Work/life balance issues exist for all people who navigate both professional and personal responsibilities, regardless of profession, gender, marital status, or number of children. This research sought to better understand the specific work/life balance challenges faced by female physicians and how medical education can better prepare future…

Designers of interactive technologies have long prioritized user engagement, and today's popular end-user products are irresistibly engaging. Modern technology offers enormous value and convenience, but it has also led to widespread feelings of dissatisfaction, and users report wishing they had a different relationship with the technologies they…

Over the past two decades reported rates of autism have steadily risen. The current incidence is 1 in 68 children. While autism can be reliably diagnosed at 18 months in most children with the condition, specialized autism treatment rarely begins before a child's third or fourth birthday. As screening and diagnosis procedures improve so does the…

This dissertation examined the experiences of participants who identified as refugees and had either obtained a graduate degree (master's or higher) or were in the process of obtaining a graduate degree during the time of this study, despite the influence of trauma on their experiences. This qualitative research study utilized Interpretive…

Research has shown that Latino males have some of the lowest collegiate completion rates compared to their racial and ethnic peers (Saenz et al., 2016). Further, individuals from rural communities continually lag behind in educational attainment than those from other geographic areas. Taken collectively, addressing this current problem becomes an…

This dissertation study investigated how immigrant youth attending two different high schools for late-arrival immigrants in New York City constructed civic belonging by attending to their everyday enactments of citizenship across the contexts of school, neighborhood and home. Civic belonging refers to the embodied social practices by which…

This study examines the experiences of first generation college students at a rural university campus on the Southern Plains through narrative inquiry. Respondents who were recent graduates or who were about to graduate shared their stories through an interview and drawing process. Their interview responses indicate how they chose to attend this…

Leadership has entered an age of chronic unrest. Scholars have emphasized the impact of healthy and effective leaders on organizations (Crother-Laurin, 2006), yet recent studies reveal high stress and burnout in the contemporary workplace (Walsh, 2005, 2013). The academy faces their own organizational challenges, (Archibald & Feldman, 2010)…

Student retention is considered a complex human behavior. Adding to the complex nature of student retention is the ever changing landscape of higher education due in large part to the growth of Hispanic undergraduate student enrollment on college campuses. While notable gains have been made increasing the number of Hispanic students graduating…

Due to the impact of Confucianism on Taiwanese society, Taiwanese married women play multiple family roles including being a daughter-in-law, wife, mother, and working woman. Having to play multiple roles usually brings Taiwanese married women burdens and stress. It is reported that Zen meditation improves people's physical and mental wellbeing.…

Female student affairs leaders who also have family responsibilities find that a primary challenge they encounter is society's expectations concerning their roles and responsibilities in both realms. Research discovers that women experience internal and external barriers that hinder their advancement opportunities however; women's…

Across the country, people believe education in America is in crisis, and the implications are frightening as historians have described the decline of public education as a threat to the nation's economy and military (Williams, 2012). This study involved examination of research on teacher home visit programs. Data were collected through a mixed…

The purpose of this study was to explore the tenacities, practices, and discourse of family-based literacy practices and their connection in African American families. It scrutinized the influence of the practices of African American families on the multiple contexts of literacy practices in their passageway across the school-community periphery.…

Within higher education today, the student population in American colleges and universities is becoming increasingly diverse, relative to students' racial/ethnic, sexual, religion, and gender identities. Specifically, students who identify as Lesbian and gay are more often seeking personal authenticity and opportunities to make meaning of their…

This project explores the impact of disparate educational attainment between first-generation college graduates and their family members. This is a conscious shifting of the unit of analysis, from the changing social position and power of an individual student/graduate, to the relational capacity, tensions, and strategies of the family unit that…