Social and Philosophical Foundations of Education Commons^™

Analyzing Environmental Education In Northern Mississippi And Its Impact On Student Outcomes, Vishnu S. Gadepalli

Honors Theses

This thesis examines environmental education in public high schools in northern Mississippi, investigating how educators describe its presence, delivery, and institutional support in communities disproportionately burdened by environmental harm. Seven semi-structured interviews were conducted with high school teachers across four northern Mississippi schools, transcribed verbatim, and analyzed through iterative thematic coding under Institutional Review Board approval. Five themes emerged: opportunistic curricular integration, time and standards as overriding structural constraints, passive institutional support, student receptivity tempered by limited awareness, and significant variation across school contexts with one magnet school as a clear outlier. The study concludes that environmental education in these …

Ancient Wisdom & Its Cultural Relevance: Reimagining Deeper Learning In Science Classrooms Through The Lens Of Yoga And Vedānta, Raaghav Pandya

Journal of Contemplative and Holistic Education

Contemporary calls to reconceptualize how science is taught and understood have brought deeper learning to the forefront of education at-large for its emphasis on critical perspectives, creativity, and student-centered inquiry. Yet this paper argues that its prevailing framework remains constrained by Cartesian dualism, a materialist foundation that disassociates the individual from self, other, and nature, and falls short of addressing the mental health, environmental, and cultural challenges facing youth today. To address this limitation, this paper proposes a complementary convergence between deeper learning and the contemplative traditions of Yoga and Vedānta, whose ancient paradigms of self-inquiry, interconnectedness, and well-being offer …

Our Own, My Own: Expereinces With Art, Kaleisha Towle

Masters Theses

Our Own, My Own: Experiences with Art is a two in one thesis project investigating dialogically based programming within art museums and how those programs can contribute to the making of art museums into civically engaged third spaces. Part one of this project included research into how dialogically based art museum programs are currently operating within the United States. The goal was to investigate pedagogical practices and forms of dialogue in use as well as their impact on participants' experiences. To accomplish this goal, I attended seven art museums within the region of New England at which I participated in …

The Pedagogical Lineage Of The Kaplans And Its Future, Taylor Yeracaris

Journal of Math Circles

This article describes the origins of Bob and Ellen Kaplan's Math Circle, one of the first Math Circles in the U.S. It covers Bob and Ellen's personal histories and some of the wide-ranging impact of their work and philosophy of teaching. It also discusses how the current form of their organization, The Global Math Circle, is working to carry forward their legacy, including building community and supporting Math Circle leaders with the Nexus project.

Love Will Get You Further: Allan Leslie Combs And The Legacy Of Radiance, Julia C. Gardner

Journal of Conscious Evolution

In this reflective tribute, I draw on a November 2025 remembrance gathering for Allan Leslie Combs to explore how his scholarship on consciousness lived through his presence, pedagogy, and relationships. The article weaves reflections from students, colleagues, friends, and family to show how Leslie treated consciousness as a living, radiant field and knowledge as participatory. Speakers describe a mentor who walked beside their work, welcoming spiritual, creative, and embodied ways of knowing, while trusting love, humor, and trickster-mischief as legitimate modes of inquiry.

I then turn to my own dissertation research on play consciousness (PlayCS) as a tangible extension of …

An Interest-Driven Approach: An Interview With Professor Allan Leslie Combs, Laurel Waterman Phd

Journal of Conscious Evolution

On March 17, 2024, I interviewed Professor Allan Leslie Combs about his teaching for my doctoral research project titled Teaching With Consciousness: A Narrative Inquiry Into Scholars’ Experiences Teaching About Consciousness Beyond the Brain. In January 2025, Leslie reviewed a draft of my interview write-up and emailed me, saying, “Beautiful work! And I have to say I am honored by the description you give of my own teaching philosophy.” This article draws on Leslie’s stories and applies their insights to the theory and practice of consciousness education—a field exploring perspectives on the source and nature of consciousness and their …

Extracting From The Extracurriculum: Using Extracurricular Composition Practices To Bring Purpose, Voice, And Engagement Back To The English Classroom, Grace N. Ellis

Department of English: Dissertations, Theses, and Student Research

This thesis explores how principles and practices from extracurricular literacy spaces and the extracurriculum as a whole can inform and revitalize the secondary English classroom. In response to growing student disengagement, apathy, and disconnection, particularly within highly standardized and product-focused classrooms, this argument investigates how programs such as the Nebraska Writers Collective’s All Writes Reserved program and the University of Nebraska–Lincoln’s Young Writer Camp model authentic engagement, identity exploration and development, and rhetorical agency through creative, student-centered writing practices. Drawing from composition theory, educational research, and experiential data from Nebraska-based writing initiatives, the thesis argues that incorporating choice, safe-risk taking, …

Creating Worlds: Anarchist Education Within And Against The State, Paul B. Berlet

West Chester University Master’s Theses

This thesis shows how contemporary U.S. schooling reproduces domination and erodes freedom by examining education as a mechanism of social reproduction, disciplinary control, surveillance, and neoliberalization. I draw on Foucault, social reproduction theory, Freire, Vygotsky, and anarchist philosophy while using a critical action research lens to name the structural forces that condition obedience, normalize hierarchy, and individualize responsibility. In response, this thesis asks how anarchist pedagogy functions as an antithesis to these forces. This framework leads me to articulate how anarchist education could emerge through prefigurative community building. Educators are capable of helping to create new worlds both within and …

Wondrous Uncertainty: Transforming Student Educational Experiences Using Restorative Practices, Zachary C. Schafer

Dissertations and Doctoral Documents, University of Nebraska-Lincoln, 2023–

One of the primary purposes of education is to help students make sense of their lived experiences. In the process of becoming, students navigate multiple relationships (school, peers, adults, and with self). These relationships often cause conditions of uncertainty which can be managed and transformed using restorative practices in tandem with the academic disciplines taught in school. Over the last decade this has been my inquiry puzzle, “As educators, how can we embrace uncertainty with students as a way of helping to empower them through their dignity, with the academic disciplines as a lens through which relational learning occurs in …

Colonising Creatitvity_Combined Final Script 2024_Published, Strutts Psyridis Med, James Thompson Phd

Staff Scholarship - Australia & Dubai

This paper examines the evolving landscape of contemporary screen education, with a focus on the impact of progressive, constructivist and vocational pedagogies, arguing that their convergence with digital surveillance and AI risks undermining student agency and creative ownership. The authors draw on philosophical and educational perspectives to contrast and critique artistic, scientific, and vocational models of creativity and highlight the twenty-first century shift to technocratic imperatives within these pedagogies. The paper contends that techno-centric, market-driven learning environments may counter stated student-centred aims, and colonise students’ creative consciousness. The authors conclude by advocating for renewed emphasis on embodied, experiential practice in …

Queerly Cultivating Anti-Racist Feminist Pedagogy, Laurie Fuller

Dialogue: The Interdisciplinary Journal of Popular Culture and Pedagogy

Queerly Cultivating Anti-Racist Feminist Pedagogy raises questions and analyzes classroom practices based on adrienne maree brown’s (2017) Emergent Strategy, a radical self-help manual for our current political climate that calls for a paradigm shift in organizing work. Black, mixed, queer, pansexual, feminist writer, pleasure activist, facilitator and sci-fi scholar, brown builds on a continuous tradition of women of color feminists resisting oppression to bring together science fiction and permaculture, biomimicry and organizing, pleasure and activism. She offers fresh perspectives on how to imagine liberation and provides dynamic ways to think about teaching and learning. Emergent Strategy provides principles to …

(Re)Learning About Learning: Using Cases From Popular Media To Extend And Complicate Our Understandings Of What It Means To Learn And Teach, Kelli Bippert, Dennis Davis, Margaret Rose Hilburn, Jennifer D. Hooper, Deepti Kharod, Cinthia Rodriguez, Rebecca Stortz

Dialogue: The Interdisciplinary Journal of Popular Culture and Pedagogy

This article utilizes sociocultural and socio-constructivist learning theories to analyze incidents of learning, and by extension teaching, in six different popular media selections. The authors describe their shared theoretical framework and the nature of the original analyses, which were completed as part of a doctoral course assignment. Each of the six excerpts is then described and discussed employing unique theoretical perspectives. The use of popular culture as the context for examining learning and teaching provides a space untethered from traditional notions of schooling through which typically accepted assumptions about pedagogy are revealed, re-examined, and reframed.

Impact Of Service Learning On Personal, Social, And Academic Development Of Community Nutrition Students, Kritika Gupta, Blake Grove, Georgianna Mann

Journal of Community Engagement and Higher Education

Service learning connects theoretical knowledge to community settings. Reflective journals were used to document student service-learning experiences in a Community Nutrition course component. Reflective journal data obtained from students (n=137) during different semesters were analyzed qualitatively. The service-learning partners included Nutrition Education, Food Provision, and Local Food sites. Positive impacts were noted on personal, social, and academic development of students for all sites. Service-learning assignments can impart transferrable skills and enhance student development.

Lessons Learned From Faculty Service-Learning Mentoring, Elizabeth A. Robinson, Debra A. Harkins

Journal of Community Engagement and Higher Education

Service-learning that targets issues of injustice within a community shares the goal with institutions of higher education of helping students become transformational citizens who deeply question and try to change unjust and ineffective social systems. Unfortunately, challenges to growing and sustaining service-learning pedagogy at institutions of higher education are many. This project discusses challenges and makes recommendations based on a pilot mentoring program at an urban, four-year university in the Northeast for faculty interested in integrating service- learning into their curriculum.

Fuel Nku: Service Learning In A Dynamic Higher Education Community, Jessica Averitt Taylor, Megan Lindsey, Laura Sullivan, Skyla Robbins

Journal of Community Engagement and Higher Education

Transdisciplinary initiatives offer valuable opportunity for students and faculty members to address community challenges, especially those challenges related to social justice. FUEL NKU is a campus food pantry for students at a metropolitan university, and is uniquely situated to serve the student population while incorporating multifaceted aspects of a macro level project. This paper describes a collaboration among two doctoral students, one faculty member, and one Master of Social Work (MSW) practicum student to address long-term sustainability of a beloved campus program.

Connections: Building Partnerships With Museums To Promote Intergenerational Service Learning And Alzheimer’S Care, Catherine Wilkins

Journal of Community Engagement and Higher Education

This article reflects upon the development of Connections, a service-learning collaboration between a Research I university and an urban art museum that trains students to work with patient groups from the community using Visual Thinking Strategies. This method of art exploration helps people with Alzheimer’s disease express memories and relieve anxiety. In describing the collaboration, instructional design, and ongoing research, this reflection seeks to encourage educators to partner with museums for intergenerational service-learning experiences.

The Scholars Program Learning Circle: An Example Of Capacity Building In The Academy For Engaged Team Science, Lauren Martin, Yingling Fan, Naomi Duke, Mary O. Hearst, Cathy Jordan

Journal of Community Engagement and Higher Education

We describe the professional development component, or Learning Circle, of the Communityengaged Scholars Program, a multidisciplinary, cohort-based program intended to build scholars’ capacity for community-engaged scholarship. We explore the Learning Circle in the context of “team science.” We argue that the Learning Circle pedagogy is a right fit for promoting, not just engaged research, but also engaged team science, within the academy.

The Influence Of Misconceptions On Pedagogical Choices Of Secondary Science Teachers: An Embedded Case Study, Tracey Beyer

Dissertations

This case study, using phenomenography within science disciplines, examines how educators' experiences with misconceptions affect teaching methods in high school physics, chemistry, and biology. Based on constructivist and interpretive theories it highlights that personal experiences shape learning and involve continuously reconstructing knowledge. The shared misconceptions of 13 educators across science disciplines reveal how those experiences influenced both their content knowledge and instructional practices. The findings indicate that educators who openly acknowledge and learn from their past experiences with misconceptions are better equipped to recognize and address gaps in understanding, an asset to furthering student learning. This research highlights the importance …

Multimodality And Transfer In First-Year Composition: A Pedagogical Reflection, Mariah Sebastiani

Symposium Of University Research and Creative Expression (SOURCE)

This research project investigates how my FYC (First-Year Comp) content transfers into my students’ diverse classes, majors, and professional discourses. By interviewing and surveying my past students, I will use transfer theory to evaluate what pedagogical tools and methods lead students to effectively or ineffectively transfer FYC concepts, such as writing process, rhetorical situations, and discourse communities, into their current classes and professional lives. I will also focus on how multimodal activities impacted the learning environment and concept retention. I will interview and survey my students about how FYC knowledge transfers into their other classes. Using this research, I will …

The Politics Of Culturally Responsive Sustaining Education: A Panel, Lonice Eversley, Richard Haynes, Asya Johnson, Dina Klein, Diana E. Lemon, Yolanda Sealey-Ruiz, Natalie P. Byfield

Journal of Critical Race and Ethnic Studies

No abstract provided.

Exploring The Significance Of The Traditional Chef’S Uniform In Making Sense Of Professionalism In Culinary Arts Using Interpretative Phenomenological Analysis, Orla Mc Connell

European Journal of Food Drink and Society

Previous studies have found that professionalism is an important success factor for chefs. Yet, research on what professionalism “means” to chefs, and how they “make sense” of it, is currently underexplored. While there is some evidence of the significance of the traditional chef’s uniform in professional identity formation, it also needs further consideration. Culinary arts lecturers and chefs have already contributed to these discussions, but the student voice remains largely unknown. Alongside this, there is no prior research specifically on professionalism in culinary arts in Ireland. Therefore, a research gap emerged, which this paper intends to address. Using interpretative phenomenological …

Incorporating Sex-Diverse And Gender-Inclusive Perspectives In Higher Education Biology Courses, Breanne N. Harris, A Kelsey Lewis, Sam L. Sharpe, Teri J. Orr, Christopher T. Martine, Chloe C. Josefson

Faculty Journal Articles

Inclusive teaching is teaching in a way that reaches all students in the classroom; this is beneficial for everyone, particularly for those with minoritized identities. Instructors play a critical role in scaffolding how students are exposed to and learn science content in the classroom. In this manuscript, we discuss how biology instructors can make their classrooms more inclusive with regard to sex and gender diversity content. Many topics in biology are based on androcentric, heteronormative, and oppressive framing, even though those lenses are more reflective of our own history and culture than they are of the diversity we see in …

Teaching To Develop Perspective, Skills, Confidence, And Identity As Problem-Solving Engineers, Russell Kirk Pirlo

Research and Reflection on Learning and Teaching in Higher Education

The “core” of an engineering degree program typically comprises the concepts, equations, and technical skills needed, as well as their practical application to common problems of the profession. This core is then divided into the “content” that must be covered in each course. It is widely recognized, however, that successful individuals do not thrive as professionals on content alone. Thus, there is significant and increasing emphasis across higher education to “educate the whole person.” These efforts aim to develop “deep” qualities like grit, critical thinking, perseverance, learning from failure, valuing diversity, teamwork, leadership, curiosity, recognizing opportunity, creating value, and acting …

Failure Facing Pedagogy In First-Year Rhetoric And Composition Classrooms, Karuna Minh Hin

English (MA) Theses

Failure in academia is commonly defined as not succeeding, missing the mark, or receiving a “below average grade or score” (Inoue 333). However, this perception of failure works to instill a fear in students that may last through their academic journey. Throughout a student’s academic journey, they are taught to operate within the binary of success and failure. “According to self-worth theory, in school, where one’s worth is largely measured by one’s ability to achieve, self-perceptions of incompetence can trigger feelings of shame and humiliation" (De Castella, Byrne and Covington 862). Teachers have attempted to address this problem throughout first-year …

Examining Elementary Teacher Perceptions And Experiences Of Transitioning From Knowledge-Based To Inquiry-Based Social Studies Standards, Benjamin Stephen Pinnick

Murray State Theses and Dissertations

Elementary educators are responsible for the earliest years of student learning in a public setting. The amount of content students are expected to master continues to grow in scope, and the methods that are utilized shift to align with educational research and social momentum. After a decade of Common Core policies, social studies education in elementary schools has become a deemphasized subject. Reading and math, as well as science, have taken a greater precedence in today’s classrooms.

Yet, expectations for the creation of knowledgeable and participatory citizens continue to serve as a goal in elementary schools. Conceptualization of citizenship form …

Six Modes Of Giving Pedagogy For Engagement And Wellbeing – For Teachers And Students, Thomas W. Nielsen, Jennifer S. Ma

Australian Journal of Teacher Education

The present study took place across two outdoor education trips to the Great Barrier Reef with two groups of college students (N = 36; 16-19 years), five staff, and one of the authors (TWN). The aim was to explore how an explicit understanding and implementation of the wellbeing research around cultivating generous behaviour for meaningful happiness could be ‘experienced’ by staff and students and articulated as an educational framework, or ‘pedagogy’. Hermeneutic phenomenology was used to record and interpret pedagogical transactions of giving. Six repeated themes were identified: (1) exploration, (2) modelling, (3) explicit instruction, (4) incidental learning, (5) crisis …

The Greatest Teacher: Modeling Jesus In Urban Education, Harley Rusk

Senior Honors Theses

Several key best practices from urban education research are reflected in the pedagogy of Jesus Christ, providing a practical foundation for Christian educators in urban schools. Related to the prevalence of poverty and trauma are the practices of learning students’ backgrounds to better interpret behavior, which Jesus reflects by healing before teaching, and holding high standards, demonstrated in Jesus’ interaction with the rich man and the Sermon on the Mount. Related to racial diversity are the practices of addressing implicit bias, a crucial part of being Christlike, and connecting instruction to students’ culture, like Jesus did through parables. Christians can …

Agroecology Curriculum Proposal, Emily Kuhn

Pitzer Senior Theses

The purpose of this research is to establish the viability of an Agroecology major at Pitzer College. I begin by problematizing Industrial Agriculture and making a case for Pitzer College to become a higher education leader in the global paradigm shift towards socially and ecologically just food systems. The proposed curriculum compiles pre-existing classes, objectives expanded from the EA field group, and an internship component embedded at five local land-based learning partner sites. I conducted a SWOT (strengths, weaknesses, opportunities, and threats) analysis of the Environmental Analysis field group as a potential host for the agroecology track, including study abroad …

When The Teacher Is The Token: Moving From Antiblackness To Antiracism, Manya C. Whitaker

Northwest Journal of Teacher Education

In this reflective essay I uncover the difficulties Black teacher educators have instructing a predominately white preservice student body about antiblackness without becoming complicit in antiblackness. So often we focus on students as the token representative of their racial/gender/sexual/linguistic identity; however, we teacher educators are also routinely the “only” in a room of white faces, often as students’ first Black professor. We therefore bear the burden of introducing students to whiteness while wondering if our Blackness is being viewed in opposition to, despite, or because of whiteness. How do I convince them of their future students’ humanity without sacrificing my …

The Purpose Of Education: A Case Study On Accountability And Latina Teachers In A Midwest Charter Network, Alexandra Irma Cruz

College of Education Theses and Dissertations

The struggle to provide all children with an equitable education remains one of the most concerning and significant social, political, and moral problems in our nation. Although neoliberal accountability reform efforts have been set in place to alleviate such gaps, inequalities persist and disproportionately affect historically marginalized groups. This dissertation in curriculum studies aims to understand the perspectives of Latina teachers, an underrepresented group both in teaching and in educational research, on the effects of neoliberal accountability measures. This qualitative, multisite instrumental case study was guided by the following research questions: 1) When thinking about education under the effects of …