IRSS Psychology Theory: Telling Experiences Among Underrepresented IS Doctorates

With the changing demographics of the American workforce, the National Science Foundation, along with the U.S. Department of Commerce, has highlighted the shortage of minorities in information technology (IT) careers ( http://www.ta.doc.gov/Reports/itsw/itsw.pdf ). Using data from a 6‐year period and the psychology Involvement‐Regimen‐Self Management‐Social (IRSS) network theory as defined by Boice (1992) , we discuss lessons learned from mentoring a group of Information Systems doctoral students who are members of a pipeline that can potentially increase the number of underrepresented faculty in business schools and who made conscious decisions to renounce the IT corporate domain. While our lessons speak to the need for more diversity awareness, we conclude that effective mentoring for underrepresented groups can and should include faculty of color (though limited in numbers) as well as majority faculty who are receptive to the needs and cultural differences of these student groups. Lastly, we draw on the work of Ethnic America to provide additional insight into our findings that are not offered by IRSS network theory.     

Headsprout® Early Reading for children with severe intellectual disabilities: a single blind randomised controlled trial

Research evaluating phonics reading programs for children with severe intellectual disabilities (ID) is limited. The current study investigated whether using an online reading program (Headsprout^® Early Reading; HER) as supplementary reading instruction for children with a severe ID leads to improvements in reading skills as compared to children not receiving this additional instruction. Fifty-five children from a special school were randomly allocated into the HER group or a waiting list control group. For six months, children in the intervention group received HER as supplementary instruction, whereas children in the control group received only ‘reading as usual’ teaching. Pre- and post-intervention tests on standardised reading measures were conducted. Analysis of data from outcome measures indicated that the HER group made improvements at post-intervention in comparison with the control group, with medium effect sizes on two domains from the main outcome measure. These results support the case for a larger research trial of HER for children with severe ID.     

The development of relational thinking: a study of Measure Up first-grade students’ thinking and their symbolic understandings

Educational Studies in Mathematics - This study is focused on the relational thinking of first-grade students following their first 3 months of instruction from the Measure Up (MU)...     

An individualised curriculum to teach numeracy skills to children with autism: programme description and pilot data

Teaching mathematics to children with autism is an area with limited research evidence. In this study we developed a teaching manual based on Maths Recovery, a numeracy programme designed for typically developing children. Six children with autism participated in the study and received daily numeracy teaching over a 20‐week period. Our aims were to explore whether Maths Recovery can be used as a numeracy curriculum for children with autism and to evaluate the progress the children make after a period of intensive teaching. Using a pre‐test post‐test design we found that the adapted Maths Recovery numeracy curriculum was successfully incorporated within each child's individualised teaching programme, and that all six children improved their mathematical ability over the course of the intervention. Our data show promising results and support the rationale for larger evaluation studies.     

Applying IRSS Theory: The Clark Atlanta University Exemplar

The percentage of underrepresented minorities (African‐American, Hispanic, Native Americans) that have obtained graduate level degrees within computing disciplines (computer science, computer information systems, computer engineering, and information technology) is dismal at best. Despite the fact that academia, the computing workforce, professional associations, and scientific societies have identified procedures, models, and best practices in an attempt to increase the number of individuals within these underrepresented communities, the number of minorities receiving MS and PhDs in these fields have only increased marginally. In this article, we discuss how Boice's four‐part IRSS model (i.e., Involvement, Regimen, Self‐Management, and Social Networks) combined with effective mentoring models as introduced in Payton et al., is a promising framework for addressing the longstanding issue of underrepresented minorities in management education, which tends to mirror findings in science, technology, engineering, and mathematics disciplines. The focus of this article is to illustrate the application of these theories at the undergraduate level by discussing two precollege/early college/scholarship programs implemented at Clark Atlanta University (CAU). These CAU programs provide the field with an exemplar which can serve as a foundational example for institutions seeking to foster, retain and graduate underrepresented minorities in higher education management disciplines, in general, and offer lessons learned from historically black colleges and universities, in particular. Using a “360‐degree mentoring” model to supplement the IRSS framework, our study concludes with implications for future research regarding how academic institutions can create, foster and sustain programs for effective recruitment, retention, and training of underrepresented minorities.     

Power to Do…What? Department Heads’ Decision Autonomy and Strategic Priorities

Using questionnaire data from the 2010 Survey of Academic Chairs, the study focuses on decision autonomy, a component of the power wielded by science, technology, engineering and mathematics (STEM) department chairs in U.S. research extensive universities. A “power index” is developed to measure chairs’ decision autonomy, specifically their control of resources employed in negotiations with faculty job candidates. The study asks: What determines the degree of decision autonomy power possessed by department heads; and, what are the strategic implications of department heads’ degree of this particular aspect of power? Results of an ordered logistic regression model show that having more power is associated with being hired from outside the current university, being male, and with department size. The power index is employed to predict departmental strategic priorities. Results show that the power index is positively associated with a strategic priority for research. The results show a negative relationship between degree of chair decision autonomy and a priority to increase faculty lines. A student-focused strategy is not predicted by the power index but is related to the size, with larger departments placing less emphasis on numbers or quality of students.     

Sexual violence in organized sport in Germany

Although the topic of sexual violence in sport has gained considerable attention in recent years, prevalence rates of sexual violence experience in German athletes are not yet available. Therefore, the current study aimed to address this by assessing prevalence rates in a comprehensive sample of German elite athletes. Overall, 1529 German elite athletes over 16 years of age from 128 different sports took part in an online survey. Mean age was 21.6 years; 56% were female. Participants were presented with seventeen different sexual violence situations (from sexist jokes to forced penetration) and asked to indicate how often they had experienced each particular situation in the sport setting. Results revealed that 37.6% of the athletes had experienced at least one sexual violence situation in organized sport; 11.2% reported a severe form of sexual violence. Female athletes were affected significantly more often than male athletes, and persons with a sexual orientation other than heterosexual more often than heterosexuals. No significant differences could be found with regard to age, level of performance, type of sports, dis-/ability or migration background of the athletes. These results indicate that sexual violence is a problem that needs to be addressed across elite sports in Germany. Prevention concepts need to be developed and applied across sports contexts.     

The advantage of distributed practice in a blended learning setting

Education and Information Technologies - Ongoing digital transformations facilitate the conduct of online courses and distance learning. In this study, it was aimed to investigate the role of...