It is often assumed that higher prestige colleges and universities, via the rankings, have a better quality of education. Yet, the prestige structure in U.S. higher education favors resources, research, and student selectivity over teaching and undergraduate educational practices. Using quantitative observational data from 587 courses across 9…

Academic rigor has long been considered important for students' learning and development in higher education. However, findings about students' outcomes from previous studies of rigor are mixed, in part because of varying conceptions of what constitutes rigor. In quantitative research, rigor is often operationalized in one of two ways: through…

This study aimed to identify the themes teacher preparation programs need to improve their current curriculum. The research focused on teacher preparation programs, professional development opportunities, technology use and integration methods, college and career readiness in PreK-12 students, ISTE Educator and Student Standards, and 21st Century…

Background: The Society for Health and Physical Educators (SHAPE) America has guided physical education curriculum, instruction, and assessment in the United States (US) for well over 100 years. We contend that in the US context for physical education, the "National Standards and Grade-Level Outcomes for K-12 Physical Education" (Society…

This study examined the relationship of intentional faculty professional development, intentional online course design, and informal course reviews to the results of official interinstitutional peer review within higher education institutions. Quality Matters[superscript TM] (QM) provided the setting for this exploration of the relationship of…

Accreditation of academic programs and recognition of student degrees provide academic institutions a measure of a set of community agreed upon standards. These can aid pedagogical change, support faculty to successfully engage students in their discipline and to provide a mechanism to maintain standards. Several professional scientific societies…

This study analyzes the correlation between required years of Bible courses and academic rigor at select private Christian schools. These findings, derived from the author's doctoral research, show a threshold of under 4 years of required Bible courses for optimal academic perception among these schools. This threshold correlates with a medium to…

The use of standards-based assessment (SBA) has gained prominence in higher education due to a wide range of research evidence that supports its effectiveness in improving learning and teaching. Although the concept is widely used in academic discourse and practice, it has multiple interpretations which have led to diverse assessment practices to…

John Widdowson CBE (Commander of the Most Excellent Order of the British Empire) is principal and chief executive of New College Durham. He chairs the Mixed Economy Group (a working group of 40 colleges that offer higher education courses in addition to their FE provision) and was a member of the HEFCE (Higher Education Funding Council for…

Many MSW-level social workers make the decision to earn a doctoral degree in social work or a related field. A large number of so-called predatory doctoral programs lack rigor or much academic substance and are ultimately of little value in advancing one's career. This article describes the characteristics of legitimate social work doctoral…

Purpose: The purpose of this paper is to review the issues and challenges associated with examining PhD theses in the modern, rapidly changing academic world. The PhD degree has been described as the "pinnacle of academic qualifications", but it is under threat in terms of the quality of supervision and the outcome of examinations. By…

There is growing awareness that established structures of higher education are often predicated on problematic assumptions about merit, excellence, and rigor. Doctoral qualifying exams, for example, are required to advance to candidacy in many Ph.D. programs despite decades of documented concerns about the implications of standard modes for…

The study studied how students studying music at Kastamonu University learn about music and whether they receive additional help in 2020. The first study detailed in this article focused on identifying student perceptions and how they learned music, and aimed to come up with suggestions on how to better meet the needs of music students. To do…

We study the effects of the COVID pandemic on educational attainment. By 2022, entry into two-year colleges was 21 percent lower than before the pandemic, with larger declines in Black- and Hispanic-majority colleges. Four-year college entry declined by only 6 percent and then rebounded 4 percent. High school graduation reached an all-time high in…

This article describes a framework of Standards-Based Grading suitable for use in a variety of mathematics courses. We detail our experience adapting this framework to various courses, ranging from Pre-calculus to Differential Equations, at four different institutions, including both small liberal arts colleges and large universities, and in class…