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GLOBALIZING LOCAL HISTORY: GIUSEPPE GARIBALDI IN NEW YORK AND THE POLITICS OF MEMORY, 1884-1932
Get PDFGlobalizing Local History: Giuseppe Garibaldi in New York and The Politics of Memory, 1884-1932 examines local historical societies and public historical sites and describes how commemorators utilized Giuseppe Garibaldi\u27s (July 4, 1807- June 2, 1882) legacy as a symbol and form of patriotic, political, and revolutionary speech and action. This dissertation explains how his life was appropriated in the late nineteenth and early twentieth century. My work explores how New Yorkers and Italian Americans used spaces, collective memory, and identity, to produce a form of world history through local historical events. This dissertation thematically describes how Garibaldi was collectively recalled in New York as a patriot, politician and revolutionary while offering chronological accounts and stories inside each respective chapter. The study analyzes Garibaldi\u27s legacy as seen through the lens of New York’s local history. The impact of New York’s local history with respect to Garibaldi caused a flow of speculation, not only in the United States but also throughout Europe and South America. This research specifies that commemorators were not worried with how short of a time Garibaldi had been in New York (less than two years) but only interested in conserving a version of who he was, that would eventually help them meet some monetary or partisan end. Commemoration exercises did much more than endorse the Italian American way of life, New York City and the New Yorkers involved; they linked people to a specific version of the past, refined battle lines between rival political groups, delivered space to create a purified Italian identity, and made sense of the journey from the Old World to the New World. Aside from advancing social ideas, memorializing Garibaldi shaped a resolve around the meaning of conflicts overseas. Both presented spaces for municipal activity, places for grift, as well as places for civil strife, destruction, and political antagonism. This study moves local history further away from promotional and sentimental images of the past and moves closer toward an international and global historical perspective
KINDERGARTEN TEACHERS’ PERSPECTIVES ABOUT LITERACY AND THE RELEVANCE OF ASSESSMENTS: IMPACT ON STUDENTS’ SUCCESS AND FIRST GRADE TRANSITION
Get PDFThe purpose of this descriptive phenomenological study was to investigate kindergarten teachers’ beliefs about literacy and the relevance of assessments at the kindergarten level, the literacy skills kindergarteners should possess, how these skills are acquired, to what extent their beliefs about literacy influenced their instructional methodology, and their perspectives on the role of parental involvement. This study was guided by six research questions. The participants consisted of twenty kindergarten teachers from various elementary public schools within a large and diverse school district in Virginia. The participants are from two ethnic backgrounds and had ranges of experience teaching kindergarten. Over a period of four months, data were collected and analyzed using the data analysis model proposed by Moustakas (1994). Data were obtained from the participants via one method. In-depth individual interviews provided detailed information on each teacher’s knowledge and views about literacy, assessments, parental involvement, and best practices. Numerical data from Fall 2022 and Spring 2023 are from the Phonological Awareness Literacy Screener (PALS) assessment. With the exception of one public school district, all public schools in Virginia use the Phonological Awareness Literacy Screener (PALS) to screen kindergarten to third grade students. The 2023-2024 period is the final time that PALS will be used. It was upgraded and changed to Virginia Language and Literacy Screener (VALLS). The PALS visual data came from the participants’ elementary schools. It added better understanding for the reasons for each teacher’s beliefs about the assessment data results and their perceptions about its current and future impact. This investigation has the potential to inform school and district policies. The results could assist in understanding the phenomena within a real-world context. The findings revealed that the kindergarten teachers are in support of the use of literacy assessments and believe that their students’ successful transition to first grade depends on strategic planning, an early start to instruction, and immediate, appropriate next steps after the analyses of assessments. The results also showed how the participants used assessments, involved parents, and engaged in best practice to enable better literacy success in kindergarten thereby facilitating a successful transition to the first grade
COPING WITH THE COVID-19 PANDEMIC: EXAMINING MEANING-MAKING IN A SOCIOECOLOGICAL FRAMEWORK
Get PDFDuring 2020, the COVID-19 pandemic emerged as a threatening, unpredictable, and uncontrollable stressor. Meaning-making, or one’s ability to make sense of a stressful life event, integrate the event into one’s narrative of the world and meaning in life, and accordingly revise life goals, is a salient intrapsychic process contributing to psychological adjustment in the face of very stressful or traumatic experiences such as chronic health issues, interpersonal grief, and natural and man-made disasters. Early findings provide evidence for the critical role of meaning-making in coping with stressors associated with the COVID-19 pandemic. Though meaning-making is a universal process, one’s capacity to do so may be fundamentally shaped by contextual factors related to social determinants of health (SDoH; i.e., the social, cultural, and economic factors that affect health status). However, relations of these factors to meaning-making during the pandemic are not yet fully understood. Further, it is not yet known how meaning-making may mediate the link between SDoH and mental health in the content of COVID-19. The aim of this study is to evaluate pathways by which a broad range of individual and community level SDoH influence meaning-making and mental health outcomes during the pandemic. In a nationally representative sample of 572 American adults, stressors associated with individual SDoH and COVID-19 burden were linked with disrupted meaning made of the pandemic and poorer mental health outcomes marked by greater anxiety and depressive symptoms. However, community stressors reflective of neighborhood burden were not linked with psychological processes. A serial mediation model in which the pathway between individual SDoH burden and psychological distress operates indirectly through individual COVID-19 burden and meaning made of the pandemic was supported. These findings suggest that individual stressors associated with SDoH may be a key force in shaping mental health outcomes during the pandemic, potentially through their relations with increased personal COVID-19 disease burden and lower capacity to make meaning of the pandemic. Findings may be used to guide psychotherapeutic assessment and interventions and to inform public health messaging and policy change around social determinants of health and COVID-19 health disparities
SCHOOL-BASED SUICIDE PREVENTION AND POSTVENTION: SCHOOL PSYCHOLOGISTS’ KNOWLEDGE OF ETHICS, LAWS, AND BEST PRACTICES
Get PDFSuicide is preventable, however suicide rates among children and adolescents are continuing to rise (Curtin & Heron, 2019). As such it is imperative that school psychologists who have an opportunity to impact the incidence of suicidal behaviors amongst students are properly trained in suicide prevention, postvention, laws, and ethics (Miller, 2014). However, there is little known about the efficacy of certain training approaches in suicide for school psychologists that may overcome barriers to implementation such as cost and time consumption (Dunn et al., 2013; Robinson et al., 2013). The present study sought to create a measure encompassing school psychologists’ objective knowledge of suicide prevention/postvention best practices, laws, and ethics and their accuracy in implementing best practices, and sought to utilize this measure to evaluate the efficacy of a one-session, virtual, expert-led workshop. The knowledge segment comprised true/false questions regarding suicide prevention, postvention, laws and ethics. The accuracy portion encompassed hypothetical prevention and postvention situations with relevant evidence-based or non-evidence-based practices that were rated by likelihood of implementation on a 5-point scale. Upon review from experts in child/adolescent suicide and piloting of this measure with school psychologists, 50 practicing school psychologists completed the knowledge measure and vignettes before, one week after, and four weeks after attending a workshop. Their ages ranged from 26-65 with majority of participants being White women who work primarily in a public school setting. Knowledge measure and vignette scores significantly increased from pre-test to post-test time point and were maintained from post-test to follow up. Overall, this study highlights the efficacy of one session, virtual, expert-led workshops in increasing knowledge and application of knowledge. Past knowledge was found to be predictive of knowledge retention upon attending the workshop. Taken together these findings suggest that this format of training can be utilized for school psychologists in the field to remain current on best practices and follow up on prior knowledge to facilitate knowledge retention. As this training was only one hour and delivered in a virtual format, training in suicide can be more approachable and accessible to school psychologists. Other implications for practice and future research are discussed
THE IMPACT OF PERSON-SITUATION CONGRUENCE ON PEOPLE’S PREFERENCE FOR INTERPERSONAL INTERACTIONS
Get PDFThe present study aims to test the hypothesis that participants will prefer to interact with individuals in situations whose demands are congruent with the participant’s personality traits. The study used both poles of the Big Five personality traits systematically and comprehensively paired with five of the eight situational characteristics from the DIAMONDS model. The study comprised 94 participants with a gender split of 70:20, favoring females. Of the participant population, 59% (59.14%) were between the ages of 18-21. 44% (44.09%) of participants were White and non-Hispanic. Results indicated the predicted congruence effects only for the Extraversion/Sociality pair, whereas Neuroticism/Adversity also showed congruence but in the unpredicted direction. For the other three pairings, the desirability of one pole of the trait dominated the preference judgment
A PHENOMENOLOGICAL STUDY INVESTIGATING THE IMPACT OF PARENTS\u27 ATTITUDES TOWARD SCIENCE UPON THEIR ADULT CHILDRENS\u27 PURSUIT OF A SCIENCE DEGREE FROM A SUBURBAN COMMUNITY COLLEGE IN NEW YORK
Get PDFThis interpretative qualitative study delves into adult children\u27s experiences pursuing science degrees, exploring how parental attitudes influence their persistence in higher education. Conducted at a suburban New York community college, the research employs Interpretative Phenomenological Analysis through questionnaires, interviews, and artifact analysis. Findings reveal that parental encouragement positively motivates participants, while financial stability and familial experiences significantly impact academic decisions. Participants perceive their parents\u27 attitudes toward learning as mostly positive, shaping their own educational orientations. The study extends Bowen\u27s theory by illustrating how parental attitudes contribute to perceptions of employment and financial stability. Additionally, Bandura\u27s social learning theory underscores the role of parental modeling and reinforcement in shaping individuals\u27 behaviors and self-efficacy beliefs. This research addresses a gap in qualitative research on parental influence on STEM outcomes at community colleges, providing foundational insights for future studies in higher education. Keywords: community college, science degree, adult children, science attitude
VOCABULARY ACQUISITION IN HIGH SCHOOL CLASSROOMS UTILIZING EMERGING TRENDS IN LITERACY DEVELOPMENT: PERCEPTIONS OF TEACHERS AND STUDENTS
Get PDFCurrent global trends demand that we remain conscious of how distinct norms in groups we affiliate with affect decisions. Among developmental aspects, childhood language acquisition depends heavily on epigenetic interactions between the innate and the immediate environment (Sinha, 2017). This explanatory sequential mixed methods study explored how high school students acquire and incrementally build their vocabulary while utilizing emergent learning trends divergent from traditional curricula. The study leans on schema theory, critical race theory, whole-language theory, and reciprocal model. The independent variable is literacy curriculum, while the dependent variable is vocabulary acquisition. The researcher utilized classroom lesson observations, one-on-one interviews, focus group discussions, and surveys to collect data and gain insights into vocabulary trends. A total of 70 students aged between 16 and 19 years participated in the study; 38 males (54.3%) and 32 females (45.7%) responded to the survey. The researcher administered surveys to nine teachers: seven females (77.8%) and two males (22.2%). Five students participated in focus group discussions. The sampled teachers ranged between 31- 60 years, with 50% between 41-50 years, 33.3% 31- 40 years, and 16.7% were 51- 60 years. Five teach English (55.6%), two teach Theology (22.2%), and two teach Special Education (22.2%). Of the nine, three participants had 21-30 years of experience, while three had 1-10 years, 11-20 years, and 5-10 years of experience, respectively. Data was analyzed using quantitative and qualitative approaches in MAXQDA software. The findings were triangulated, interpreted, integrated, and discussed using converged data results and findings. The researcher hopes this study will enlighten education stakeholders on the benefits of flexible curricula. This might inform policy on the prevailing trajectory of literacy skills development, leading to revised curricula and best practices in education. Replicating this study on a larger scale will bolster the research base. Sharing their literacy development experiences and knowing their viewpoints are valued might have fostered a sense of belonging in students and enhanced their self-reverence. As senior students, participation may motivate them to pursue higher education. Keywords: constructivist, positivist, paradigm, mixed methods, vocabulary acquisition, literacy development, struggling reader