Essays in the Economics of Education

<p>This dissertation is comprised of three essays in the economics of education. In the first essay, I examine how college students' major choice and major switching behavior responds to major-specific labor market shocks. The second essay explores the incidence and persistence of overeducation for workers in the United States. The final essay examines the role that students' cognitive and non-cognitive skills play in their transition from secondary to postsecondary education, and how the effect of these skills are moderated by race, gender, and socioeconomic status.</p>

Effect of reading sport chronicles on the perception of justice and the predisposition to protest actions in soccer

In this study three chronicles from national newspapers (one generalist and two sport press) were analyzed. The chronicles belong to Spain���s soccer final of the King���s Cup in 2014. The aim of the study was to know if there was any influence on the readers��� perception of justice and consequently if this influence could cause a particular predisposition to participate in acts of protest. 462 university students participated. The results showed that different chronicles caused differences in the perception of justice depending on the chronicle read. However, a clear influence on the willingness to participate in acts of protest was not obtained. These results should make us think about the impact of sport press and its influence, and to be aware of the indirect responsibility of every sector on the antisocial behaviors generated by soccer in our country.

Cooperative or collaborative learning: Is there a difference in university students��� perceptions?

The hypothesis that the same educational objective, raised as cooperative or collaborative learning in university teaching does not affect students��� perceptions of the learning model, leads this study. It analyses the reflections of two students groups of engineering that shared the same educational goals implemented through two different methodological active learning strategies: Simulation as cooperative learning strategy and Problem-based Learning as a collaborative one. The different number of participants per group (eighty-five and sixty-five, respectively) as well as the use of two active learning strategies, either collaborative or cooperative, did not show differences in the results from a qualitative perspective.

Higher Education - Border or Boundary? Can Theatre in Education Help Promote a University Education?

With the expansion and increased availability of Higher Education the progression to study for an undergraduate degree has been viewed as a simple stepping stone with examination success a straight - forward border pass. Changes in the funding of degree courses has established a series of more challenging boundaries to entry which demand a rigorous assessment of the benefits of Higher Education. The Widening Participation Unit at The University of Worcester has sought to ease this border crossing for pupils whose parents have not been to university. Their experience from previous projects was that school pupils more easily relate to undergraduate students whose experience of Higher Education is recent and relevant. With this in mind they commissioned the Drama and Performance Department to create a Theatre in Education programme that introduced an awareness of post sixteen options and future choices to challenge Higher Education stereotypes. As a result of this collaboration Why Bother? was created, directed by myself and devised and researched with four students who were studying drama. Their own experiences were used to inform the character development and dealt with worrying as a mature student about integration into full ��� time education, loss of income after working, the pressures of emotional commitments to partners and being away from home. The programme toured to two thousand year 9 ��� 11 pupils in Worcestershire and Herefordshire schools in January and May 2011. Devising and touring Why Bother provided students with an opportunity to work as a professional paid TIE team that it is not possible for them to do as part of their undergraduate degree course. My initial research looks at the effectiveness and limitations of this project based on pupil questionnaires and the experiences of the team which are explored within the broader context of TIE and its potential for affecting attitudinal change. This has given rise to a number of questions that need consideration in the development of a new TIE programme aimed at raising the awareness of sixth form students who are about to make the decision whether to apply to university or not. Collaboration with university students in exploring the value of an education that they have subscribed to raises issues of bias and whether their powers of persuasion actually prevent pupils from making their own individual decision. The ethics of promoting a ���free��� university education seem much less complex than the decision required now which involves balancing the real value against the high financial cost suggested in the working title of Is it Worth it? This paper will present my first attempts to develop research methods and methodologies that will enable me to evaluate the success of this and future TIE.

Tying it Together: Education-Focused Community Change Initiatives

Policymakers make many demands of our schools to produce academic success. At the same time, community organizations, government agencies, faith-based institutions, and other groups often are providing support to students and their families, especially those from high-poverty backgrounds, that are meant to impact education but are often insufficient, uncoordinated, or redundant. In many cases, these institutions lack access to schools and school leaders. What���s missing from the dominant education reform discourse is a coordinated education-focused approach that mobilizes community assets to effectively improve academic and developmental outcomes for students. This study explores how education-focused comprehensive community change initiatives (CCIs) that utilize a partnership approach are organized and sustained. In this study, I examine three research questions: 1. Why and how do school system-level community change initiative (CCI) partnerships form? 2. What are the organizational, financial, and political structures that support sustainable CCIs? What, in particular, are their connections to the school systems they seek to impact? 3. What are the leadership functions and structures found within CCIs? How are leadership functions distributed across schools and agencies within communities? To answer these questions, I used a cross-case study approach that employed a secondary data analysis of data that were collected as part of a larger research study sponsored by a national organization. The original study design included site visits and extended interviews with educators, community leaders and practitioners about community school initiatives, one type of CCI. This study demonstrates that characteristics of sustained education-focused CCIs include leaders that are critical to starting the CCIs and are willing to collaborate across institutions, a focus on community problems, building on previous efforts, strategies to improve service delivery, a focus on education and schools in particular, organizational arrangements that create shared leadership and ownership for the CCI, an intermediary to support the initial vision and collaborative leadership groups, diversified funding approaches, and political support. These findings add to the literature about the growing number of education-focused CCIs. The study���s primary recommendation���that institutions need to work across boundaries in order to sustain CCIs organizationally, financially, and politically���can help policymakers as they develop new collaborative approaches to achieving educational goals.

Multiraciality Enters the University: Mixed Race Identity and Knowledge Production in Higher Education

���Multiraciality Enters the University: Mixed Race Identity and Knowledge Production in Higher Education,��� explores how the category of ���mixed race��� has underpinned university politics in California, through student organizing, admissions debates, and the development of a new field of study. By treating the concept of privatization as central to both multiraciality and the neoliberal university, this project asks how and in what capacity has the discourses of multiracialism and the growing recognition of mixed race student populations shaped administrative, social, and academic debates at the state���s flagship universities���the University of California at Berkeley and Los Angeles. This project argues that the mixed race population symbolizing so-called ���post-racial societies��� is fundamentally attached to the concept of self-authorship, which can work to challenge the rights and resources for college students of color. Through a close reading of texts, including archival materials, policy and media debates, and interviews, I assert that the contemporary deployment of mixed race within the US academy represents a particularly post-civil rights development, undergirded by a genealogy of U.S. liberal individualism. This project ultimately reveals the pressing need to rethink ways to disrupt institutionalized racism in the new millennium.

Attachment patterns and suicidal behaviours on higher education students

Introduction: Every individual has a necessity to establish affective relationships throughout life in order to feel comfort and support. This need is called attachment and allows the human being to explore the world, acquiring knowledge about himself and everyone else(1) There are several changes that occur on students��� lives when enrolling and attending university, a period that is known to include a set of situational and academic transitions which might lead to mental health problems, and thus making students more vulnerable and more prone to develop suicidal behaviours. Objectives: To determine the prevalence of suicidal ideation on higher education students and to assess its relationship with attachment patterns. Methods: Quantitative, descriptive and correlational study, applied on a sample of 1074 students from a Portuguese higher education institution. Data collection was possible through an online platform that included a survey with questions regarding sociodemographical and academic profiling, the Portuguese version of the Adult Attachment Scale (EVA)(2) and the Suicidal Ideation Questionnaire(3) Results: Students��� age varies between the 17 and 49 ( = 23,9 years old �� 6,107 Sd), the vast majority (64.7%) are females. Results show that the presence/severity of suicidal thoughts is low ( = 13.84; �� 20.29 Sd) on a scale from 0 to 180 and cut-off point > 41 for values that suggest potential suicidal risk, and based on that, 84 students were identified (7,8%). We verified significant relationships between suicidal ideation and anxiety and attachment (r=0.314 p=0.000). Conclusions: Although there is not a high prevalence of suicidal ideation on students, we found 84 students in our sample (7,8%) that reveal a potential risk for suicide. The results also show that young students with safe attachment patterns display less suicidal ideation. Safe attachment patterns are essential on interpersonal and social relationships and play an important role during the academic period. We cannot be indifferent towards this issue due to its individual, familiar and social repercussions. Every higher education institution should then establish student support offices and develop mental health promotion programs as well as suicide prevention campaigns.

Motivos de participaci��n y satisfacci��n en la actividad f��sica, el ejercicio f��sico y el deporte

La motivaci��n en la actividad f��sica es una caracter��stica psicol��gica multidimensional, que se ve influenciada tanto por los aspectos internos de la persona (preferencias, deseos, temores, entre otras), como por las vivencias externas de su entorno (aceptaci��n social, amistades, habilidades, entre otras). En una ��poca en la que en el nivel mundial, la actividad f��sica de personas de todas las edades, est�� en aumento constante, es fundamental para profesionales como educadores f��sicos, entrenadores deportivos o instructores de ejercicio, tener presentes los principales motivos de participaci��n de los sujetos que tienen a su cargo, con el fin de velar por elaborar planes de trabajo ideales para que se mantengan realiz��ndolo, orient��ndolos a disfrutar y estar satisfechos con su intervenci��n y as�� alargar su ciclo de vida activa, evitando el abandono, aspecto tan relacionado con el sedentarismo y el riesgo de padecer enfermedades cr��nicas y degenerativas. As��, los ni��os prefieren la diversi��n y hacer amigos; los adolescentes la competici��n y las amistades; los universitarios la aventura y la diversi��n; los adultos obtener actividad f��sica regular y los adultos mayores los beneficios relacionados con la salud. Las mujeres se motivan por la apariencia y aspectos sociales, mientras los hombres por la competici��n y el estatus. Los sujetos que hacen deporte se motivan por la competici��n y los que hacen ejercicio por la imagen corporal. A mayor nivel de actividad, se valora m��s la competici��n. Finalmente, la diversi��n, la competici��n, el aprender habilidades y la condici��n f��sica son los motivos m��s importantes para participantes de actividad f��sica norteamericanos, europeos y asi��ticos. El presente trabajo se realiz�� con el prop��sito de dar a conocer a los profesionales de las ciencias del movimiento humano, las diferentes variables que determinan los motivos de participaci��n en los distintos tipos de actividad f��sica en sujetos con diferente edad, g��nero, cultura y nivel de actividad.

The Amplifier - v. 15, no. 9

In this issue...Theta Tau, Continental Oil Company, International Club, Independent Party, Coed Housing, Pollution Control, KXLF TV, Athletic Department, Physical Education

A Retrospective-Longitudinal Examination of the Relationship between Apportionment of Seat Time in Community-College Algebra Courses and Student Academic Performance

During the past decade, there has been a dramatic increase by postsecondary institutions in providing academic programs and course offerings in a multitude of formats and venues (Biemiller, 2009; Kucsera & Zimmaro, 2010; Lang, 2009; Mangan, 2008). Strategies pertaining to reapportionment of course-delivery seat time have been a major facet of these institutional initiatives; most notably, within many open-door 2-year colleges. Often, these enrollment-management decisions are driven by the desire to increase market-share, optimize the usage of finite facility capacity, and contain costs, especially during these economically turbulent times. So, while enrollments have surged to the point where nearly one in three 18-to-24 year-old U.S. undergraduates are community college students (Pew Research Center, 2009), graduation rates, on average, still remain distressingly low (Complete College America, 2011). Among the learning-theory constructs related to seat-time reapportionment efforts is the cognitive phenomenon commonly referred to as the spacing effect, the degree to which learning is enhanced by a series of shorter, separated sessions as opposed to fewer, more massed episodes. This ex post facto study explored whether seat time in a postsecondary developmental-level algebra course is significantly related to: course success; course-enrollment persistence; and, longitudinally, the time to successfully complete a general-education-level mathematics course. Hierarchical logistic regression and discrete-time survival analysis were used to perform a multi-level, multivariable analysis of a student cohort (N = 3,284) enrolled at a large, multi-campus, urban community college. The subjects were retrospectively tracked over a 2-year longitudinal period. The study found that students in long seat-time classes tended to withdraw earlier and more often than did their peers in short seat-time classes (p < .05). Additionally, a model comprised of nine statistically significant covariates (all with p-values less than .01) was constructed. However, no longitudinal seat-time group differences were detected nor was there sufficient statistical evidence to conclude that seat time was predictive of developmental-level course success. A principal aim of this study was to demonstrate���to educational leaders, researchers, and institutional-research/business-intelligence professionals���the advantages and computational practicability of survival analysis, an underused but more powerful way to investigate changes in students over time.

Sex-Positive Curricula: An Investigation of the Relationship Between Physical Fitness, Self-Concept and Sexual Functioning

Despite the well-recognized benefits of exercise, Americans are gaining weight in astounding proportions and levels of physical activity are on the decline. The purpose of this study was to investigate a relationship between physical fitness, self-concept and sexual health. There is a dearth of knowledge on this relationship specifically in the context of sex-negative curricula, which is the dominate discourse in the United States. One hundred and thirty-three participants between the ages of 18 - 50 volunteered for fitness testing and data collection. Physical fitness was assessed through body fat, resting metabolic rate, cardiovascular endurance, muscular strength, muscular endurance and flexibility. Self-reported exercise was measured using the International Physical Activity Questionnaire. Self-concept was measured by the Six Factor Self-Concept Scale, which presented a total self-concept score and as six individual concepts of self (likability, morality, task accomplishment, giftedness, power and vulnerability). Additionally, sexual function was measured by Derogatis Interview for Sexual Functioning and presented as both an aggregate score and five separate constructs of sexual functioning (fantasy/cognition, arousal, orgasm, behavior/experience, and drive/desire). Questions pertaining to sexual partners, sex education, and demographic information were also included. The results of the General Linear Model indicated significant relationships between physical fitness, self-concept and total sexual functioning. The sexual behavior/experience of men was predicted by body fat percentage and flexibility. In women, behavior/experience was predicted by body fat percentage and arousal was predicted by cardiovascular endurance. Total self-concept was related to muscular endurance. When men were isolated in the analysis, likability was positively related to sexual behavior/experience, and task accomplishment was inversely related to sexual behavior/experience. In women, giftedness was related to cognition/fantasy, arousal, orgasm and total sexual functioning. No relationships were found between physical fitness and the number of sexual partners in men; however, both muscular strength and the power self-concept were significantly related to number of sexual partners in women. As a result of these findings, women may be inclined to exercise to improve arousal and sexual functioning. Furthermore, educators should note the findings of a positive relationship between physical and psychological health and sexual well-being because they provide support for the development and adoption of sex-positive curricula that incorporate potential benefits of sexual activity.

What would physical educators know about movement education? A review of literature, 2006-2016

This review paper identifies the conceptual underpinnings of current movement research in Physical Education. Using a hermeneutic approach, four analogies for movement education are identified: the motor program analogy, the neurobiological systems analogy, the instinctive movement analogy, and the embodied exploration analogy. Three issues related to logical consistency and its relevance for movement education are raised. The first relates to tensions between the analogies and educational policy. The second concerns differences among the four analogies. The third issue relates to the appropriateness of specific analogies for dealing with certain movement contexts. In each case, strategies for improvement are considered. The paper is concluded with a brief summary along with reflections on issues that require further attention.

Essays on employment / education, investment in education and student achievement

M��thodologie: Mod��le de r��gression quantile de variable instrumentale pour donn��es de Panel utilisant la fonction de production partielle

El ejercicio y el desempe��o musical: doce semanas de actividad f��sica mejoran la capacidad de ejecuci��n de un instrumento musical en estudiantes de conservatorio

Con el fin de evaluar los cambios que produce un programa de actividad f��sica en la percepci��n que tienen los m��sicos sobre su capacidad de ejecuci��n de un instrumento musical, se realiz�� una intervenci��n con un programa de actividad f��sica basado en la t��cnica Pilates, durante 12 semanas, en el Conservatorio de M��sica de la Universidad Nacional de Colombia, con estudiantes del programa de m��sica instrumental. Se midieron par��metros de la aptitud f��sica (capacidad cardiorrespiratoria, fuerza, flexibilidad y composici��n corporal) y de la percepci��n de la capacidad de ejecuci��n (fatiga muscular, nivel de esfuerzo, dolor y fluidez) antes y despu��s de la intervenci��n. Los resultados arrojaron cambios positivos en la aptitud f��sica logrando un aumento significativo en la flexibilidad y resistencia de los miembros inferiores en 14 participantes (70% de la muestra), y en la percepci��n de la capacidad de ejecuci��n instrumental con el retraso en la aparici��n de la fatiga muscular mientras se est�� ejecutando el instrumento (30 minutos en promedio). Esto permite a los m��sicos abordar un repertorio extenso con menor fatiga, minimizando el riesgo de lesi��n o alteraciones musculo-esquel��ticas que influyan directamente en su desempe��o t��cnico y art��stico.

Actividad f��sica, imagen corporal y condiciones de vida. Un abordaje te��rico desde los determinantes y la determinaci��n social de la salud

El objetivo de este trabajo fue analizar la construcci��n social del conocimiento en Actividad f��sica desde dos planteamientos te��ricos de la salud centrando el an��lisis en la relaci��n con la imagen corporal y las condiciones de vida. Se trata de un estudio te��rico desde el an��lisis de contenido de corte narrativo de 98 art��culos desarrollado en cinco etapas a trav��s de: rastreo de documentos en bases de datos en el periodo 2000-2014, revisi��n de art��culos, y an��lisis y hallazgos de significados, sentidos o contenidos. Como hallazgo importante se puede mencionar que en la literatura cient��fica relacionada con la triada Actividad f��sica-imagen corporal-condiciones de vida predomina la construcci��n del conocimiento a partir de modelos hegem��nicos y dominantes que priorizan la intensidad, la frecuencia y el tiempo dedicado a la AF, la estandarizaci��n en la comparaci��n de la apariencia f��sica y la medici��n de elementos materiales en el modo de vivir de las personas, principalmente desde el abordaje de los determinantes sociales de la salud. Se concluye que es necesario revisar las poblaciones que incluyendo en los estudios al estar concentrados el conocimiento en solo unos grupos; as�� como se hace expl��cita la necesidad de revisar cuales son los aportes de la Educaci��n F��sica y otras disciplinas (ciencias sociales) para una mayor comprensi��n te��rica y pr��ctica de la AF.