The purpose of this dissertation study is to examine the variables that impact student teachers' perceptions of their teaching efficacy during their reading and writing lessons. Extending Bandura's four sources of efficacy beliefs--performance or mastery experiences, vicarious experiences, verbal or social persuasion, and physiological and/or…

My dissertation contains three studies centering on the question: how to motivate people to share high quality information on online information aggregation systems, also known as social computing systems? I take a social scientific approach to "identify" the strategic behavior of individuals in information systems, and "analyze" how non-monetary…

This study used qualitative methodology to document what happened when two groups of children--a second grade class in Columbia, South Carolina, U.S.A. and a third grade class in Amman, Jordan--collaborated on a technology enhanced cultural exchange. Key aspects of this project included dialogic collaboration based upon Short's (2003) model of…

The purpose of this exploratory study was twofold. One was to identify the entry-level goal commitment in STEM graduate students at the beginning of an academic year and identify change in commitment at the end of an academic year. The other was to identify factors and types of experiences and their impact on commitment in this context. Data came…

The exploratory study sought to examine the relationships between teachers' self-efficacy beliefs and professional learning community. Specifically, this study presents a quantitative analysis of the relationship between teachers' perceptions of self-efficacy and PLC implementation. The Teachers' Sense of Efficacy Scale (TSES) (long form)…

"During the past two decades, two-year and four-year colleges have increased their reliance on part-time faculty" (Antony & Valadez, 2002, p. 41). The hiring of part-time faculty started as a convenient way to meet the demands for instruction while remaining financially responsible during tough budgetary times. Currently "...hiring part-time…

The current study merges theory and research in higher education and organizational psychology in order to investigate student retention in adult learners. Factors that are associated with student retention were examined and points of intervention are recommended. Specifically, this study focuses on the role of campus environment, classroom…

This historical analysis provided an opportunity to appreciate Chicago's course in the national school reform landscape. This study helped to understand the effects school reform efforts had on school leadership policy in Chicago. It verified a roster of superintendents in Chicago during 1983-2008, established a chronology of school reform events…

This action research study examines targeted instruction and its effect on academic referrals to elementary intervention and referral service committees. The West Harvard School District was not effectively utilizing targeted instruction, and there was a distinct lack of a differentiated vision throughout the district. This lack of differentiation…

The goals of this thesis have been to gain a better understanding of collaborative knowledge sharing and distilling and to build a prototype collaborative system that supports flexible knowledge generation and distillation. To reach these goals, I have conducted two user studies and built two systems. The first system, Arkose 1.0, is a…

"End-to-End (E2E)" voting systems provide cryptographic proof that the voter's intention is captured, cast, and tallied correctly. While E2E systems guarantee integrity independent of software, most E2E systems rely on software to provide confidentiality, availability, authentication, and access control; thus, end-to-end integrity is not…

This qualitative inquire examined the financial behavior of six college educated Black women located in the Midwest. Utilizing Black feminism as a theoretical framework for analysis, a depiction was prepared on the adeptness of the women at managing their finances; the influence of parental teaching on personal finances; and their behavior toward…

Patient health literacy skills are critical to effective healthcare communication and safe care delivery in primary care settings. Methods and strategies to identify patient health literacy (HL) capabilities and provider/staff knowledge, attitudes and beliefs (KAB) regarding HL must be known before addressing provider/staff communication skills.…

Globalization and changing demographics in the United States have resulted in the need for higher education to prepare students for a global society. To this end, college and universities have responded in a number of ways including in the curriculum with required diversity courses. However the impact of this intervention on students is an area in…

The present study attempted to accurately measure crimes that occur on a college campus and whether students' perceptions of police influenced their decisions to report their victimization. A specific emphasis was placed on sexual assaults. Previous research has examined the reporting of sexual assault (Bachman, 1998; Sampson, 2002), sexual…