Exploring the experiences of refugee arrivals who have participated in community-based programming in multiple cities across the United States, this dissertation considers the role of such programming in refugee integration and implications for engaged scholarship. Through collaborative partnerships, IHE and USRAP offices offer both students and…

The purpose of this non-experimental, quantitative survey study was to determine the stakeholders' perspectives on experiential learning at Canvas College. Experiential learning has potential benefits for students as stakeholders, and internship can be a vehicle for experiential learning. Experiential learning can involve benefits such as…

There is a problem in Minneapolis communities at the intersection of ecological and social systems. Despite efforts to use native prairie plants for cleaning water, the social justice stories connected to native prairie plants were being ignored. This problem has negatively impacted communities because native prairie plants can be an educational…

The present qualitative study aimed to investigate how school garden-based science pedagogy improves students' attitudes toward science learning, particularly in under-resourced urban school districts. The findings of this study suggest that the implementation of school garden-based science pedagogy can positively impact elementary students'…

The United States has invested millions of dollars in STEM program initiatives; however, African Americans in STEM career fields are underrepresented. The purpose of this qualitative hermeneutic phenomenological study aimed to explore the lived experiences of African-American first-year college students from rural communities in a STEM program and…

The present research involved two studies that considered "ecology-centered experiences" (i.e., experiences with living things) as a factor in children's environmental attitudes and behaviors and adolescents' ecological understanding. The first study (Study 1) examined how a community garden provides children in an urban setting the…

This dissertation used a phenomenological approach in investigating the development of a grassroots community history-based educational outreach and chronicled its development from inception to incorporation into the mission of an established institution. The research questions focused on Deweyan principles of student-centered, experiential…

Patient centered medicine is a paradigm of health care that seeks to treat the whole person, rather than only the illness. The physician must understand the patient as a whole by considering the patient's individual needs, social structure, socioeconomic status, and educational background. Medical education includes ways to train students in this…