate. An alternative approach, corequisite remediation, assigns students instead to college-level quantitative courses with additional academic support, often aligned to a student’s major. Here we report the longer-term results of a randomized controlled trial comparing corequisite remediation (with statistics) and traditional algebra remediation (297 students per group). The corequisite group not only demonstrated significantly higher quantitative course pass rates, but also success in many other disciplines, as well …

Impacts Of The Erosion Of State Funding For Public Higher Education: Longitudinal Case Studies Of Four State Systems – California, Georgia, New York And Wisconsin, Meghan M. Moore-Wilk

Dissertations, Theses, and Capstone Projects

The rising cost of higher education in America is national news on a regular basis and many feel that as the costs increase the American dream of upward mobility slips further and further out of reach. Much of the research on higher education to date focuses on the quantifiable changes in support for public colleges and universities at the national or state levels, but less is written about individual state public higher education systems. This study provides a fifty-year, fifty-state history of funding for the operating costs of higher education and new information, from the four quadrants of the country, …

School Optimism: Fast Life And Slow Debt In The Financialized University, Mark Alan Porter Webb

Dissertations, Theses, and Capstone Projects

Over the past two decades, educational debt has quickly transformed US colleges and universities into spaces of cruel optimism: the higher education that students desire is all too often an obstacle to their flourishing. This study maps the contours of the white, middle-class attachment to the college dream, paying particular attention to the moments when the optimism surrounding higher education turns cruel. As this optimism wanes in the face of mounting educational debt, students deploy a myriad of fast life strategies—a flurry of actions that include work, activism, protest, leaving school and/or satirical critique—with the hope of mitigating the impact …

Art Across The Disciplines: How The Integration Of Fine Arts Across The Curriculum Is Influencing And Changing Stem Pedagogy, Ida Bazan

Dissertations, Theses, and Capstone Projects

Within the past decade, several academic institutions have begun to investigate techniques combining the fine arts and humanities into STEM coursework and curriculum. The resulting trend STEAM (Science, Technology, Engineering, Art, Mathematics) indicates that the arts could contribute to critical thinking, transfer across subject domains, and higher order thinking skills. This work examines the theoretical foundations of STEAM along with early and recent methodologies. Case studies are evaluated and the thesis concludes with recommendations suggesting how academics could apply these concepts to undergraduate studies.