College students engage with religion, faith, and spirituality for a variety of reasons; however, current literature exploring these motivations is limited. We utilised a constructivist, qualitative, phenomenological design and surveyed 201 students to understand their motivations for pursuing faith, religion, or spirituality. Of those surveyed,…

In this qualitative case study, using Freire's theory of critical consciousness development, we examined the influence of a 1-credit immigration policy service-learning course on college students' motivations to act against immigration injustices. We found that after witnessing immigration issues at the Lower Rio Grande Valley area in Texas,…

The Maroon & White Leadership Program at Texas A&M University is a formal leadership program that involves students completing eight leadership experiences including leadership education, training, and development dimensions. Students also reflect on each leadership experience and meet with a leadership coach to synthesize the experience.…

Assessing the degree to which students engage and learn from their online courses will be important as online courses are becoming more ubiquitous. This study sought to capture student perceptions of their independence as learners, their level of engagement, their effort exerted, and the amount of information they learned in online courses. The…

Although there is high enrollment in online college courses, there are concerns about student engagement (Martin & Bolliger, 2018; Dumford & Miller, 2018). Gamification has been shown to have the potential to improve student engagement. The purpose of the study was to describe how academic student engagement is impacted by Nicholson's…

College-level students experience various life stressors that impact them academically, mentally, and physically. They struggle to navigate through those stressors; however, campus counseling services are underutilized. (Laidlaw et al., 2016). The central purpose of this Dissertation in Practice was to understand college-level students' perception…

This study was conducted to examine the impact of spirituality and religion on a student's College experience at a large Hispanic-serving community college in South Texas. The problem is that in the realm of higher education literature and research, there is scant information regarding spirituality and religion as factors in a student's motivation…

College students at a large south Texas university have proven consistently that they have a higher-than-average Body Mass Index (BMI), spend less time per week engaged in physical activity, and in general feel that they are less healthy than students in a national cross-sectional survey of college students by the American College Health…

The ability to communicate well through writing has never been more critical. Writing is a necessary skill to make a living and a "life." Even before beginning school, children try to make themselves known by writing. Graves (1983) writes that a child's marks on paper-or a wall-say to the world, "I am" (p. 3). Children are…

Student enrolment in higher education is increasing, as are enrolments in non-traditional pathways, such as degree completion programs, particularly those that are offered online. These changes have shifted the nature of student learning needs and perceptions. Therefore, stakeholders in higher education need a greater understanding of the drivers…

Feedback is essential to enhance students' performance in an online learning environment, although this is influenced by how feedback is delivered. Feedback is an assessment of learning and promotes motivation to the learner. With the COVID-19 pandemic, teaching and learning rapidly shifted to online learning, and the importance of instructor…

Schools across Texas are tasked with detailing action plans in support of students identified as at-risk of dropping out (TEA, 2020b). The intent of this study was to learn the perspective of students, identified as at-risk of dropping out, in terms of whether there is a relationship between campus retention/recovery intervention efforts and their…

This study was grounded in the social cognitive career theoretical framework (Lent, Brown, & Hackett, 1994). The purpose of this four-year longitudinal study was to examine the factors that may have contributed to students' motivation to develop STEM interest during secondary school years. The participants in our study were 9th-11th grade high…

Research has consistently demonstrated the benefits of using ePortfolios in higher education and the Association of American Colleges and Universities (AAC&U) added ePortfolios to its High-Impact Practices list (Watson, Kuh, Rhodes, Light, & Chen, 2016). The majority of studies on college students' ePortfolio use have focused on…

The purpose of this sequential mixed methods study was to explore differences in students' STEM identities, game play motivations, and game preferences. The need to grow and support STEM education and careers in the U. S. is a widely-held concern for those in leadership, industry, and education. A purposeful sample of 167 9th grade-12th grade…