Students in higher education complain regularly that their classes are boring and their instructors seem not to know how to teach. If, in fact, those instructors do not know how to teach, there are likely many reasons for this. There is also a great deal of literature, which this paper reviews, about helping those instructors to do a better job.…

Research on early adolescence reveals significant declines in intrinsic motivation for reading and points out the need for metacognitive strategy use among middle school students. Research indicates that explicit instruction involving motivation and metacognitive support for reading strategy use in the context of a discipline is an efficient and…

Federal Title I funding has been allocated to districts since 1965 in an effort to provide schools with a high population of identified low socioeconomic students with additional resources to close the achievement gap. The basis for this study was to ascertain whether the Title I funding that schools received was having a positive impact on…

The purpose of this quantitative, causal-comparative research study using cross-sectional data was to compare groups of higher education institutions based on their level of scholarship of engagement across: (a) level of faculty-student interactions and (b) how the predictive value of faculty-student interactions compares among the three…

Recent studies have indicated the necessity for changes in literacy assessment and instruction. Well respected authorities have agreed that direct, explicit, and systematic instruction in the five basic components of reading (i.e., phonemic awareness, phonics, vocabulary, fluency, and comprehension) is essential to ensure that all students have an…

Spurred by the "No Child Left Behind Act" of 2001, virtually every educational reform program now includes an accountability component that requires sound data collection and reporting (NCLB, 2002, section 101). Drawing from empirically based and theoretical literature in the field, this dissertation examines Adequate Yearly Progress (AYP) and the…

The purpose of this study was to explore the state of student early alert models at nonprofit, four-year institutions of higher education through both quantitative and qualitative lenses. The use of these retention initiatives has become a much heralded practice on college campuses (Kuh, 2007a; Kuh 2007b; Seidman, 2005; Tinto, 2008). However,…

This phenomenological study explores how African-American female administrators (individually and collectively) perceive the relationship between their identity and their leadership voice. The study focuses upon perceptions of 11 African-American female administrators who serve the 14 main campuses of the universities constituting the Pennsylvania…

High schools in the United States are facing increased scrutiny to increase the number of students graduating with a diploma in four years. This pressure comes from many sources. First, the No Child Left Behind Act instituted graduation as a measure of a high school's success at the federal level. States soon followed by increasing accountability…

The post-observation conference offers a potentially fecund context for promoting language teacher learning, but very little research has been conducted into how this actually happens. Taking Vygotskian sociocultural theory as its theoretical framework, this study examined the mediational discourse of a series of post-observation conferences…

Low-income high school graduates are less likely to get to a postsecondary institution than their middle and upper-income peers (U.S. Department of Education, 2000). Students who do enter a four-year institution do not have the necessary academic preparation to succeed and obtain a professional degree. The study examined how two national college…

This research study compared gender and grade level differences in divergent thinking among middle school and high school students in the Midwest, in an attempt to determine whether gender or grade level-based differences exist in divergent thinking. The instrument used was based on the Wallach and Kogan Creativity Test (WKCT). There were 166…

The purpose of this study was to examine relationships between the job satisfaction of speech language pathologists (SLPs) and self-efficacy, work relationships and two components of job performance: teacher judgments of student improvement and supervisor ratings of teacher efficiency. It was hypothesized that each of the variables would be…

As the economy has become increasingly global, organizations whose employees are more creative and innovative compete at a higher level than those who do not. And, organizations that incorporate multi-generations into their workforce will realize more creativity and innovation within their organizations. Now, and in the future, leaders will…

The purpose of this study was to examine the satisfaction and perceived learning and development of university peer mentors. Mentoring research exists that focus on student retention, academic achievement, and satisfaction of university students who are mentored, but little research exists that provides a comprehensive, quantitative perspective of…