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COVID Disruption Requires More Than Providing a Device: How Districts are Engaging Students and Families Online
Get PDFAs school districts pivoted to online delivery in the spring of 2020, the urgent need for each student to have a device in hand and internet connectivity was a remarkable challenge. Immediate action was taken, incredible financial investments were made, and creative problem solving peaked to provide students access to the tools needed for online learning. Despite this laudable feat, districts are entering the third school year disrupted by COVID and confronted with the Delta surge, disheartening student learning loss, and an emerging reality that hybrid and online learning models are not going away. Truancy issues, unresponsive home supports, and parental deficits in technology skills have challenged schools. A repeat of last year is not an acceptable option for our country’s students. With the intent to guide schools toward more effective practices, 55 Technology Directors detailed how their districts engaged students and families online
Midwest Elementary School Principals and the Use of Social Media
Get PDFThe purpose of this mixed-methods study was to examine the use of social media among elementary school principals in Minnesota. It was part of a dissertation study conducted at Bethel University (Hill, 2016). The survey collected data from elementary school principals across the state of Minnesota gathering demographic information on age, years of service, presence of a district social media policy, gender, school location, school size, and school poverty level as defined by its free and reduced lunch rate. As a result of the study, it was found that a negative relationship exists between the number of years of service from an elementary school principal and their use of social media. Age, gender, school location, school size, and poverty level have no relationship with a principal’s use of social media tools. A qualitative analysis was run on one open-ended question on the survey to determine its themes. Facebook was found to be the most popular tool for sharing information with friends and family while Twitter was cited as the most popular social media tool for professional development
Narrative Study: The Impact of Food Insecurity on Student Health and Persistence
Get PDFThe current study collected and evaluated students’ firsthand stories to learn whether their stress from nutritional intake or lack thereof impacts students’ health, well-being, coursework, sense of belonging and mattering, and persistence. Additionally, this narrative study investigated students’ experiences with a college pantry on their campus. The students were invited to share personal narratives about their engagement with the campus food pantry and their feelings about any perceived effects of this institutional support in such areas as health, self-esteem, community support, academics, motivation, and future plans.
The research question presented in this study utilizing a qualitative narrative-inquiry approach was the following: What are the experiences of food-insecure students at a two-year college in Minnesota? The study explored Baumeister and Leary’s theory of the Sense of Belonging (previously described in the third tier of Maslow’s Hierarchy of Needs, “love and belonging”); Morris Rosenberg’s theory of Mattering; Schlossberg’s theory of Mattering and Marginality; and Tinto’s Framework of Student Departure. It was through these frameworks that the current study connected a student’s basic need of food, a sense of belonging along with a sense of mattering. With the sense of belonging and a sense of mattering, the current study explored the degree to which regularly accessible student-support services such as a food pantry could foster health, and greater percentages of student persistence, completion, and graduation from students’ programs.
The results of this study show that food-insecure students are suffering from physical- and mental-health issues, lack of energy, lack of focus needed for class work, stress, anxiety, poor self-care, and undesirable behaviors such as stealing or other non-ideal methods of obtaining food for survival. Additionally, findings from the students suggest that if a college campus offers a food pantry to its students, it may inspire food-insecure students to have a greater sense of belonging and mattering to their institution, with a variety of benefits to the student, the college, and the community.
INDEX WORDS: food insecurity, sense of belonging, mattering, student persistence, student success, academic performance, and food pantry
University Chronicle [February 2021]
Get PDFSt. Cloud State University student newspaper, volume 96, issue 5, February 2021https://repository.stcloudstate.edu/chron/1014/thumbnail.jp
A Comprehenisve Review of the Acoustic Correlate of Duration and Its Linguistic Implications
Get PDFSpeech is a three-dimensional physical entity that consists of F0/pitch, intensity, and duration. This paper is the last of three publications devoted to a comprehensive review of the aforementioned correlates. Koffi (2019) and Koffi (2020) focused on F0/Pitch and intensity respectively. The current study is devoted entirely to duration. The goal behind these comprehensive reviews is to assemble in a single paper as much information as possible so that speech data can be interpreted accurately in accordance with acoustic phonetics, engineering, and speech signal processing norms. With regard to duration, first, it must be noted that its measurements are to be interpreted linearly but not literally. Secondly, it is worth emphasizing that speech signals have their own intrinsic durational characteristics. Consequently, the duration of a syllable, a word, a phrase, or an utterance is the sum total of the intrinsic durations of its constitutive segments. Yet, the duration of speech signals is also conditioned by factors as diverse as articulatory gestures, the syntactic distribution of words, the venue where the speech event takes place, the relationship between the talker and the hearer, the formality or informality of the occasion, the tempo of delivery, among others. The key linguistic factors that affect duration are discussed in this paper. Though the examples are mostly from American English and Anyi (a Niger-Congo/Akan language spoken in Côte d’Ivoire) the insights derived from this paper apply broadly to other languages because the speech production and perception mechanisms that undergird duration are the same for every language
An Acoustic Phonetic Analysis of Three Tonally Contrastive Grammatical Moods in Anyi: Orthographic Implications - A Festschrift in Honor of Rev. Dr. Gilbert Ansre
Get PDFIt is an honor to write this paper for Dr. Gilbert Ansre’s festschrift. He was my mentor when I was doing my Ph.D. in linguistics. In the summers, the United Bible Societies would send me to study under him as a translation-consultant in training. He challenged me and coached me in applying theoretical linguistics concepts to real life language problems. When I received my Ph.D. and joined him in Togo, West Africa, he congratulated me saying, “Now, you are going to do real linguistics. This was an absurd statement at first, but over the years, I keep discovering its wisdom. The mentoring that Dr. Ansre provided helped me to improve on the existing orthographies of the languages under my supervision. The lack of tone marking in these languages made the reading of the Holy Scriptures a herculean task, even for the translators themselves. The quest for solutions led me to pioneer an orthographic approach to tone marking known as Tone Optimality Model (Koffi 2012:230-232). It is deeply anchored in acoustic phonetics and influenced by Dr. Ansre’s view that orthographies need not be overcrowded with superfluous diacritic marks. The model that I came up with marks tones systematically, yet sparingly. This paper describes and exemplifies how the same model was used to transcribe three tonally contrastive moods in the New Testament of Anyi Morofu, an Akan language spoken in Côte d’Ivoire. This festschrift is a fitting tribute to Dr. Gilbert Ansre whose book, Tonal Structure of Ewe (1961), is highly regarded for its seminal contribution to contemporary understanding of the tonal structure of West African languages
High Frequency Amplifier Design and Development for Dielectric Treatment of Poultry Claws
No full textTrimming of poultry tissues including claws and beaks/bills is a common industry practice to keep the poultry from causing harm to one another affecting welfare of the flock as well as decreased value at slaughter. Current methods for treating poultry claws utilize older aging technology and leave room to be improved from both a technology and bird welfare standpoint. A new RF amplifier design is introduced and implemented using solid state amplifier technology. The amplifier utilizes an embedded control system with custom firmware to actively monitor the forward and reflected RF energy and control the output power, frequency (synthesizer), and other elements to ensure accurate and consistent treatment. A dynamic power range of 54dB is achieved across the 2.4GHz-2.5GHz frequency band with .1dB of resolution across the entire power range. A measurement accuracy of less than .15% forward and reflected power is also achieved. A design of an applicator capable of coupling the amplifier output to the tissue is introduced as well. Efficacy trials were performed comparing the newly developed system to current methods of trimming Digit I on a turkey. Results showed the new design with a score of 92% and 91% for the left and right claws respectively with the ideal amount of claw removed approximately 30 days after treatment. The results from the current methods used were 52% and 39% for the left and right claws, respectively with the same amount of claw removal. These results show the developed system can be an improved alternative to the current industry methods of claw trimming
Supporting Educators in Digital Citizenship
Get PDFDigital citizenship is more important than ever due to the rapidly shifting landscape of internet use, especially in regard students, parents and educators. The guidance students receive throughout their K-12 education shapes the way they interact with global communities as a digital citizen. To effectively guide students in digital citizenship education, parents and educators need to be digital citizens themselves. What is digital citizenship in today’s society? Why do we need a village mindset to accomplish it effectively? And how can we learn through authentic experiences and opportunities? This is a secondary research study that combines academic literature, research reports, and online curriculum and teaching resources as a framework to answer these questions and support educators in their work with digital citizenship
A Personalized Learning Approach to Educating Students Identified with Special Education Needs
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K-12 Special Education Paraprofessionals: Perceptions about Preparedness to Work with Special Education Students in an Inclusive Setting
Get PDFThe first study conducted on the use of paraprofessionals was done by a man name Cruickshank in 1957. According to Cruickshank in 1957 the classroom paraprofessional (teacher assistant) role was defined as; assisting with tasks that were of non-teaching duties to relieve the teacher, so the teacher could assist the students more in-depth (Cruickshank, [c1957], p. 9). Then in 2010 Giangreco stated that “over the past several decades, the number of special education paraprofessional’s has steadily grown and their roles have become increasingly instructional” (Giangreco, 2010, p. 2).
In examining the role of paraprofessionals Giangreco et al found that “Paraprofessionals continue to engage in a broad range of role, many of which they are under trained or insufficiently trained to perform” (Giangreco et al., 2001, p. 53). Brock and Carter (2013) found that when paraprofessionals are given the opportunity for training on evidence-based practices, they can follow through with the information and help provide positive outcomes for students with disabilities (p. 217). According to Brock and Carter (2015) a concern for the work of paraprofessionals is that, more often than not, paraprofessionals are provided with stand-alone training on special education topics, of which many paraprofessionals receiving this training have no prior training (p. 48). “Descriptive studies suggest that without strong training, paraprofessionals support does not appear to improve the learning outcomes of students with disabilities and may hinder them” (Brock & Carter, 2015, p. 40).
Many of the researchers discuss what the roles of paraprofessionals are, that they have received inadequate training, but do not have the perspective from those who are actually working in these roles. The purpose of this study is to solicit the level of preparedness, job responsibilities, training received and best practices of paraprofessionals to work in an inclusive setting with special education students. Inclusive or inclusion means that a student who qualifies for special education has a certain amount of time that is spent in the general education classroom. Paraprofessionals may be assigned to a student or a specific class to help support the needs of special education students to successfully participate in the general education classroom. Some paraprofessionals may come into their roles with some educational background, often they may only have a high school diploma. The only training, they may receive when entering the field is the training provided by the school district