Over the last two decades, increasingly scholarship has promoted pedagogies and curricular frameworks that push students to develop skills that transfer between disciplines and outside of classroom contexts. There are a number of kairotic moments that are taking hold of our society today that warrant a shift in education. As new AI tools emerge,…

This study explored the impact of Digital Game-Based Learning (DGBL) on focus, engagement, and time-on-task learning behaviors among 8- to 10-year-old students. Grounded in Csikszentmihalyi's Theory of Flow, the study utilized a quantitative experimental design to compare DGBL experiences with alternative instructional strategies through learner…

This research investigates significant moments in college students' drawn life stories in mathematics with the aim of examining implications for STEM engagement and potential reasons for gender-related differences in participation in mathematics intensive STEM fields. My research employs drawn life stories in mathematics specifically focused on…

Community colleges serve as the primary educational pathway for Black American males. Despite years of high enrollment by Black American males in community college, their persistence rates in community college continue to decline. The continued persistence decline has concerned community college leaders. Community colleges have attempted to…

In this dissertation I explore instructors' work with instructional tasks as they plan to introduce various representations of derivatives. Drawing on the notion of "framing" from sociology, I adopt a situative lens to study calculus instructors' planning of instructional tasks. I rely on Herbst and Chazan's (2012) notion of…

This dissertation investigates the factors contributing to low student engagement in a Title I school located in Southeast Texas. Recognizing the critical importance of student engagement for academic success, the study employs a qualitative phenomenological approach to explore teachers' perceptions of the underlying causes of disengagement within…

There is a need for ongoing study of veterans' academic progress (U.S. Department of Veterans Affairs, 2012). Student-veterans are the least engaged group on campuses (McNair & Stielow, 2012). Integration methods and rational choice methods of student-veteran engagement, used together, lead to academic progress during and after military tours…

The implementation of computer-based simulations by teachers in the classroom can have a significant and varied impact on students' learning outcomes and engagement. In meta-analyses of the use of computer simulation in the classroom, several studies show a significant impact on students' learning and achievement outcomes. However, the…

School systems across America are faced with the challenge to engage all students in the academic learning process and increase academic achievement. More specifically, teachers often have difficulty engaging Black male students. Throughout the years, several studies have been conducted to examine factors influencing academic achievement. Using a…

The need to understand the differences in the self-efficacy of K-12 mathematics teachers based on teachers' characteristics and school factors is imperative because research has shown teachers' self-efficacy to be a mediating factor on students' academic achievement. As such, education policymakers and school administrators need to understand…

Adult students constitute a large and increasing proportion of community college enrollment across the United States. For personal, economic, and sociological reasons, the success of these students is vital to the students themselves, the institutions they attend, and society as a whole. The purpose of this dissertation was to examine results from…

The purpose of this quantitative, non-experimental, cross-sectional, ex-post facto data study was to examine factors related to community college students who enrolled in developmental English and/or enrolled in combined developmental English and reading courses persistence and engagement at urban community colleges. The dependent variables…

This teacher-research study explored how opportunities for multimodal project learning provided time in the classroom for ongoing conversations and inquiries that promoted student agency and growth, cultivated content and literacy learning, and inherently provided authentic assessment opportunities. This study documented the multimodal curriculum…

Educators are continuously searching for ways to increase teaching effectiveness and improve student outcomes for nursing programs across the country. Educational research historically has focused on student engagement and teaching effectiveness separately, and while there is a connection that is presumed between the two in the literature, it is…

As a field, higher education frequently assumes lived experiences of undergraduate students, such as participating in student activism, are automatically experiential learning opportunities; however, there is a lack of research focusing and featuring students' voices on the matter. In this preliminary research study, qualitative research methods…