This dissertation examined the significance of the Undergraduate Students Together Reaching Instructional Diversity and Excellence (USSTRIDE) community of practice (CoP) mentorship program offered at Florida State University College of Medicine and its profound impact on first-generation, rural, and economically disadvantaged undergraduate student…

Although some studies have incorporated poetry into engineering courses, no studies exist that explore the use of writing poetry about technical topics to develop creative thinking skills in undergraduate engineering education. This study explores engineering students' perceptions of incorporating poetry writing within an upper-level…

This article presents an overview of the iterative design and evolution of an undergraduate course at Florida State University that offers students the opportunity to explore how society's increased reliance on information technology has changed the way in which we interact with each other and the world around us. Drawing upon course iterations…

The current study investigated how high-skill spellers and low-skill spellers incidentally learn words during reading. The purpose of the study was to determine whether readers can use uninformative contexts to support word learning after forming a lexical representation for a novel word, consistent with instance-based resonance processes.…

The Florida Undergraduate Research Conference (FURC) is an annual multidisciplinary conference that enables student scholars to present their research, network with other students, and attend professional development seminars. FURC has been held since 2011 and has featured more than 2,100 student presentations with participation from a broad array…

The advantages of active learning approaches have prompted national recommendations for the development of inquiry-based laboratories to replace traditional laboratory classes. However, there is little consensus for the most-effective implementation strategies. Frequently, a single inquiry-based exercise is incorporated at the end of a traditional…

The Global Citizens Project (GCP) is a university-wide global learning initiative at the University of South Florida, aimed at enhancing undergraduate students' global competencies through curricular and co-curricular experiences. The GCP uses the United Nations Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) as a framework for these experiences.…

While computing programs in the U.S. are experiencing growth in enrollment trends, they are still grappling with matters related to retention and persistence of computing undergraduates. One construct identified by scholars as having an impact on persistence in computing is computing identity, which is shaped by constructs such as recognition,…

Reading in difficult or novel fonts results in slower and less efficient reading (Slattery & Rayner, 2010); however, these fonts may also lead to better learning and memory (Diemand-Yauman, Oppenheimer, & Vaughan, 2011). This effect is consistent with a desirable difficulty effect such that more effort during encoding results in better…

Children's mental health can be a barrier to school success. School-based mental health services exist and research has shown positive results with the implementation of them. However, students spend the majority of their school time with a teacher and very little research exists on the role of a teacher in regards to students with mental health…

Employers expect college graduates to be critical thinkers. However, the impact of college curricula on critical thinking skills is debated. Furthermore, individuals with low critical thinking ability may have difficulty improving it, since they may lack the metacognition skills needed to accurately assess weaknesses in their thought processes. A…

This study explored whether three-dimensional wisdom and psychosocial growth, defined as increases in psychological well-being (PWB), spirituality, and death acceptance, can be learned in university courses. Specifically, the study examined whether courses that tried to engage the whole person rather than only the intellect and/or courses that…

Teacher candidates have lower participation in undergraduate research than students in other disciplines. To enable teacher candidates to develop skills for scholarly activities and to engage them in research activities, teacher education programs utilize diverse approaches. This article describes a strategy to promote undergraduate research among…

Undergraduate retention, graduation, and postgraduation success are greater when students engage in undergraduate research. This article describes a grassroots, faculty-initiated effort to increase the number of students who received research experiences at a large, urban institution. Peer course coaches, students who had previously taken a course…

This paper presents reflections on educators' experiences while teaching critical global consciousness and students' conceptualizations of global citizenship and civic mindedness in an undergraduate course. The course applied the principles of critical multicultural education to education in a global context. This analytical autoethnography…