The algebra-based introductory statistics course is the most popular undergraduate course in statistics. While there is a general consensus for the content of the curriculum, the recent Guidelines for Assessment and Instruction in Statistics Education (GAISE) have challenged the pedagogy of this course. Additionally, some arguments have been made…

The National Association for Sport and Physical Education supports the offering of strong college and university instructional physical activity programs (C/UIPAPs). With a rapid decline in physical activity levels, high stress levels, and unhealthy weight-loss practices among college-age students, it is apparent that C/UIPAPs embedded in the…

Surveys of employers continually highlight the need for better communication skills among recent college graduates. Yet, writing instruction in higher education serves far more than a transactional purpose. Writing facilitates learning, helps students gain skills in analysis and synthesis, and supports a range of other personal and intellectual…

The Kettering Foundation's research has been focused on putting the public back into the public's business for more than thirty years. Some questions that have recently been useful to Kettering researchers as the foundation focuses on its work with institutional actors--especially higher education and its relationship with the public--have…

Studies of undergraduate curricula in the field of Information Systems (IS) over the past two decades demonstrate a continual process of development and change. Many factors influence curriculum design, including new technologies and methodologies, and emerging subfields and subject areas. However, one deficit in the literature about IS curriculum…

In the era of knowledge economy today, social development and progress are much more relying on HEIS (higher education institutions) than ever before. Besides, the three familiar missions of "training capable persons", "doing research" and "serving the society", in the tussle of knowledge race in East Asia, a new…

While industry and academia agree that leadership skills are critical for engineering graduates, there exists no consensus regarding the definition of "engineering leadership". The engineering leadership development program at Penn State University has a decade-long experience in teaching leadership to engineering undergraduates. In…

This article synthesizes and extends data from some of the most prominent and promising large-scale research projects in writing studies while also presenting results from the authors' own research. By juxtaposing these studies, the authors offer a complex understanding of writing practices at the high school and college level. Future directions…

A college education has never been so necessary, or so expensive. It is incumbent upon us, the educators, to do it the best we can. The products of our work are not the buildings on our campuses but our students who go out into this complicated and exciting world to serve as its leaders, its citizens, and its workers. The Bates College general…

The purpose of this study was to evaluate final projects in a freshman leadership course (combining grounding in leadership theories with a service-learning component) to determine what students learned about leadership, themselves as developing leaders, and leading in the civic community, and how deeply they learned these concepts. Students found…

American colleges and universities have historically sought to promote an enlightened citizenry. In the early 1980s many felt that this civic purpose was in danger of being lost. What unfolded was a widespread educational reform movement aimed at reasserting the public and democratic purpose of American higher education. This article traces the…

We examined two curricular change efforts at a small, midwestern engineering and science college in order to explore how organizational culture influences curricular change processes. We found that the failure of one effort (measured by inability to sustain the curriculum over time) and the success of the other (the curriculum continues to be…

Purpose: The purpose of this paper is to provide concepts and strategies to successfully introduce and implement curricular change; especially, related to incorporating diversity management into academic programs. Design/methodology/approach: Utilizing documents and accounts from two agents involved in the change process and an outside observer,…

Student retention is one of the most studied areas in higher education. Much of the focus has been on providing services to aid in retention efforts from the first to the second academic year. Freshman seminar classes as well as learning community programs have become common on college campuses to provide students with the resources and support to…

Background: Under the impact of globalization and the coming of the Information Age, there is a paradigm shift occurring in the engineering curriculum and academic structure. Apart from the creation of new programs for the emerging fields in engineering, the approach and orientation have also been shifted from objective-based/input-based education…