This dissertation focuses on developing and evaluating hybrid approaches for analyzing free-form text in the medical domain. This research draws on natural language processing (NLP) techniques that are used to parse and extract concepts based on a controlled vocabulary. Once important concepts are extracted, additional machine learning algorithms,…

This investigative research focuses on the level of readiness of Science, Technology, Engineering, and Mathematics (STEM) students entering Historically Black Colleges and Universities (HBCU) in the college Calculus sequence. Calculus is a fundamental course for STEM courses. The level of readiness of the students for Calculus can very well play a…

This is a phenomenological research study about a college that is changing course management systems for online courses and the experiences that the full-time faculty go through during the transition from one course management system (CMS) to another. The reason this method was chosen was to capture the experiences of the faculty and gain an…

This dissertation takes up the issue of transparency and opacity in vowel harmony--that is, when a segment is unable to undergo a harmony process, will it be skipped over by harmony (transparent) or will it prevent harmony from propagating further (opaque)? I argue that the choice between transparency and opacity is best understood as a…

The central premise of this project is that researching student communication and composing actions in light of audience will illuminate particular features of student composing processes in 21st century interdisciplinary contexts. Students in this study took part in a six week inquiry unit about their local area. Data generated included student…

The objective of this work is to examine the efficacy of natural language processing (NLP) in summarizing bibliographic text for multiple purposes. Researchers have noted the accelerating growth of bibliographic databases. Information seekers using traditional information retrieval techniques when searching large bibliographic databases are often…

Teachers' perceptions of their school leaders influence student achievement in their schools. The extent of this influence is examined in this study. This quantitative study examined teachers' perceptions of the leadership style of their principals as transformational, transactional or passive-avoidant in improving and non-improving schools in…

The University of Chicago Everyday Mathematics Program is among the nation's most popular programs used in schools throughout the United States. However, despite the widespread use of the Everyday Mathematics Program, a disconnect exists between the increased acceptance of the program in elementary schools throughout the United States and student…

As technology continues to change the way society communicates, teachers need to prepare their students for digital literacy and competencies in their adulthood. Specific training is necessary for educators in the appropriate and effective methods for incorporating technologies such as smart phones and hand-held devices. Teachers, who work in…

Teaching about culture at the college level is always a challenge with regards to the heterogeneous reality of Spanish. The debatable status of the language within the United States is not always reflected in the language and literature departments of institutions of higher education. Moreover, standardization has been continuously favored in the…

According to recent research, "Very few teacher education programs in the United States offer a curriculum for online teaching, leaving districts, states, and virtual schools to train online teachers" (Dawley, Rice, & Hinck, 2010, p. 11). One of the difficulties of creating a training program for online educators is identifying their unique needs…

What happens when the problem of inequitable access to mathematics is addressed by agape (pronounced agapa) or attending to the relationships students develop with mathematics? To respond to this question, this paper offers a description of the journey towards teaching mathematics as agape. First, I organized examples of equity pedagogy around the…

Studies in adult learning have increased and better developed in the past century. From them adult learning theory emerged, comprised of andragogy, self-directed learning, and transformational learning. The main purpose of this study is to measure the teaching style preferences of trainees at a mid-size police department. The second purpose is to…

A quantitative, correlational design was utilized in this study to examine the relationship between academic self-efficacy, racial identity, and the academic success of first-generation African American male college students at Predominantly White Institutions of higher education. The study comprised 89 first-generation African American male…

This descriptive study investigates the ways that students in an Ancient History class make meaning of past events by relating them to their present lives and experiences. The study is grounded in theories of historical thinking, particularly focusing on the concepts of presentism and its usefulness for examining classroom teaching. The following…