The role of community college counselors as validating agents on men of color student success

The purpose of this study was to explore the role of counselors in providing validation for men of color in community colleges. Through protocol writing, 13 counselors from seven community colleges responded to open-ended questions asking them to reflect and describe strategies they employed when advising and counseling men of color. Thematic analysis using a combination of detailed, selective, and wholistic reading approaches, as described by van Manen (1990), was employed to identify themes reflecting different forms of validation. Findings from this study demonstrate the critical role of community college counselors as validating agents in affirming men of color as being capable of college success, helping them build confidence, affirming them as individuals, and providing opportunities for academic and personal development. Implications for practice are discussed.     

Math skills and labor-market outcomes: Evidence from a resume-based field experiment

We examine the link between math skills and labor-market outcomes using a resume-based field experiment. Specifically, we send fictitious resumes in response to online job postings, randomly assigning some resumes to indicate stronger math skills, and measure employer responses. The resumes that are randomly assigned to indicate stronger math skills receive more interest from employers than the comparison resumes. Our findings add to the body of evidence showing that stronger math skills positively affect labor-market outcomes.     

Structural Pluralism in Journalism and Media Studies: A Concept Explication and Theory Construction

This article critically reviews scholarship on structural pluralism (Tichenor, Donohue, & Olien, 1973 Tichenor , P. J. , Donohue , G. A. , & Olien , C. N. ( 1973 ). Mass communication research: The evolution of a structural model . Journalism Quarterly , 50 , 419 – 425 .[Crossref], [Web of Science ®] , [Google Scholar], 1980 Tichenor , P. J. , Donohue , G. A. , & Olien , C. N. ( 1980 ). Community conflict & the press . Beverly Hills , CA : Sage . [Google Scholar]) in journalism and media studies. Relying partly on a concept explication and theory construction process (McLeod & Pan, 2004 McLeod , J. M. , & Pan , Z. ( 2004 ). Concept explication and theory construction . In S. Dunwoody , L. B. Becker , D. M. McCleod , & G. M. Kosicki (Eds.), The evolution of key mass communication concepts honoring Jack M. McLeod (pp. 13 – 76 ). Cresskill , NJ : Hampton . [Google Scholar]), the article explicates structural pluralism as a multifaceted concept with multiple dimensions and indicators. While reviewing relationships or hypotheses between structural pluralism and various outcomes, the article then discusses and proposes issues and agendas for future studies.     

A Patient-centered Approach to Breaking Bad News: Communication Guidelines for Health Care Providers

This investigation takes a patient-centered approach to examining strategies physicians use to deliver bad news to patients. Qualitative data were obtained from 68 patients who had received a message they perceived as negative information from a health care provider. Through grounded theory methodology, patient accounts were examined to reveal four provider strategies for breaking bad news. This investigation underscores the importance of using effective communication strategies to achieve patient satisfaction and compliance.     

Children in carts: digital rhetorics of Christian commission and capital

Compassion International is a prominent Christian humanitarian organization. Working primarily via a digital platform, Compassion International aims to connect financially stable sponsors with impoverished global children. This essay deals with Compassion International’s online sponsorship platform as an illustrative case study of a neoliberal media ecology and the digital, humanitarian, visual, and Christian rhetorics therein. Compassion International’s sponsorship platform presents a triad of appeals that (re)imagine would-be sponsors as digital missionaries fulfilling God’s commission, as stand-in family members, and, ultimately, as consumers. Compassion International’s sponsorship model is digitally rendered via a marketplace platform in which children are placed into virtual shopping carts. Both children and Christian users are, this essay concludes, coopted by a digital rhetoric of capital.