Quality of student involvement and college contribution toward development of traditional and nontraditional undergraduate students

Nontraditional students differ from traditional students on characteristics such as age, employment status, marital status, and parental status. The quality of a student's experience is important as it relates to his or her transformation and is a reflection of the quality of the college. ^ Using theory of involvement as a framework, the purpose of this study was to test if there were differences between traditional and nontraditional undergraduate students in their ratings of quality of college involvement (academic, co-curricular, student interactions, and faculty interactions) and perceptions of college contribution toward development (intellectual, personal, social, and career). A two part survey was distributed to a random cluster sample of sophomore and higher level undergraduate classes equaling 400 undergraduate students. ^ Results of a 2 x 4 repeated measures ANOVA indicated that traditional students rated quality for co-curricular involvement and student involvement significantly higher than nontraditional students. Both traditional and nontraditional students had similar ratings of college contribution toward development. There were different patterns of correlations between involvement and development. Traditional students' ratings of academic and student involvement were more highly correlated with development than were the ratings of nontraditional students. However, nontraditional students' ratings of academic and faculty involvement were more highly correlated with development. When testing for differences in correlations between quality of involvement and college contribution toward development, the largest observed differences were quality of student involvement and college contribution toward personal and social development. Although not significantly different, traditional students had stronger correlations between those factors than did the nontraditional students. ^ This research demonstrates the importance of using social role when defining student type. It contributes to involvement theory by explaining how traditional and nontraditional students differ in their ratings of quality of involvement. Further, it identifies different patterns of correlations between ratings of quality of involvement and college contribution toward development for the two types of students. While traditional students may need a more rounded college experience that includes more social and co-curricular experiences, nontraditional students use the classroom as their stage for learning. ^

Leadership in the Hospitality Curriculum

Although some universities have introduced leadership courses in their curricula, schools of hotel and restaurant management are not following suit. As the industry's rate of growth and complexity outpaces that of its human resources, the formation of hospitality leaders becomes indispensable.

The effects of required/sequenced preparatory courses on academic success and retention at a community college

This dissertation had two purposes: first, to analyze how required sequenced college preparatory courses in mathematics, reading, and writing affect students' academic success and, second, to add to a theoretical model for predicting student retention at a community college. Grade point average, number of degree credits earned, and reenrollment rate were measured as determinants of academic success. The treatment group had a significantly higher grade point average than the control group. There was no significant difference in the number of degree credits earned or re-enrollment rate for the groups. A series of logistic regressions used the independent variables E-ASSET scores in math, reading, and writing; number of college prep areas required; credits earned; grade point average; students' status; academic restrictions/required course sequencing; sex; race; and socio-economic status to determine the predictor variables for retention. The academic variable that showed the greatest potential as a predictor for retention was grade point average. Overall, receiving financial aid was the greatest predictor for reenrollment. For a financial aid recipient the odds of reenrollment were 2.70 times more likely than if no financial aid was received.

Quality of student involvement and college contribution toward development of traditional and nontraditional undergraduate students

Nontraditional students differ from traditional students on characteristics such as age, employment status, marital status, and parental status. The quality of a student's experience is important as it relates to his or her transformation and is a reflection of the quality of the college. Using theory of involvement as a framework, the purpose of this study was to test if there were differences between traditional and nontraditional undergraduate students in their ratings of quality of college involvement (academic, co-curricular, student interactions, and faculty interactions) and perceptions of college contribution toward development (intellectual, personal, social, and career). A two part survey was distributed to a random cluster sample of sophomore and higher level undergraduate classes equaling 400 undergraduate students. Results of a 2 X 4 repeated measures ANOVA indicated that traditional students rated quality for co-curricular involvement and student involvement significantly higher than nontraditional students. Both traditional and nontraditional students had similar ratings of college contribution toward development. There were different patterns of correlations between involvement and development. Traditional students' ratings of academic and student involvement were more highly correlated with development than were the ratings of nontraditional students. However, nontraditional students' ratings of academic and faculty involvement were more highly correlated with development. When testing for differences in correlations between quality of involvement and college contribution toward development, the largest observed differences were quality of student involvement and college contribution toward personal and social development. Although not significantly different, traditional students had stronger correlations between those factors than did the nontraditional students. This research demonstrates the importance of using social role when defining student type. It contributes to involvement theory by explaining how traditional and nontraditional students differ in their ratings of quality of involvement. Further, it identifies different patterns of correlations between ratings of quality of involvement and college contribution toward development for the two types of students. While traditional students may need a more rounded college experience that includes more social and co-curricular experiences, nontraditional students use the classroom as their stage for learning.

O erro produzido pelo aluno no contexto pedagógico: uma luz ou uma pedra no meio do caminho?

Student’s mistakes as viewed in a didactic and pedagogical perspective are a phenomenon inevitably observed in any context in which formal teaching-andlearning processes are taking place. Researchers have shown that such mistakes are viewed most of the times as undesirable and often as a consequence of lack of attention or poor commitment on the part of the student and rarely considered didactically useful. The object of our reflections in this work is exactly those mistakes, which are born in the entrails of the teaching-and-learning processes. It is our understanding that a mistake constitutes a tool which mediates knowledge and may therefore become a strong ally of the instructor’s actions in her/his teaching tasks and thus should be taken into the teacher’s best consideration. Understanding a mistake as so, we postulate that the teacher must face it as a possibility to be exploited rather than as a negative occurrence. Such an attitude on the part of the teacher would undoubtedly render profitable didactic situations. To deepen the understanding of our aim, we took a case study on the perception of senior college students in the program of Mathematics at UFRN in the year 2009, 2nd term. The reason of this choice is the fact that Mathematics is the field presenting traditionally the poorest records in terms of school grades. In this work we put forth data associated to ENEM1 , to the UFRN Vestibular2 and the undergraduate courses on Mathematics. The theoretical matrixes supporting our reflections in this thesis follow the ideas proposed by Castorina (1988); Davis e Espósito (1990); Aquino (1997); Luckesi (2006); Cury (1994; 2008); Pinto (2000); Torre (2007). To carry out the study, we applied a semi-structured questionnaire containing 14 questions, out of which 10 were open questions. The questions were methodologically based on the Thematic Analysis – One of the techniques for Content Analysis schemed by Bardin (1977) – and it was also used the computer program Modalisa 6.0 (A software designed by faculties the University of Paris VIII). The results indicate that most of the teachers training instructors in their pedagogical practice view the mistakes made by their students only as a guide for grading and, in this procedure, the student is frequently labeled as guilty. Conclusive analyses, therefore, signal to the necessity of orienting the teachers training instructors in the sense of building a new theoretical contemplation of the students’ mistakes and their pedagogical potentialities and so making those professionals perceive the importance of such mistakes, since they reveal gaps in the process of learning and provide valuable avenues for the teaching procedures.

For the win (FTW)! Contribuições de um serious game para o ensino-aprendizagem de argumentação

This is a qualitative and reflexive research with focus on digital literacy. Among the digital media that could support the teaching of argumentation in the Science & Technology and Information Technology undergraduate courses of the Federal University of Rio Grande do Norte, we chose a serious game as object of research. Given the object of study in the discipline of reading and writing II – argumentation and genre from the order of argumentative writing -, common to the undergraduate courses mentioned, we invest on the development of a serious game, named ArgumentACTION, because we believe that it may, in fact, become a promising didactic instrument. Therefore we intend to understand whether and how this game can help students develop their reading and writing skills more independently, specifically towards an argumentative order genre: the opinion piece. With this research, we intend to contribute to the teaching of the Portuguese language on three bases: extending theoretical scope, in order to generate greater intelligibility on the teaching-learning process of argumenting; proposing a new methodological possibility, with the incorporation of a serious games to teaching; perfecting the game with which we are working, in order to build – and make available – a more refined digital tool to subsidize the teaching and learning of reading and writing of opinion pieces. To do so, we use the following as theoretical-methodological: Studies of Literacy (KLEIMAN, 2012b; TINOCO, 2008; OLIVEIRA, 2010; GEE, 2009; 2010; ROJO, 2012), The Applied Linguistics (KLEIMAN, 1998; BUSH-LEE, 2009), The Philosophy of Language (BAKHTIN, VOLOSHINOV, 2012) and Critical Pedagogy (DEWEY, 2010). A group of students from the upper mentioned undergraduate courses collaborated with this research by playing and analyzing the game. They were also interviewed about their experience in this matter. From the data generated, we established the categories of analysis: decollection, interest, multimodality/multisemiosis and interactivity, agent of literacy, learning principles. The conclusions we obtained show that the investment in applications, especially games, can bring real benefits to the teaching/learning of the Portuguese language; moreover they reveal that the work on argumenting has much to gain with the incorporation of serious games; however the possible advantages depend on a focused teaching practice and constant improvements and updates of this type of interactive tool, as well as the pedagogical practice from those who use and develop the games.

A construção da identidade profissional de licenciados em Música da UFRN: um estudo de narrativas autobiográficas

Aims to understand the construction of the professional identity of undergraduate in Music UFRN, through the study of autobiographical sources of these subjects, checking their formative dimensions and their (re) meanings established throughout life stories. To do so, shows a brief presentation of the study and the main motivations of the author to do it; expresses the life story of the researcher and their training courses in music career; analyzes the historical overview of the route Search (Auto) biography as research and training approach (JOSSO, 2010; NÓVOA; FINGER, 2010; SOUZA, 2007; PASSEGGI; SILVA (2010b) and DELORY-MOMBERGER, 2012); It presents some reflections and discussions about the construction of identity, beyond the concepts and perceptions of the training and professional representations of this building (DUBAR, 2005); discusses the historical background regarding teacher training in Brazil and Music Education; describes the ways and methodological resources used for data collection and implementation of this research, namely, a reflective open questionnaire and autobiographical essays; It presents the life stories of the undergraduate students of the Music course and its educational and musical dimensions; Lastly, it presents a reflection about the paths taken. The results indicated that the autobiographical essays make it possible to understand the ways and social relations in the various identified training dimensions, in addition to realize that the family contexts and the first musical social contacts in informal settings, enable the licensees, an identification with the possible career lecturer in Music, as well as the main reasons for this choice. We conclude, therefore, that the experiences and musical experiences throughout life favor the construction of professional identity and that in the course of training, such experiences make ways to (re) define the musical experiences, as well as the (re) thinking their professional career.

A construção da identidade profissional de licenciados em Música da UFRN: um estudo de narrativas autobiográficas

Aims to understand the construction of the professional identity of undergraduate in Music UFRN, through the study of autobiographical sources of these subjects, checking their formative dimensions and their (re) meanings established throughout life stories. To do so, shows a brief presentation of the study and the main motivations of the author to do it; expresses the life story of the researcher and their training courses in music career; analyzes the historical overview of the route Search (Auto) biography as research and training approach (JOSSO, 2010; NÓVOA; FINGER, 2010; SOUZA, 2007; PASSEGGI; SILVA (2010b) and DELORY-MOMBERGER, 2012); It presents some reflections and discussions about the construction of identity, beyond the concepts and perceptions of the training and professional representations of this building (DUBAR, 2005); discusses the historical background regarding teacher training in Brazil and Music Education; describes the ways and methodological resources used for data collection and implementation of this research, namely, a reflective open questionnaire and autobiographical essays; It presents the life stories of the undergraduate students of the Music course and its educational and musical dimensions; Lastly, it presents a reflection about the paths taken. The results indicated that the autobiographical essays make it possible to understand the ways and social relations in the various identified training dimensions, in addition to realize that the family contexts and the first musical social contacts in informal settings, enable the licensees, an identification with the possible career lecturer in Music, as well as the main reasons for this choice. We conclude, therefore, that the experiences and musical experiences throughout life favor the construction of professional identity and that in the course of training, such experiences make ways to (re) define the musical experiences, as well as the (re) thinking their professional career.

A questão ambiental nos cursos de graduação em Educação Física no estado do Rio Grande do Norte

Environmental education started to be discussed since the intensification of the human activity, as a consequence of the industrial revolution. In Brazil, the proposal has gained attention due to the National Environmental Policy, which suggested inserting environmental education in all education levels and later as a crosscutting topic pervading the contents offered in all courses, according to the National Curricula Parameters. Faced with such a challenge, this work aimed to identify how environmental concerns is being considered in physical education licentiate courses at Rio Grande do Norte. For this purpose, we have adopted a descriptive method starting from interviews with coordinators of six institutions offering a physical education licentiate degree (UFRN, UNI-RN, UNIFACEX, FANEC, and UERN – Mossoró and Pau dos Ferros Campi), the application of a questionnaire with 30% of graduating students in the second half of 2015, and observations from the pedagogical projects and syllabi of the institutions that have provided such documents. Results have pointed out the acknowledgement of students and coordinators on the importance of addressing environmental concerns in physical education. However, coordinators and students contradict each other in all investigated institutions. According to the coordinators, environmental education effectively is in some courses of the curriculum as a mandatory requirement from the Brazilian National Ministry of Education. Nonetheless, in practice, most graduating students have no knowledge about environmental education in their courses, stating that they do not have training suited to meet these concerns. When requested to exemplify how they would deal with environmental education, a fragile education to address this topic in their future workspaces was revealed, showing uncritical activities. Despite the obligatoriness in the educational context already exists for decades and the importance of this topic revealed in the speeches of professionals, environmental education is still shy in physical education curricula and education courses, thereby showing the need of a curricular restructuration and a new understanding on this topic, as well as making it to be more present in the daily activities of the future teachers who should take it into consideration in their classes.

A questão ambiental nos cursos de graduação em Educação Física no estado do Rio Grande do Norte

Environmental education started to be discussed since the intensification of the human activity, as a consequence of the industrial revolution. In Brazil, the proposal has gained attention due to the National Environmental Policy, which suggested inserting environmental education in all education levels and later as a crosscutting topic pervading the contents offered in all courses, according to the National Curricula Parameters. Faced with such a challenge, this work aimed to identify how environmental concerns is being considered in physical education licentiate courses at Rio Grande do Norte. For this purpose, we have adopted a descriptive method starting from interviews with coordinators of six institutions offering a physical education licentiate degree (UFRN, UNI-RN, UNIFACEX, FANEC, and UERN – Mossoró and Pau dos Ferros Campi), the application of a questionnaire with 30% of graduating students in the second half of 2015, and observations from the pedagogical projects and syllabi of the institutions that have provided such documents. Results have pointed out the acknowledgement of students and coordinators on the importance of addressing environmental concerns in physical education. However, coordinators and students contradict each other in all investigated institutions. According to the coordinators, environmental education effectively is in some courses of the curriculum as a mandatory requirement from the Brazilian National Ministry of Education. Nonetheless, in practice, most graduating students have no knowledge about environmental education in their courses, stating that they do not have training suited to meet these concerns. When requested to exemplify how they would deal with environmental education, a fragile education to address this topic in their future workspaces was revealed, showing uncritical activities. Despite the obligatoriness in the educational context already exists for decades and the importance of this topic revealed in the speeches of professionals, environmental education is still shy in physical education curricula and education courses, thereby showing the need of a curricular restructuration and a new understanding on this topic, as well as making it to be more present in the daily activities of the future teachers who should take it into consideration in their classes.

A IMPORTÂNCIA DAS TICS E DA EDUCAÇÃO COMO PROCESSO COMUNICACIONAL DIALÓGICO NO ENSINO SUPERIOR: Um Estudo da Universidade Estadual de Mato Grosso do Sul

Esta tese teve por objetivo saber como o corpo docente da Universidade Estadual de Mato Grosso do Sul (UEMS) percebe, entende e reage ante a incorporação e utilização das Tecnologias de Informação e Comunicação (TICs) nos cursos de graduação dessa Instituição, considerando os novos processos comunicacionais dialógicos que elas podem proporcionar na sociedade atual. Metodologicamente, a tese é composta por pesquisa bibliográfica, buscando fundamentar as áreas da Educação e Comunicação, assim como a Educomunicação; pesquisa documental para contextualização do lócus da pesquisa e de uma pesquisa exploratória a partir da aplicação de um questionário online a 165 docentes da UEMS, que responderam voluntariamente. Verificou-se que os professores utilizam as TICs cotidianamente nas atividades pessoais e, em menor escala, nos ambientes profissionais. Os desafios estão em se formar melhor esse docente e oferecer capacitação continuada para que utilizem de forma mais eficaz as TICs nas salas de aula. Destaca-se ainda que os avanços em tecnologia e os novos ecossistemas comunicacionais construíram novas e outras realidades, tornando a aprendizagem um fator não linear, exigindo-se revisão nos projetos pedagógicos na educação superior para que estes viabilizem diálogos propositivos entre a comunicação e a educação. A infraestrutura institucional para as TICs é outro entrave apontado, tanto na aquisição como na manutenção desses aparatos tecnológicos pela Universidade. Ao final, propõe-se realizar estudos e pesquisas que possam discutir alterações nos regimes contratuais de trabalho dos docentes, uma vez que, para atuar com as TICs de maneira apropriada, exige-se mais tempo e dedicação do docente.

Does attendance affect grade? An analysis of first year economics students in Ireland

This paper examines the relationship between attendance and grade, controlling for other factors, in first year economics courses in University College Cork. Determinants of both class attendance and grade are specified and estimated. We find that attendance is low, at least by comparison with US evidence. Hours worked and travel time are among the factors affecting class attendance. Class attendance, and especially tutorial attendance has a positive and diminishing marginal effect on grade, while hours worked in a part-time job have a significant negative effect on grade.

Undergraduate course catalog (Florida International University). [2014-2015]

This catalog contains a description of the various policies, undergraduate programs, degree requirements, and course offerings at Florida International University during the 2014-2015 academic year.

Storytelling and story testing in domestication

The domestication of plants and animals marks one of the most significant transitions in human, and indeed global, history. Traditionally, study of the domestication process was the exclusive domain of archaeologists and agricultural scientists; today it is an increasingly multidisciplinary enterprise that has come to involve the skills of evolutionary biologists and geneticists. Although the application of new information sources and methodologies has dramatically transformed our ability to study and understand domestication, it has also generated increasingly large and complex datasets, the interpretation of which is not straightforward. In particular, challenges of equifinality, evolutionary variance, and emergence of unexpected or counter-intuitive patterns all face researchers attempting to infer past processes directly from patterns in data. We argue that explicit modeling approaches, drawing upon emerging methodologies in statistics and population genetics, provide a powerful means of addressing these limitations. Modeling also offers an approach to analyzing datasets that avoids conclusions steered by implicit biases, and makes possible the formal integration of different data types. Here we outline some of the modeling approaches most relevant to current problems in domestication research, and demonstrate the ways in which simulation modeling is beginning to reshape our understanding of the domestication process.

Digging up the frequency of phrasal verbs in English for the Police: the case of "up"

The present study focuses on the frequency of phrasal verbs with the particle up in the context of crime and police investigative work. This research emerges from the need to enlarge McCarthy and O’Dell’s (2004) scope from purely criminal behavior to police investigative actions. To do so, we relied on a corpus of 504,124 running words made up of spoken dialogues extracted from the script of the American TV series Castle shown on ABC since 2009. Based on Rudzka-Ostyn’s (2003) cognitive motivations for the particle up, we have identified five different meaning extensions for our phrasal verbs. Drawing from these findings, we have designed pedagogical activities for those L2 learners that study English at the Police Academy.