This dissertation presents the design, development and short-term evaluation of an embodied conversational agent designed to mentor human users. An embodied conversational agent (ECA) was created and programmed to mentor African American computer science majors on their decision to pursue graduate study in computing. Before constructing the ECA,…

Programs for gifted students have been criticized for narrowly defining giftedness as merely cognitive or academic performance. Teacher referrals are usually an important component of identifying gifted students. Teacher perceptions, low expectations, and lack of cultural competence are perceived as barriers to the access of Gifted and Talented…

The term rebel is virtually nonexistent in academic literature within the field of educational leadership and maintains a generally negative connotation. This research is intended to cast the term in a new light and allow for conceptualization of the word as a positive descriptor for educational leaders. This study explored the impact and efficacy…

This research study examines the various decision-making processes that superintendents may encounter within the field. The degree to which public school superintendents and public school systems are being held accountable has increased in recent years. The recent unethical decisions made within the last decade in both the public and private…

Previous research showed that motivation influences writing in school settings (Hidi & Boscolo, 2006), but further empirical research is needed to understand how motivation influences specific writing tasks (Bruning & Horn, 2000; Haswell, 2006). This study addresses that gap in research by investigating how the motivational construct of…

This research examined the cases of three diverse Spanish universities, making inferences about the factors influencing the internationalization processes of higher education institutions in response to the broader forces of globalization. Data were collected from a panel of experts and multiple public and institutional sources utilizing a mixed…

Athletic trainers work in clinical settings such as secondary schools, colleges and universities, sports medicine clinics, professional sports, hospitals, and other healthcare environments. However, with the rapid expansion of athletic training education programs (ATEP) over the years, another role for the athletic trainer has developed, the…

The purpose of this investigation was to develop and implement a Response to Critical Communication Needs (RT-CCN) co-teaching training model designed for special educators in the Bahamas, and to examine the effects of the training on the pedagogical knowledge and skills of the participants. This study was conducted in Abaco, Bahamas at a special…

The U.S. has experienced a large surge of foreign talent, as evidenced by the large number of international students enrolling each year in science and engineering fields (IIE, 2010). Among the foreign countries and economies, China ranks top in the number of doctorate degree recipients from U.S. institutions in science and engineering fields…

In this chapter, the authors discuss challenges and decision-making in the process of conducting quality mixed methods research in higher education, and offer the lessons learned from their experiences. The chapter begins with a discussion of quality and the ways of establishing quality in mixed methods studies. Two examples of studies are used to…

Early Years Professionals are graduate leaders working with children below 5 years of age, their families and practitioners in early years settings in the private, voluntary and independent sectors and children's centres in England. Their leadership of practice role is central to raising the quality of early years provision and practice. In this…

School nurses are well positioned to address risk-taking behaviors for adolescents in their care. The purpose of this mixed-method exploratory study was to explore risk taking in Afro-Caribbean adolescents in South Florida, comparing first- to second-generation adolescents. Quantitative and qualitative data were collected from an immigrant group…

Within Problem-Based Learning successful learning depends on the quality of cognitive, social and motivational contributions students make to the tutorial group. But at the same time, not all students in PBL automatically contribute in a high quality manner, which might impede successful group functioning. This study investigated whether peer…

Background: Although social exclusion among typically developing school-aged children has been well explored, it is under-researched for children with disabilities even though they are at a higher risk for being excluded. While there are a number of different programs available to improve social inclusion at school, the appeal of these programs to…

This mixed method study explored the professional competencies that administrators expect from entry-, mid-, and senior-level professionals as reflected in 1,759 job openings posted in 2008. Knowledge, skill, and dispositional competencies were identified during the qualitative phase of the study. Statistical analysis of the prevalence of…