Heterogeneity in the Effects of College Course Placement

Traditionally colleges have relied on standalone non-credit-bearing developmental education (DE) to support students academically and ensure readiness for college-level courses. As emerging evidence has raised concerns about the effectiveness of DE courses, colleges and states have been experimenting with approaches that place students into credit-bearing coursework more quickly. To better understand which types of students might be most likely to benefit from being placed into college-level math coursework, this study examines heterogeneity in the causal effects of placement into college-level courses using a regression discontinuity design and administrative data from the state of Texas. We focus on student characteristics that are related to academic preparation or might signal a student’s likelihood of success or need for additional support and might therefore be factors considered for placement into college-level courses under “holistic advising” or “multiple measures” initiatives. We find heterogeneity in outcomes for many of the measures we examined. Students who declared an academic major designation, had bachelor’s degree aspirations, tested below college readiness on multiple subjects, were designated as Limited English Proficiency (LEP), and/or were economically disadvantaged status were more likely to benefit from placement into college-level math. Part-time enrollment or being over the age of 21 were associated with reduced benefits from placement into college-level math. We do not find any heterogeneity in outcomes for our high school achievement measure, three or more years of math taken in high school.

     

Topicalization and the Processing of Expository Prose by Children: mediating effects of cognitive styles and content familiarity

This study assessed the effects of text topicalization conditions (initial position, final position, or no topic sentence) on the comprehension of main ideas and specific passage information for middle school readers. Also of interest were interactions of topic familiarity and readers’ cognitive styles (degree of field independence) with text topicalization. One hundred and seven subjects were randomly assigned to one of the three topicalization conditions and read three familiar and three less‐familiar multipleparagraph expository texts. Main idea comprehension was assessed with both a sentencesummary (generation) and best‐title (recognition) task. Comprehension of specific passage information was evaluated with multiple‐choice items. Text topicalization effects were observed for main idea comprehension (with initial position best, followed by final position), while topic familiarity resulted in higher comprehension scores for specific passage information. Moreover, a cognitive style‐text topicalization interaction was found on the best‐title task; in this case, relatively field dependent readers were assisted by a final topic sentence placement. Implications are drawn for future research concerning the complex interplay of texts, tasks and readers in prose‐processing.     

THE DEPARTMENT CHAIR AS SPEAKER OF THE HOUSE: SHARED AUTHORITY IN THE COMMUNITY COLLEGE DEPARTMENT

The department chair position is vital to the effective administration of both the academic unit and the entire college. Inherent in the roles and tasks of the individual position is a responsibility for consensus development, which in turn requires the involvement of faculty in decision-making activities. This consensual development dictates that faculty who are specialists in their particular academic disciplines be involved in decisions ranging from admissions and grading to institutional policy formation and cross-disciplinary curricula development. The current study was conducted to examine the perceptions of department chairs in the involvement of faculty in departmental decision-making.     

Analyzing a service-learning experience using a social justice lens

This mixed methods study explores a service-learning experience embedded in a social foundations course in a teacher education program. The authors differentiate learning outcomes for social justice and charity service-learning, and utilize this framework to examine whether the service-learning experience fosters a social justice perspective. The findings demonstrate that while the experience did foster social justice perspectives for some students, the data also reflect evidence of learning outcomes that align with charity service-learning.     

The uses and abuses of power: teaching school leadership through children's literature

There are relatively few studies of how representations of teachers, schools and educational administrators in popular films and television might be, and are, used in leadership preparation. This paper seeks to add to this small body of work; it reports on an exploratory study of the representation of headteachers in contemporary children's fiction. Thirty-one texts are analysed to ascertain key themes and the major characterisations. The paper draws on children's literature scholars to argue that both the historical school story and its contemporary counterpart focus heavily on the power of the head to control the micro-world of the school. Because these fictional accounts deal with issues of power and justice more openly than many mainstream educational administration texts, this makes them particularly useful in the preparation of potential school leaders.     

Conversing with pedagogical agents: A phenomenological exploration of interacting with digital entities

In this paper, we examine the meaning of conversing with pedagogical agents. Previous research has focused on examining cause and effect relationships, failing to take into account the meaning of the experiences individuals have when holding a dialogue with conversational agents for educational purposes. To understand these experiences, we have conducted a phenomenological examination of what it means to converse with a pedagogical agent. In phenomenological terms, findings suggest the experience is complex, engrossing, virtual yet real, human‐like, and social. Implications for the future design, implementation, and research of conversational agents in educational and other settings are discussed.