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Exploring the Content of Introductory Quantitative Methods Courses for Education Doctoral Students
Get PDFQuantitative methods training is an integral part of an Education Doctoral Degree (EdD). Students tend to struggle with the content of these courses and consequently their quantitative proficiency has suffered. Currently, there is no consensus on the learning outcomes of introductory quantitative methods classes, leaving instructors to individually decide the content and teaching methods of their classes. The aim of this study was to capture the content of introductory quantitative methods course and determine their alignment with current best practices in statistics education. Q1 What curricular and pedagogical techniques are used in introductory quantitative methods course for EdD students? Q2 How do the teaching practices of introductory quantitative methods courses for EdD students align with the Guidelines for Assessment and Instruction in Statistics Education (GAISE)?
Instructors of quantitative methods courses from EdD programs were surveyed and asked to submit a class syllabus. Descriptive statistics and graphical summaries were used to analyze the survey results (n=23). Syllabi were coded in two separate processes – open coding and structural coding (n = 19). In general, the quantitative methods courses tended to be a mixture of quantitative literacy and statistical analysis. The placement of a class on the continuum dictated the types of learning outcomes and assessments; quantitative literacy classes have more article critiques and design components, while statistical analysis courses have more research papers and programming assignments. Overall, the courses utilize the best practices for teaching introductory statistics; there is strong alignment between the quantitative survey results and the qualitative analysis. Despite meeting best practices guidelines, more information is needed on whether these classes meet the needs for EdD students
Does Mindset Matter: The Perceptions Pre-Licensure Nursing Students Have Regarding Mindset and Academic Success
Get PDFNursing programs need to graduate more students to increase the potential number of practicing nurses and help the nursing shortage. However, with high attrition rates, nursing programs are looking for ways to promote student success. Many factors lead to students not finishing a nursing program and nurse educators need to develop innovative ways to help students succeed. Identifying characteristics that make students successful is key to reducing attrition rates. One characteristic that a nurse educator can identify in students is a growth mindset. Mindset is formed by students’ beliefs and experiences, by having a growth mindset, one believes their intelligence can change and improve. The purpose of this descriptive qualitative study was to explore pre-licensure nursing students’ perceptions of mindset and academic success. The following research questions guided this study: Q1 What does mindset mean to pre-licensure nursing students? Q2 What strategies do pre-licensure nursing students perceive as helpful in the development of a growth mindset? Q3 What type of connection do pre-licensure nursing students perceive between having a growth mindset and academic success?
Using the mindset theory to guide the study, I used focus group interviews to capture the perceptions and experiences participants had with growth mindset. Eighteen entry level pre-licensure nursing students from across the United States participated in this qualitative, descriptive study. Semi-structured focus group interviews were conducted, recorded, and analyzed. Five themes were identified: (a) resiliency, (b) readiness to learn, (c) effort equals results, (d) embracing learning in every moment and place, and (e) learning for real-world impact. Being the first qualitative study regarding growth mindset and academic success, the study provided unique knowledge and increased the body of knowledge in nursing education. First, pre-licensure nursing students believed that having a network of support helped them in the development of a growth mindset. Second, most all the nursing students believed learning was an active process that never stops. Lastly, they discussed how being able to apply what they had learned to a patient setting and being a competent nurse was truly academic success. The discussion provided potential implications and recommendations for nurse educators to encourage the development of a growth mindset in nursing students. By encouraging the development of a growth mindset in nursing students nurse educators can help prepare competent nurses ready for practice
Magic in Europe from Ancient Greece to the Enlightenment: A Sourcebook
Get PDFThis sourcebook was created for HIST 264: Magic in Europe from Antiquity to Enlightenment at the University of Northern Colorado. It presents key primary sources such as epic poetry, classic tragedies, legal codes, and religious texts that illustrate how magic was imagined, practiced, condemned, and theorized across different eras and belief systems
A Quantitative Analysis of the Relationship Between Collective Teacher Efficacy and its Enabling Conditions with Student Achievement in Colorado’s Elementary and Middle Schools
Get PDFThis quantitative, correlational study aimed to investigate the relationships between collective teacher efficacy (CTE), its enabling conditions (EC-CTE), and student achievement in third through eighth grades in Colorado. Leveraging the theoretical foundations established by Rotter (1954), Bandura (1977) and expanded by Tschannen-Moran et al. (1998) and Adams and Forsyth (2006), a newly formed construct of CTE was created by using questions from the Teaching and Learning Conditions Colorado (TLCC) Survey. The following research questions guided the study: Q1 Is there a statistically significant relationship between the collective teacher efficacy construct, as measured by selected TLCC Survey questions, and student achievement scores? Q1a Does collective teacher efficacy make an independent contribution to explaining the variance in student achievement when controlling for the SES of the school? Q2 Is there a statistically significant relationship between the enabling conditions of collective teacher efficacy, as measured by selected TLCC Survey questions, and student achievement scores? The research design utilized structured equation modeling to examine the association between a school-wide CTE construct and student achievement scores, as represented by the school’s English language arts and mathematics scores on the Colorado Measures of Academic Success (CMAS) assessment. Additionally, this study addressed a gap in the existing literature by focusing on the enabling conditions that facilitate CTE and examining their correlation with student achievement. Finally, this study explored whether CTE and EC-CTE independently contributed to student achievement after controlling for socioeconomic status (SES). This secondary analysis used data from public schools in Colorado that completed the TLCC Survey and CMAS in 2022. Data were used from 353 schools in Colorado that met the threshold for publicly reportable TLCC survey data and CMAS assessment data. TLCC Survey questions were used to create a CTE construct and an EC-CTE construct that were then both used for future calculations. The results showed that CTE had a significant positive relationship with student achievement in both mathematics and English language arts (ELA), meaning that schools with higher levels of CTE tended to have students who performed better academically. In contrast, EC-CTE did not exhibit a direct significant effect on student achievement. Additionally, the study highlighted the persistent influence of SES on student achievement. SES showed a significant negative relationship with both math and ELA scores. This study aimed to provide insights that could guide school leaders and policymakers in school improvement approaches and strategies. Precise wording and comprehensive question inclusion were concluded as a necessity when measuring CTE and EC-CTE
A Great War Requiem
Get PDFThe following dissertation is a researched music composition project that utilizes remembrance poetry from the Great War, also called the First World War or World War I, and the Requiem Mass tradition. The purpose of this study is to create a War Requiem composition that brings awareness to female narratives of the Great War by using Great War Poetry by women poets. The dissertation composition combines Requiem aeternam, Lux aeterna, and Requiescant in pace texts from the Requiem Mass.1 In addition, the composition uses Vera Brittain’s poem “Roundel,”2 Winifred Mabel Letts’s poem “Your Name,”3 Margaret Cole’s poems “Rest” and “Falling Leaves,”4 and Josephine Preston Peabody’s poem “Harvest Moon.”5 The seven-movement composition is approximately 45 minutes long and scored for mixed SATB (soprano, alto, tenor, bass), choir, and organ. The seven movements are titled (1) “Requiem aeternam et Rest,” (2) “Falling Leaves,” (3) “Roundel,” (4) “Harvest Moon,” (5) “Your Name, Loss, and If Love of Mine” (6) “Lux aeterna,” and (7) “Postlude: Requiem aeternam et Rest.”
The research and music composition dissertation unfolds in five chapters. The first chapter of the dissertation contains an introduction to the study, primary composition goal, limitations, compositional constraints, rationale, a brief overview of the Great War, a background section on the Requiem Mass, Requiem Mass texts and plainchants, background on composed Requiem Masses from the late 15th century to the 20th century, a section on works studied, a section on critical Requiem Mass sources relevant to the study, and a chapter summary. The second chapter houses the investigative study on the concepts of rest, loss, death, light, combat, remembrance, irony, and anti-war politics in the Great War poetry used in A Great War Requiem composition and provides background vignettes on the poets Vera Brittain, Winifred M. Letts, Josephine Preston Peabody, and Margaret Cole. Chapter III will feature the score, and Chapter IV provides thematic analyses of A Great War Requiem. More specifically, the chapter discusses how the Requiem Mass plainchant melodies and textual themes were embedded into the melodic material, harmonic structure, and other features, such as counterpoint, rhythm, timbre, and soundscape of the composition. The final chapter is a conclusion of the study and offers recommendations for future scholarship and creative projects on War Requiems
Development and Evaluation of an Instrument for Exploring Achievement Emotions of General Chemistry Students: General Chemistry Achievement Emotions Questionnaire
Get PDFGeneral Chemistry, a course that is required for many STEM degree programs, is often perceived as a difficult and stress-inducing course by students. One aspect of a student’s course experiences that can be measured are achievement emotions. Emotions that students can experience that can affect and are affected by academic performance are called achievement emotions. Achievement emotions, such as anxiety, have been extensively studied in recent years in relation to student performance and retention in different courses. Instruments that have been developed to measure achievement emotions in broad academic settings. However, achievement emotions have been determined to be domain-specific, meaning achievement emotions experienced in one setting can be different to those in a different setting. Therefore, to measure achievement emotions that students experience in a General Chemistry course, an instrument designed to measure these emotions in this setting would need to be developed. The purpose of this study was to design an instrument to explore the connections between achievement emotions and academic achievement of students enrolled in a first-semester General Chemistry course, as well as evaluate how both achievement emotions and academic achievement affect student retention in chemistry. To create the General Chemistry Achievement Emotions Questionnaire (AEQ-GCHEM), a previously developed achievement emotions instrument (the Shortened Achievement Emotions Questionnaire) was modified to contain more chemistry-centric language, as well as adding laboratory-specific questions to assess student achievement emotions in general chemistry lab courses, which are often taken in tandem with General Chemistry courses. This instrument was developed through several iterations and given to student populations (N = 1091) across four postsecondary institutions and six semesters. Evidence of reliability and validity was found through the use of qualitative interviews (N = 48), factor analysis, and analyzing the relationships between the achievement emotions and settings. These results suggest that the modifications made to develop the AEQ-GCHEM produced an instrument that can collect reliable and valid data on the achievement emotions experienced by students enrolled in a General Chemistry course. The achievement emotions of hopelessness in the classroom setting and pride in the testing setting of a General Chemistry course were found to have predictive qualities in regards to a student’s academic performance in the course. Hopelessness in the classroom setting was found to have a negative relationship with academic performance, meaning more hopelessness predicted worse academic performance, while pride in the testing setting showed a positive relationship. Through interviews with students, potential sources of these achievement emotions were explored. Further development of these types of instruments and exploration of achievement emotions is necessary for instructors to fully understand student experiences in a General Chemistry course in the development of novel and equitable teaching practices
“I’m Stressed—You Have to do Something to Help Me:” The Relationship Between Student Academic Entitlement, Academic Stress, and Satisfaction
Get PDFConcern over academic entitlement has grown in higher education in the last two decades. Academic entitlement, defined as unfounded expectations of academic success, undeserved services and unrealistic accommodations (McLellan & Jackson, 2017), in nursing students is an under investigated phenomena. The purpose of this study was to examine the impacts of academic stress and general student satisfaction on academic entitlement beliefs in baccalaureate, junior, and senior level nursing students. In this correlational, cross-sectional study, the transactional theory of stress (Lazarus & Folkman, 1987), and Jeffreys’ (2022) nursing universal retention and success model were used to understand how academic stress and student general satisfaction might affect academic entitlement and impact student success. A stratified random sample of 100 prelicensure, junior and senior nursing students representing all regions of the United States participated in this study. Instruments used to measure study variables included the Academic Entitlement Scale (Chowning & Campbell, 2009), the Undergraduate Nursing Student Academic Satisfaction Scale (Dennison & El-Masri, 2012), and the Perceptions of Academic Stress Scale (Bedewy & Gabriel, 2015). Descriptive statistics, correlation testing, simple linear regression analyses, and hierarchical multiple linear regression analyses determined that lower levels of academic stress and higher levels of general student satisfaction were associated with lower levels of academic entitlement. Additionally, changes in the levels of academic stress and general student satisfaction significantly predicted changes in academic entitlement. The findings of the study could be used in nursing academia to mitigate academic entitlement and might improve student success. There remains a need for future research on academic entitlement in nursing academia including studies to investigate the effectiveness of interventions to reduce academic entitlement, how faculty perceive the problem of academic entitlement, and the impact academic entitlement has on student success
Voices of Change: Exploring the Narratives of Physical Education Stakeholders’ Policy Work in Colorado
Get PDFQuality physical education, pivotal for the development of physical, social, and emotional skills for an active and healthy lifestyle (Society of Health and Physical Educators [SHAPE] America, 2014; United Nations Educational, Scientific, and Cultural Organization [UNESCO], 2021), has been globally marginalized, necessitating a heightened focus on policy advocacy engagement (Hardman, 2013; van der Mars, 2021). Policies touch nearly all aspects of physical education (UNESCO, 2014), and a significant barrier is the ‘policy illiteracy’ that contributes to the field’s neglect (van der Mars et al., 2021). Many educators receive little to no policy education, often not identifying as policy actors (Lorusso et al., 2020). However, innovative approaches such as case stories are emerging in undergraduate programs to address policy education (Lorusso et al., 2023; Scanlon et al., 2022). While most literature is derived from outside the United States (Lambert & Penney, 2020; Penney, 2016), this area has garnered increased attention (van der Mars, 2018), yet empirical research remains scarce (Marttinen & Beighle, 2024). This study aimed to explore physical education stakeholders’ policy work in the United States through the Narrative Policy Framework (Crow & Jones, 2018; Jones et al., 2022; Shanahan et al., 2015). Using a mixed-methodology approach, this study combines case study and narrative inquiry (Richmond, 2002) to explore the policy work of physical education stakeholders at micro-, meso-, and macro-levels. Semi-structured interviews were conducted (N = 15), and additional qualitative data (e.g., policy documents and other artifacts) were collected (N = 32) to gain a comprehensive understanding of each case. Data collection began in December 2023 and continued through March 2024. Data were analyzed using both inductive narrative analysis (Riessman, 2010) and thematic analysis (Braun & Clarke, 2006), with triangulation across sources, participants, and cases (Patton, 1999). Findings suggest how strategic advocacy efforts can be effective in physical education work across micro-, meso-, and macro-levels. At the micro-level, themes of advocacy champions within and beyond school walls, redefining the role of physical educators, and navigating policy challenges shed light on the important role of individual efforts and school-community support in overcoming barriers. The meso-level analysis emphasized a “students first” advocacy focus, the rationalization for more resources, navigation of policy processes amidst battles of marginalization, and advocacy principles. At the macro-level, strategic coalition-building, a clear advocacy “ask” for improved access to quality physical education, and effective use of stories, data, and tailored messaging emphasize the importance of diverse, strategic coalitions and nuanced advocacy strategies in influencing state policy. This dissertation exposed the complexities of physical education policy advocacy at school, district, and state levels, highlighting the need for resilience, innovation, and the use of narratives as a powerful advocacy tool. Emphasizing the role of educators as policy actors and the effectiveness of storytelling supported by evidence, this study presented a compelling case for the integration of policy education within physical education teacher education (PETE) programs and/or professional development settings, as well as enhancing stakeholder engagement in policy endeavors to improve access and implementation of quality physical education in the United States. Thus, this work serves as a call to the field to embrace their roles as policy actors and prioritize capacity-building for impactful policy advocacy for physical education
Exploring the Therapeutic Benefits of Dance in the Academic Schedule: The Effects on Stress Among High School Students
Get PDFThe purpose of this study was to gain insight into the minds of dance students about the stress they experienced as a result of their academic schedules and extracurriculars. The following research questions informed this study:
Q1 Does incorporating dance into the academic schedule lower stress in high school students?
Q2 In what mental state are students before and after taking dance class?
Q3 Does dance provide mental health benefits for high school students?
Student stress was evaluated before the study using a questionnaire as well as before and after each dance class through surveys. Eighteen students participated in a group interview at the conclusion of the six-week study to discuss how dance affected their mental health and the benefits of including dance in the academic schedule. Quantitative and qualitative data obtained from this study suggested that dance in the academic schedule reduced stress in high school students