The Value of Midterm Student Feedback in Cross-Disciplinary Graduate Programs

End-of-course student evaluations are frequently used to evaluate university faculty teaching. However, employing midterm student feedback has been found to be instrumental in informing faculty about instructional quality and improving student learning outcomes. This study examined and compared the effects on classroom instruction of using a midterm student feedback (MSF) survey in the graduate courses of two faculty, an untenured professor in public administration and a full professor in education. The researchers gathered data from 122 students over two years for three courses in 6 classes—4 in public administration, 2 in education. Results indicate that midterm student feedback offered insight for faculty at both levels. In addition, when faculty make instructional changes based on MSF data, students\u27 responses improve. Implications for future research are also discussed

Leveling the Field: Using Rubrics to Achieve Greater Equity in Teaching and Grading

Rubrics can be used to assure greater consistency in grading and as a teaching tool to promote greater equity, especially with students who are first generation and /or non-native speakers of English

Structuring Creativity: Successful Strategies for Using Creative Activities in the Classroom

From the political to the environmental, the 21st century presents a dizzying array of challenges for current and future generations. Society needs people who have the confidence to explore unique ideas and the willingness to take risks in shaping and sharing those ideas. Where will we prepare and encourage people to be creative? Is it in our universities? How can faculty members help our students learn to envision new, unusual and, in fact, creative solutions to ensure a better life for all? The purpose of this chapter is twofold: first, to show how three faculty members from three different disciplines structured their curriculum to foster creative thinking and, then, second, to offer a set of key principles derived from these activities that faculty members can consider when incorporating creative activities into their own classes

Examining Doctoral Student Development of a Researcher Identity: Using the Draw a Researcher Test

With a core identity as working professionals, education doctoral students struggle with seeing themselves as researchers. Because research is essential in a doctoral program, the sooner doctoral students include researcher as an identity, the smoother and more successful their journey will be. To support doctoral student researcher identity development, we focused on scaffolding and embedding academic writing experiences in the first year seminar in a U.S. doctoral program. The purpose of this study was to describe and explain doctoral students’ development of a researcher identity as measured by the Draw-a-Researcher Test (DART). In the fall and spring, we collected drawings (DART) and narrative reflections from nine students. We created a five-dimension DART scoring guide. In the fall, the drawings revealed students’ uncertainty about the agency (ability to make changes) and the research process dimensions; in the spring, however, the drawings showed students’ clearer understanding of these two dimensions. In the narrative reflections, students noted the influence of writing expectations and experiences on their role identity as researchers. Implications, as measured by the DART, are that an embedded writing support model seems to assure the development of doctoral students’ core identity as researchers during the first year of the program

Doctoral supervision and COVID-19: Autoethnographies from four faculty across three continents

Doctoral students represent the fresh and creative intellectuals needed to address the many social, economic, political, health care, and education disparities that have been highlighted by the 2020 pandemic. Our work as doctoral student supervisors could not be more central nor vital than it was at the beginning of, during, and following the pandemic. Written during the pandemic of 2020, the purpose of this paper was to describe how four faculty from three continents navigated their relationships with doctoral students in the research and dissertation phase of their doctoral programs. Using a common set of prompts, four faculty members each wrote an autoethnography of our experience as doctoral student supervisors. Even though our basic advising philosophies and contexts were quite different, we learned about the possibility and power of resilience, empathy, and mentoring online. Our findings imply that new online practices could be closely examined and retained after the pandemic to expand the reach, depth and impact of doctoral education

Examining the Context of Strategy Instruction

The goal of literacy instruction is to teach reading and writing as tools to facilitate thinking and reasoning in a broad array of literacy events. An important difference in the disposition of children to participate in literacy experiences is the extent to which they engage in intentional self-regulated learning. The contexts attending six traditional models of strategy instruction are examined. An exploratory study, conducted with heterogeneous third graders, is reported, examining the implementation and outcomes of three models of strategy instruction—Direct Instruction, Reciprocal Teaching, and Collaborative Problem Solving—which manipulated teacher and student control of activity, as well as the instructional context.Peer Reviewedhttp://deepblue.lib.umich.edu/bitstream/2027.42/69008/2/10.1177_074193259101200306.pd

Feedback, Accountability, and the Standards-based System

The standards-based system provides feedback and accountability, and, more importantly, it challenges educators to re-examine basic assumptions about teaching, learning, and schooling. These assumptions are changing as a result of the standards-based system, and this has positively affected practices in the classroom

Final Dissertation Paper Rubric: 5-part Dissertation

This is a rubric developed by Dannelle D. Stevens, Doctoral Program Coordinator in the Graduate School of Education, designed to help guide evaluations for doctoral dissertations in Educational Leadership at Portland State University

Introduction to Rubrics: An Assessment Tool to Save Grading Time, Convey Effective Feedback, and Promote Student Learning

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