Academic literature on the topic 'Undergraduate Division'

A survey of 52 top-ranked undergraduate business schools suggests that profi ciency in written and oral communication is considered an important requirement for an undergraduate business degree. This conclusion derives from a study of offi cial Web sites, with follow-up verification by e-mail. All schools have writing and other communication ( primarily oral) standnrds in place; 50 have lower-division writing requirements, and 17 schools have other lower-division communication requirements ( primarily oral). A total of 36 schools have upper-division writing requirements, and 25 of those schools offer business communication courses through the business schools, and not through liberal arts divisions.

Developing a curriculum that integrates laboratory, field, and nonlaboratory experiences requires solid planning, cooperation, and compromise among the faculty members in a department. This is especially true for laboratory experiences where basic skills and familiarity with the different groups of plants and animals carry over to upper-division courses. In an introductory Principles of Biology laboratory, for example, exercises can be designed to give students a clear idea of a statistical distribution and the consequences of random molecular motion. Both concepts are used in nearly all upper-division courses to some extent. Some important but "mechanical" features of courses within a curriculum, such as adopting within the department a single format for writing a scientific paper, will go a long way in tying together different laboratory experiences. Other similar but simpler ideas are to develop appendexes to laboratory exercises that can be used in introductory and upper-division courses, e.g., how to do dilutions, the use of SI units, etc. The latter may be a good way to stimulate departments to think more carefully about continuity and consistency in the design of the overall curriculum. Continuity of instruction from lower-division to upper-division courses and among upper-division courses requires communication between instructors at all levels.

ABSTRACT Background Residency program location may be an important factor for orthopedic surgery residency applicants. More than half of residents locate their practice near the site of their training, and surgical specialties (eg, otolaryngology, plastic surgery, and general surgery) have shown geographic patterns in their residency matches. Objective We analyzed geographic trends in the orthopedic surgery Match. Methods Hometown, undergraduate institution, and medical school “preresidency locations” of all allopathic, nonmilitary, orthopedic surgery residents were recorded from program websites for the 2015–2016 academic year. Program and preresidency locations were coded according to state and US census division. Statistical analysis was used to investigate associations between residency program locations and preresidency locations. Results Of 2662 residents in the study, 1220 of 2614 (47%), 536 of 1329 (40%), and 308 of 744 (41%) matched into the same division as their medical school, undergraduate institution, and hometown, respectively. There were significant differences among divisions (P < .001). Also, 817 of 2662 (31%), 319 of 1329 (24%), and 200 of 770 (26%) residents matched in the same state as their medical school, undergraduate institution, and hometown, respectively, with significant differences between states for medical school (P < .0001) and undergraduate institution (P < .0001), but not hometown (P = .22). Overall, 21% of residents (538 of 2612) matched at the program affiliated with their medical school. Conclusions There is an association among hometown, undergraduate institution, and medical school for the training program location in which orthopedic surgery residents match, with variability in locations matched at state and census division levels.

This exploratory study was designed to assess undergraduate students' understanding of division of fractions. A paper and pencil instrument was administered as a pre- and posttest to 59 undergraduate students who major in elementary education. Analysis by independent t test of written responses provided by students on the pre- and posttests showed lack of understanding, even postinstruction.

Students cooperatively conducted research experiments in an upper division cognitive psychology course in the Behavioral Sciences and Leadership Department at the United States Air Force Academy. The pedagogical structure of the course was modified to emphasize teaching cadets how to think versus what to think through the process of conducting research. Students were expected to cooperate in pairs to design and conduct their research. Cooperative research projects were used in the attempt to develop critical thinking skills and intrinsic motivation to excel. This paper presents the authors' views on the rationale and perceived benefits of cooperative research projects in upper division courses to develop critical thinking skills and intrinsic motivation.

The workplace success of new engineering graduates is ultimately affected by their oral and written communication skills. However, engineering students' academic preparation for industry's needs in terms of written communication has been widely acknowledged as inadequate. The present study is intended to improve our understanding of a prominent engineering genre, the engineering design report (EDR), and provide support for students learning to write this genre. The goals of this study are to (a) conduct a corpus-based register comparison between student and professional EDRs and (b) provide a more detailed description of professional EDRs, by determining their rhetorical organization and identifying linguistic features associated with this organization.

This research is based on two EDR corpora (N of texts=262, with approximately 1,119,186 words), one with upper-division engineering students' EDRs and the other with professional engineers' EDRs. The study examines both non-linguistic and linguistic features of student and professional EDRs. First, non-linguistic characteristics of EDRs are examined using the EDR situational framework developed for the study. Then, corpus-based methodologies are used to analyze core grammatical features and features associated with grammatical complexity in both corpora. Finally, to determine conventional discourse structures of professional EDRs, the study draws on the English for Specific Purposes tradition of genre analysis and then uses register analysis to investigate linguistic features associated with particular rhetorical structures.

The register analyses revealed complex patterns of linguistic variation, frequently influenced by the registers' situational characteristics. The results of these analyses indicate that two EDR registers fill different positions on the spoken-to-written continuum, with reports produced in the workplace being closer to professional written registers and student reports using more speech-like features. The genre analysis of professional EDRs uncovered the highly variable nature of this genre. Despite considerable variation in EDR rhetorical organization, 12 common moves were identified that cluster in specific ways to form EDR organizational units and rely on particular sets of linguistic features. A streamlined template of the EDR genre is introduced as are linguistic features associated with its organization. Study results may have pedagogical implications for teaching features of professional EDRs to students.

Identity research requires a multidisciplinary approach for a comprehensive understanding. Even with acceptance of multiple perspectives, one is left with ambiguous terminology and indiscrete concepts (Ashmore, Deaux, & McLaughlin-Volpe, 2004).

The inquiry into the identity of a nontraditional college population such as student-athletes is no less complicated and challenging (Gohn & Albin, 2006). The role development and role demands confronting these students make for a unique undergraduate experience (Greer & Robinson, 2006). The identity balance achieved through role salience necessitates that these students learn self-regulation and self-management skills in order to perform both academic and athletic roles effectively (Adler & Adler, 1987; Killeya-Jones, 2005; Melendez, 2009). Nonetheless, proficiency at these roles does not preclude the inevitable role foreclosures that all these student-athletes face at the end of their undergraduate experience (Ogilvie & Taylor, 1993; Pearson & Petitpas, 1990).

This dissertation is a three-part examination of this dual identity phenomenon. It explores the experiences of seven former NCAA Division I student-athletes who participated in the revenue-producing sports of basketball or football. All three of the analyses utilize a phenomenological methodology and rely on both an interview and projective stimulus. The interviews consist of three sets of open-ended questions, and the projective data instrument utilizes Card 1 (Boy with violin) of the Thematic Apperception Test (TAT) (Murray, 1943).

The initial inquiry looks at the developmental process of the student-athlete, including how the two identities are formed, sustained, and foreclosed. Many college student-athlete studies examine identity issues while the students are enrolled as undergraduates, but this inquiry focuses on those former NCAA Division I athletes who successfully navigated the dual role dynamic. The reports of those who have been able to play and graduate give insight to particular problems and the solutions these athletes developed. The results reveal a pre-collegiate dual identity development that is sustained through college by role salience strategies and role foreclosure recognition.

The second inquiry identifies those individual identity elements that may be active in the formation of the dual role identities for these former student-athletes. The dominant identity themes for the interviews were framed by Ashmore, Deaux, and McLaughlin-Volpe (2004). The narratives were scrutinized for identity themes from the participants’ high school and college experiences. The narratives consisted of the following identity elements: self-categorization, evaluation, importance, affective commitment, and content and meaning. The assessment of the TAT projections was grounded in McClelland, Atkinson, Clark, and Lowell’s (1953) achievement motivation scoring criteria. High-achievement content was found in five of the seven stories. Implications of the findings are discussed for future research into the complexity of college student-athlete identity.

The final inquiry examines the motivational and self-regulatory underpinning of these former student-athletes. Delay of gratification (DOG) has been recognized as a psychological trait involving both ego control and ego resiliency (Funder & Block, 1989). It is also recognized as an important psychological condition for academic success (Bembenutty & Karabenick, 1998).

The same two data collection instruments were used: an open-ended question interview and Card 1 (Boy with violin) of the TAT. The interview yielded recall data concerning DOG in both the high school and college experiences of these participants. The TAT gave a projective story and fictional response to the structured stimulus in the TAT picture card. There were similar responses between the data sets alluding to DOG when the narratives were assessed according to Academic Delay of Gratification strategies (Bembenutty & Karabenick, 1998). Implications for further research, policy, and practice as well as a need for more expansive qualitative inquiry into this studentathlete subpopulation are discussed.

Doctor of Philosophy
Department of Physics
Eleanor C. Sayre
In this dissertation I will start with the broad research question of what does problem solving in upper division physics look like? My focus in this study is on students' problem solving in physics theory courses. Some mathematical formalisms are common across all physics core courses such as using the process of separation of variables, doing Taylor series, or using the orthogonality properties of mathematical functions to set terms equal to zero. However, there are slight differences in their use of these mathematical formalisms across different courses, possibly because of how students map different physical systems to these processes. Thus, my first main research question aims to answer how students perform these recurring processes across upper division physics courses. I break this broad question into three particular research questions: What knowledge pieces do students use to make connections between physics and procedural math? How do students use their knowledge pieces coherently to provide reasoning strategies in estimation problems? How do students look ahead into the problem to read the information out of the physical scenario to align their use of math in physics? Building on the previous body of the literature, I will use the theory family of Knowledge in Pieces and provide evidence to expand this theoretical foundation. I will compare my study with previous studies and provide suggestions on how to generalize these theory expansions for future use. My experimental data mostly come from video-based classroom data. Students in groups of 2-4 students solve in-class problems in quantum mechanics and electromagnetic fields 1 courses collaboratively. In addition, I will analyze clinical interviews to demonstrate how a single case study student plays an epistemic game to estimate the total energy in a hurricane. My second research question is more focused on a particular instructional context. How do students frame problem solving in quantum mechanics? I will lay out a new theoretical framework based in epistemic framing that separates the problem solving space into four frames divided along two axes. The first axis models students' framing in math and physics, expanded through the second axis of conceptual problem solving and algorithmic problem solving. I use this framework to show how students navigate problem solving. Lastly, I will use this developed framework to interpret existing difficulties in quantum mechanics.

The purpose of this quantitative study was to examine, from a constructivist career development perspective, the factors of well-being and vocational identity that emerged among a diverse sample of upper-division undergraduate students. This study also examined which factors of vocational identity predicted well-being and which factors of well-being predicted vocational identity. Participants included 411 diverse, upper-division health science students from a public university in Southern California. The first two research questions that guided this study were designed to explore emergent factors of well-being and vocational identity using items from the PERMA Well-Being Profiler (PERMA) and the Vocational Identity Status Assessment. The final two research questions were designed to examine the best predictors of well-being among the factors of vocational identity and the best predictors of vocational identity among the factors of well-being. To address the research questions, data obtained from surveys was analyzed using exploratory factor analysis and multiple linear regression analysis.

The findings of this study demonstrated that PERMA theory and Vocational Identity Status theory explained the constructs of well-being and vocational identity among the diverse sample with few exceptions. Further, the PERMA and VISA instruments proved valid and reliable among the diverse sample. In-depth career exploration, identification with career commitment, and career self-doubt were the vocational identity factors that best predicted well-being. Meaning, accomplishment, and engagement were the well-being factors that best predicted vocational identity.

Recommendations based on the findings of this study included revisiting performance based funding policies to incorporate the measurement of well-being and vocational identity as metrics of student success alongside more objective measures like retention, GPA, and time to graduation. Further, recommendations were offered for integrating well-being and vocational identity enhancing activities and interventions into current practices in classroom, counseling, and advising settings. Recommendations for qualitative, experimental, and longitudinal research designs were offered based on the findings of this study.

abstract: This descriptive qualitative case study explored undergraduate degree attainment by African American males in football and basketball at a National Collegiate Athletic Association (NCAA) Division I institution in the Southwest. Semi-structured interviews were conducted with four participants at the institution to uncover experiences that helped or hindered their progress toward degree completion. Student perceptions of their environment, the role of athletics in determining future goals, and the role of the athletic institution and its constituent members in promoting or deterring degree completion is explored. Student aspiration to attain a degree, expectations for job prospects and financial opportunity after college is also discussed. Contextual and perceptual elements emerged as salient attributes in their experiences as students and athletes. The study results are consistent with previous findings linking academic engagement and motivation, to family and environment.
Dissertation/Thesis
Ed.D. Higher and Postsecondary Education 2012

Course-based Undergraduate Research Experiences (CUREs) have been described in a range of educational contexts. Although various learning objectives, termed anticipated learning outcomes (ALOs) in this project, have been proposed, processes for identifying them may not be rigorous or well-documented, which can lead to inappropriate assessment and speculation about what students actually learn from CUREs. Additionally, evaluation of CUREs has primarily relied on student and instructor perception data rather than more reliable measures of learning.This dissertation investigated a novel biochemistry laboratory curriculum for a Course-based Undergraduate Research Experience (CURE) known as the Biochemistry Authentic Scientific Inquiry Lab (BASIL). Students participating in this CURE use a combination of computational and biochemical wet-lab techniques to elucidate the function of proteins of known structure but unknown function. The goal of the project was to evaluate the efficacy of the BASIL CURE curriculum for developing students’ research abilities across implementations. Towards achieving this goal, we addressed the following four research questions (RQs): RQ1) How can ALOs be rigorously identified for the BASIL CURE; RQ2) How can the identified ALOs be used to develop a matrix that characterizes the BASIL CURE; RQ3) What are students’ perceptions of their knowledge, confidence and competence regarding their abilities to perform the top-rated ALOs for this CURE; RQ4) What are appropriate assessments for student achievement of the identified ALOs and what is the nature of student learning, and related difficulties, developed by students during the BASIL CURE? To address these RQs, this project focused on the development and use of qualitative and quantitative methods guided by constructivism and situated cognition theoretical frameworks. Data was collected using a range of instruments including, content analysis, Qualtrics surveys, open-ended questions and interviews, in order to identify ALOs and to determine student learning for the BASIL CURE. Analysis of the qualitative data was through inductive coding guided by the concept-reasoning-mode (CRM) model and the assessment triangle, while analysis of quantitative data was done by using standard statistical techniques (e.g. conducting a parried t-test and effect size). The results led to the development of a novel method for identifying ALOs, namely a process for identifying course-based undergraduate research abilities (PICURA; RQ1; Irby, Pelaez, & Anderson 2018b). Application of PICURA to the BASIL CURE resulted in the identification and rating by instructors of a wide range of ALOs, termed course-based undergraduate research abilities (CURAs), which were formulated into a matrix (RQs 2; Irby, Pelaez, & Anderson, 2018a,). The matrix was, in turn, used to characterize the BASIL CURE and to inform the design of student assessments aimed at evaluating student development of the identified CURAs (RQs 4; Irby, Pelaez, & Anderson, 2018a). Preliminary findings from implementation of the open-ended assessments in a small case study of students, revealed a range of student competencies for selected top-rated CURAs as well as evidence for student difficulties (RQ4). In this way we were able to confirm that students are developing some of the ALOs as actual learning outcomes which we term VLOs or verified learning outcomes. In addition, a participant perception indicator (PPI) survey was used to gauge students’ perceptions of their gains in knowledge, experience, and confidence during the BASIL CURE and, therefore, to inform which CURAs should be specifically targeted for assessment in specific BASIL implementations (RQ3;). These results indicate that, across implementations of the CURE, students perceived significant gains with large effect sizes in their knowledge, experience, and confidence for items on the PPI survey (RQ3;). In our view, the results of this dissertation will make important contributions to the CURE literature, as well as to the biochemistry education and assessment literature in general. More specifically, it will significantly improve understanding of the nature of student learning from CUREs and how to identify ALOs and design assessments that reveal what students actually learn from such CUREs - an area where there has been a dearth of available knowledge in the past. The outcomes of this dissertation could also help instructors and administrators identify and align assessments with the actual features of a CURE (or courses in general), use the identified CURAs to ensure the material fits departmental or university needs, and evaluate the benefits of students participating in these innovative curricula. Future research will focus on expanding the development and validation of assessments so that practitioners can better evaluate the efficacy of their CUREs for developing the research competencies of their undergraduate students and continue to render improvements to their curricula.

In the monograph reviewed the development of the inventory management of railway transport in the new economic environment of market economy. According to the results of theoretical research, innovative and production potential of the supply system of railway transport the main directions and methods of transformation of the restructuring process under the corporate changes of JSC "RZD", positioned value system of the logistics of railway transportation, and developed a classification model used logistical resources. Evaluation of activity of structural divisions of Russian Railways supply is proposed to be viewed through an integrated and comprehensive approach to the development of systems of balanced indicators of supply and prompt handling of material resources, the implementation of which allows to distribute the strategic objectives of the company "Russian Railways" activities in the system of logistics of the Railways and also to involve in economic circulation of excessive and unused inventories of material and technical resources and efficiently reallocate them among enterprises at the site of the railway. Recommendations for the implementation of the developed algorithms and models are long term in nature and are based on the concept of logistics management and improve the business processes of the logistics system. Will be useful for managers and specialists of directorates of logistics of Russian Railways supply, undergraduates and graduate students interested in the economy of railway transport.

Division of Paediatric Surgery, at the University of Cape Town and Red Cross War Memorial Children’s Hospital has been in the forefront of modern surgical training by introduction of online training and surgical skills training. The dramatised teaching on surgical conditions is a novel way of teaching rich surgical knowledge through the journey of a patient with a surgical condition from admission to discharge. This will be beneficial to both undergraduate and postgraduate students and will allow them to experience real life like interactions between patients and trainees as well as trainees and teachers. The filming of the video took place at the surgical skills training centre located at the Institute of Child Health building, Red Cross War Memorial Children’s Hospital. This medical video uses, in the main, actors and medically trained personnel. There are no violations with regard to ethics and such was cleared before and post the recording of the film. The Division would like to acknowledge the Foxwood TV, its producers, directors, and filming crew for their highly professional approach filming a medical training video. We would like to thank all the Divisional staff for their contributions to the preparation of manuscript, and performance in the video. We also would like to thank Karl Storz Endoscopy for their sponsorship of the episode.

The introduction presents the circumstances that led to the author’s development of the book. Explaining that millennial students had expressed skepticism that adult researchers could understand the dynamics of hookup culture, Beste constructed an assignment in which undergraduates became ethnographers analyzing college party culture. The author describes the methodology of her qualitative research and explains the book’s three divisions: part I explores students’ descriptions and perspectives, and finds that most undergraduate ethnographers are privately dissatisfied with college hookup culture; part II examines students’ reflections on Johann Metz’s account of full humanity within the context of party culture; part III envisions how campus communities can create a sexually just culture in which sexual disrespect and violence is no longer tolerated and all persons are treated as ends in themselves.

The history behind the Department of Geological Sciences at New Mexico State University goes back one hundred and thirty years and is complex. This history, as told in the pages of this monograph, documents the important details behind the founding of the NMSU geology program and its growth and evolution to 2015. The program's history is conveniently divided into three administrative phases. Phase I comprises the first 55 years, during which the program's activities were managed by one or two regular academic departments of the University. In the Earth Sciences phase, the geology program was administered as a division, along with one or two other divisions in the same department. In its third phase, the geology program became a regular academic department within the College of Arts and Sciences, its current status as the Department of Geological Sciences. Two obvious legacies of NMSU's geology program are the Department of Geological Sciences and the geophysics program in the Department of Physics. However, the program's legacy is also reflected in the students who have taken its courses and the program's research output through the efforts of its faculty, graduate students, and undergraduate students. Since the mid-1960s, the geology program has produced a vast amount of research that has led to a sophisticated understanding of the geology of southern New Mexico and adjacent areas. Finally, through a better understanding of the geology program's academic evolution, the program's alumni and current students, faculty, and staff will have a more profound appreciation of their academic experience at New Mexico State University

Evolutionary Ecology simultaneously unifies conceptual and empirical advances in evolutionary ecology and provides a volume that can be used as either a primary textbook or a supplemental reading in an advanced undergraduate or graduate course. The focus of the book is on current concepts in evolutionary ecology, and the empirical study of these concepts. The editors have assembled a group of prominent biologists who have made significant contributions to this field. They both synthesize the current state of knowledge and identity areas for future investigation. Evolutionary Ecology will be of general interest to researchers and students in both ecology and evolutionary biology. Researchers in evolutionary ecology that want an overview of the current state of the field, and graduate students that want an introduction the field, will find this book very valuable. This volume can also be used as a primary textbook or supplemental reading in both upper division and graduate courses/seminars in Evolutionary Ecology.

Robert May's seminal book has played a central role in the development of ecological science. Originally published in 1976, this influential text has overseen the transition of ecology from an observational and descriptive subject to one with a solid conceptual core. Indeed, it is a testament to its influence that a great deal of the novel material presented in the earlier editions has now been incorporated into standard undergraduate textbooks. It is now a quarter of a century since the publication of the second edition, and a thorough revision is timely. Theoretical Ecology provides a succinct, up-to-date overview of the field set in the context of applications, thereby bridging the traditional division of theory and practice. It describes the recent advances in our understanding of how interacting populations of plants and animals change over time and space, in response to natural or human-created disturbance. In an integrated way, initial chapters give an account of the basic principles governing the structure, function, and temporal and spatial dynamics of populations and communities of plants and animals. Later chapters outline applications of these ideas to practical issues including fisheries, infectious diseases, tomorrow's food supplies, climate change, and conservation biology. Throughout the book, emphasis is placed on questions which as yet remain unanswered. The editors have invited the top scientists in the field to collaborate with the next generation of theoretical ecologists. The result is an accessible, advanced textbook suitable for senior undergraduate and graduate level students as well as researchers in the fields of ecology, mathematical biology, environmental and resources management. It will also be of interest to the general reader seeking a better understanding of a range of global environmental problems.

This chapter presents a practical approach to implementing change in music departments and conservatories by focusing on cultural rather than curricular change. Forward-thinking proposals abound, but meaningful curricular change is difficult and potentially divisive. A focus on understanding institutional culture and then using that understanding to foster changes that align with institutional values can yield tangible results quickly and chart a path toward meaningful curricular change. Drawing on his seven years of experience at the Lawrence Conservatory of Music, Dean Brian Pertl shares a snapshot of an ongoing process of cultural change, faculty engagement, and redefining the future of one particular conservatory.

AbstractThis chapter tackles the impact of the COVID-19 pandemic on French higher education (HE), focusing on the growing differentiation between higher education institutions (HEIs). The first part reflects on the current system and investigates how the central political level (Ministry of HE), alongside the president, framed policy during the crisis. France has a highly centralised yet dynamic decision-making process: no fewer than five consecutive adaptations to the teaching system took place during 2020–2021. In the second part, responses at the meso level are analysed, considering variables such as size and funding levels to ascertain the level of (pro)reactivity and room for manoeuvre of different HEIs, including public, private, and ‘elite’ sub-systems. The chapter applies the lens of public policy analysis centred on process tracing combined with classic organisational analysis. Data is drawn from both survey and qualitative datasets as well as a desktop analysis of official documents related to the frameworks in which HEI have had to operate. Finally, the chapter reflects on how contextual parameters (historical trajectories, systemic funding inequalities, the division between selective and less selective undergraduate programmes) have made some HEIs more vulnerable in the face of the crisis. It concludes by suggesting potentially lasting effects of the pandemic on the future HE landscape, critically reflecting on equity-related dimensions such as accessibility in the context of growing inequality.

The use of technology to enhance formative assessment in higher education continues to be a challenge regardless of advances in digital capabilities; yet research has shown its potential regardless of discipline. In undergraduate electrical and electronic engineering, which is the discipline focus in this chapter, lab work is an area that can be enhanced in this way but with such an enhancement comes a change in pedagogy from the conventional approach of in-lab physical practical work conducted by the individual student alone or in a group with limited support to one of working collaboratively in remote access laboratories scattered far and wide through an online learning systems that provides access to laboratory infrastructure and learning environments through the internet. In a collaborative learning environment, students work together to solve problems and need to become involved in dialogue to achieve a common goal where they depend on and are accountable to each other. This chapter explores students' experience of a collaborative approach to lab work regarding mastery of the voltage division rule and its relevance to formative assessment using remote access laboratories that depend on technology and internet access. The implications for task design and formative assessment are discussed based on the results of interviews with participating students. The nature of change in pedagogical practice is highlighted as are the implications for the design of formative assessment and the need to work at the level of “feedback markers” that are able to feed forward to progress learning.

Self-regulation is a core concept associated with the metacognitive, motivational, and emotional aspects of learning. The COVID-19 pandemic provides a large-scale setting to collect new empirical evidence to test this conceptual framework in an authentic online learning environment. By reference to 64,949 participants enrolled at 39 universities in China, the authors developed the Undergraduate Online Self-Regulated Learning Questionnaire and estimated the associations among self-regulation, motivation, emotion, and skill mastery with regard to online learning across different subgroups of a diverse student body. The results demonstrated that males, rural students, lower-division undergraduates, first-generation college students, SEAM majors, and students at elite universities reported significantly lower UOSL scores. After controlling for motivation and emotion, these gaps decreased substantially and become statistically nonsignificant. The findings highlight the critical role played by targeted interventions in the creation of a supportive online environment for disadvantaged subgroups.

Prominent in the public debate on college affordability is the rising cost of textbooks. Owing to limited finances or mounting college debt, many students fail to purchase required course textbooks. Among the perils students without textbooks face are delayed course enrollment, high failure or dropout rates, and extended time to graduation. At Fort Valley State University, an Historically Black University within the University System of Georgia, the mathematics faculty first observed increasing numbers of college algebra students without textbooks, then, similarly, with upper division students. As a cost-savings measure, the faculty redesigned eight courses using open educational resources (OER). This chapter highlights the four-year results of faculty and students' OER course experiences. OER students have better grades, lower failure rates, and better attendance records than those using traditional textbooks. The attitude of OER students towards mathematics also improved. A total cost savings of $197,780 was realized with an average, per student savings of $198.

Abstract Those of us who teach undergraduate classes on religion are engaged in an exceedingly complex enterprise, and the introduction of psychoanalytic frameworks into our courses does little to diminish the complexity. How, after all, are we to do justice to the depth and richness of religious phenomena-symbols, rituals, languages-while at the same time introducing students in a rigorous fashion to psychoanalysis and the ways in which we might draw on and develop this tradition to help explain or clarify religious beliefs and practices? The task is made no easier by the fact that students bring with them many misperceptions about religion and equally fuzzy notions (often quite negative ones) about psychoanalysis. But we needn’t despair. My own strategy at a liberal arts institution has been to approach the materials in a largely convecsational manner, one that allows upper-division undergraduates (even those who are at first quite resistant) an important role in a discovery of the richness of both the religious and the psychoanalytic materials. Though I begin the class with an introduction to Freud’s hermeneutics and his notion of the unconscious, the majority of the assignments are designed to have students approach the psychoanalytic study of religion through Freud’s cultural texts.

According to the US Federal Bureau of Investigations (FBI) the number of complaints about cyberattacks to their cyber division is up to as many as 4,000 a day. Every year in the U.S., 40,000 jobs for information security analysts go unfilled, and employers are struggling to fill 200,000 other cybersecurity-related roles. Colleges and universities have created certificate, undergraduate, and graduate programs to train professionals in these job roles. The challenge to meeting the cybersecurity workforce shortage through degree programs is intensified by the reality of the limited number of cybersecurity and engineering faculty at colleges and universities. This chapter explores the essential need to develop more doctorate faculty in technology-related areas and explains some unique and non-traditional paths to doctoral completion that allow professionals with significant real-world work experience to complete a doctorate without career interruption and relocation from highly respected and established universities in the US and the UK.

Today, the use of Computational Fluid Dynamics (CFD) software in academia occurs primarily in the context of student projects or research. The potential of CFD as a tool to enhance teaching is largely untapped, despite growing interest in computer tools to assist learning. FlowLab (http://flowlab.fluent.com) is a CFD-based educational software package that will allow students to solve fluid dynamics problems without the long learning curve required by today’s commercial CFD packages. We will provide an update of the FlowLab beta-testing program with over 30 universities worldwide. We outline a process for university collaboration and peer-review procedures in the development of FlowLab exercises for engineering classes in fluid dynamics and heat transfer.

A typical undergraduate fluid dynamics course includes sections on Bernoulli’s equation, flow visualization, and lift and drag for external flows. The purpose of this work has been to develop a fully interactive, two-dimensional potential flow solver using a panel method for flow over thin-sail geometries to aid in student understanding of these topics. The user may specify either rigid sail shapes, or flexible sails in which the final equilibrium shapes are determined by the pressure distribution. The solver was developed in Fortran 90/95. The user interface and graphics routines were developed using the high-level plotting library DISLIN. A variety of controls are available to adjust sail shapes and angles-of-attack. Available graphics include velocity vectors, pressure coefficient contours, and streamlines. Lift, axial and normal force coefficients are also output in the form of bar graphs. The code was recently introduced in an undergraduate fluid dynamics class taught by the author, and is available from the author’s website for download.

This paper presents a dynamic learning framework (DLF) based on dynamic course contents and assessment methods using latest web-based technologies with keeping in mind the recent advancement in touchpad computing devices (such as IPAD and Android based tablets). In the DLF framework, the effectiveness is assessed via evaluating the learning outcomes of increasing the learnability of high level concepts in the Bloom’s Taxonomy of cognitive learning. It proposes to address the challenges is creating a fluid mechanics module that incorporates all levels of the Bloom’s cognitive taxonomy. This is achieved via integration of mathematical, conceptual and visual contents. The lower level concepts (i.e., Remembering, Understanding, and Applying) are computerized and tested using Computer Adaptive Testing (CAT) algorithm. Our targeted audiences are from a predominantly Hispanic cultural setting and in undergraduate mechanical engineering courses. To capitalize on unique cultural setting and linguistic needs, the assessment is prepared in bi-lingual (Spanish and English) with localized problems. A pre-assessment of students’ learning styles was performed to assess their learning preference and the presentation was tuned to average audiences. It was observed that about 10% of the students used bi-lingual instructions in the exam which was conducted as an extra-credit option to paper based exam in order to assess the DLF framework. Students were also asked to contribute questions to generate a question database with localized problems.

As CFD technology matures, there is increasing need for undergraduate CFD education. CFD allows the undergraduate student to calculate flow features that are beyond the scope of concepts covered in introductory courses. In this paper it is shown how the teaching of CFD and fluid mechanics can be integrated in a senior level course to develop professional practitioners of CFD. The course uses techniques like CFD visualization and a case study approach to reinforce student understanding of physical features of complex fluid flows. Full advantage is taken of the physical basis of the finite volume method to connect the structure of discrete equation sets, solution accuracy and iterative convergence trends to the features of simulated flows. The success that students achieve in developing and integrating CFD and fluid mechanics knowledge is measured in a final project in which CFD is used to evaluate a proposed design change.

Undergraduate required fluid dynamics and elective aerodynamics courses include substantial material on analysis techniques for forces acting on bodies in external flows. These methods include momentum integral analysis, and, for aerodynamic applications, lift computed using circulation and the Kutta-Joukowski theorem. The author presented in a previous FED meeting code development and preliminary classroom results for the implementation of a fully interactive, two-dimensional potential flow solver for flow over both rigid and flexible thin-airfoil (or sail) geometries. The intent of the development was to design a code that could be used as a virtual wind tunnel. The solver was developed in Fortran 90/95 with user interface and graphics routines developed using the high-level plotting library DISLIN for use on Windows-based computers. The analysis code solves the potential flow equations for single or multiple airfoils using a vortex panel method in which the vortex strength varies linearly along the panel and is continuous from one panel to the next. A variety of controls are available to adjust airfoil shapes and angles-of-attack. The user may also specify either rigid thin airfoil shapes, or flexible airfoils in which the final equilibrium shapes are determined by the pressure distribution. Available graphics include velocity vectors, pressure coefficient contours, and streamlines. Lift, axial and normal force coefficients are also output in the form of bar graphs. Several improvements have been implemented in the code, based on early student feedback, to improve its suitability for educational purposes in fluid dynamics and aerodynamics classes. These include pressure plot distributions over the airfoils, the inclusion of standard NACA 4-digit airfoil definitions, the output of velocity and pressure data about a closed contour for use in circulation and momentum integral analysis calculations, and improvements regarding compatibility for use on computers of widely varying screen resolutions. In this work to be presented, recent improvements to the code, and subsequent educational/student learning results based on a series of Qualtrics online student survey questions are presented. These survey questions query the students understanding of a) momentum integral analysis, b) circulation, c) lift calculations using the Kutta-Joukowski theorem, d) airfoil-to-airfoil fluid flow interactions, e) the necessity for attention to details when performing engineering analysis. The code may be downloaded for use by educators and students at other universities.