Heavy metals are a recognized toxic environmental contaminant, even at very low concentrations. There have been well-known events in the last decade within the US of high amounts of lead in the drinking water supplies of cities, leading to detrimental effects within its population. Ways have been found to remove this metal, and others, from water…

The research-to-practice gap (RPG) is a continued concern in education, with limited knowledge and use of evidence-based practices by school practitioners frequently cited in the educational literature. Although studies exist evaluating practitioners' perspectives on RPG, to date, no study has examined the education researchers' approaches to…

This study showcases stories of minority students participating in the Geopaths research program at California State University, Bakersfield. The study examined faculty mentorship and research activity variables to understand their influence on STEM recruitment and retention. Using a narrative analysis approach, the researcher documented the…

Deciding whether or not to open an international branch campus requires that senior leaders at higher education institutions have an understanding of the benefits and risks associated with one of the riskiest forms of internationalization. Three historical waves characterize the modern incarnation of the international branch campus, which began in…

As a managerial construct, knowledge management (KM) optimizes organizational knowledge assets to achieve sustainable business advantages by connecting people with the intellectual resources needed to operate more effectively. Yet KM may have its greatest impact when used with repeatable, systems engineering-based "frameworks." As such, this study…

This qualitative, multiple case study looked at the emerging organizational identity of four charter schools during the early years of development and the influence of the founder on that developing identity. The study looked at the ways in which each founder's sensemaking and sensegiving behaviors may have influenced the organizational identity…

This case study of 2 state universities qualifying as learning organizations, based on administration and staff viewpoints, was completed using a qualitative methodology. The idea of what a learning organization is can be different depending on who or what is being analyzed. For this study, the work of theorists including W. Edwards Deming,…

Complex and expensive systems' development suffers from a lack of method for making good system-architecture-selection decisions early in the development process. Failure to make a good system-architecture-selection decision increases the risk that a development effort will not meet cost, performance and schedule goals. This research provides a…

The purpose of this methodological study is to explore how well a process called "concept mapping" (Trochim, 1989) can articulate the theory which underlies a social program. Articulation of a program's theory is a key step in completing a sound theory based evaluation (Weiss, 1997a). In this study, concept mapping is used to…

The purpose of this study was to understand the conditions necessary to gain research access to parents of children with anorexia. In this study, I also examined and explored avenues parents have for sharing their story and their experiences of parenting a child with anorexia as well as whether gatekeepers have a role in connecting parents and…

Much generational research has been conducted in the last decade, prompted most likely by the drastic social and technological changes of the late 20th century, the increase in enrollments in higher education, the increase in families with two working parents, and the meteoric rise in the widespread use and acceptance of emerging technologies.…