As acts of violence in schools increase, schools are unprepared and in-equipped to prepare for targeted violence. This dissertation focuses on how professionals organizations are preparing educational leaders in threat assessment and how school personnel can reach out for support to community resources and agencies who specialize in threat…

This ethnographic dissertation research project focuses on a digital storytelling workshop called Food/Stories which took place in collaboration with Black Yield Institute in Spring of 2023. The Food/Stories workshop is the case study that I used to explore the effectiveness of Collaborative Visual Storytelling, a methodological approach that…

This qualitative descriptive study delves into the strengths and challenges community-engaged faculty face in sustaining university-community partnerships through community engagement. Framed by Bender's community engagement model, the primary research question examines how university faculty articulate their strengths and challenges within these…

Ending projects -- in whatever form that takes -- is a known area of difficulty for research that involves designing and implementing technologies with community partners. The ending process is particularly salient to underserved and marginalized communities and populations. This dissertation explores the project ecosystem and power dynamics in…

As a means of building community trust and living into their institutional missions, many higher education institutions have initiated or are exploring strategic community engagement initiatives and partnerships that directly address the needs of local and regional communities. Whether through research, workforce development, educational outreach,…

The purpose of this qualitative case study was to examine and understand educators' perceptions of the community support offered to kindergarten students and their families by the partnership between the Henry Doorly Zoo and Aquarium Robert B. Daugherty Education Center and Bancroft Elementary. These educators included those teaching or leading…

Community Writing has emerged as a relatively new subdiscipline that spans elements of larger fields such as Rhetoric and Writing Studies, Technical and Professional Communication, and Composition Pedagogy. Despite this recent emergence, teacher-scholars are still grappling with three major problematics traditionally associated with Community…

This dissertation in practice (DiP) was conducted to address the absence of a district-coordinated effort aligning Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) and real-world project-based learning (PBL) with intentional community partnerships in Anaya Independent School District (ISD). The study aimed to develop a community outreach framework that can be…

The purpose of this case study was to examine the qualities novice teachers find valuable when determining whether or not they want to stay in their schools and districts after their first years of teaching. This case study also included undergraduate teacher preparation programs and whether or not graduating from a program with a partnership…

Colleges and universities are increasingly under pressure to prepare students for professional success after graduation, and, at the same time, are facing calls to enhance student civic learning and to contribute to their local communities. High-impact practices have been embraced as pedagogical approaches to address these goals. In particular,…

This study focused on what values teachers saw in nature-based learning, what outcomes they saw for their students, and what factors have enabled them to do nature-based learning. This explanatory sequential mixed-methods study looked at nature-based learning in St. Louis elementary schools with kindergarten through second-grade students. We used…

This study focused on what values teachers saw in nature-based learning, what outcomes they saw for their students, and what factors have enabled them to do nature-based learning. This explanatory sequential mixed-methods study looked at nature-based learning in St. Louis elementary schools with kindergarten through second-grade students. We used…

Community engagement and service-learning programs have become staples in the curricula of colleges across the United States. While the intentions behind many of these programs are altruistic, they can often unwittingly replicate oppressive power dynamics with the communities they seek to serve. This dissertation explored how feminist community…

The traditional nature of higher education, the permanence of its structure and function, has allowed many universities to act with a degree of invisibility, a reluctance to change with the times, though the evasion of public purview is more difficult in a regional institution so dependent and interconnected with its local community. This…

This descriptive 10-year case study examined the school-community partnerships in a South Carolina, USA, elementary school from August 2011 to June 2021. The study used a qualitative interview approach with a quantitative description of the school and community-school activities. Data was gathered from the Observer's Field Notes and school…