“Partnering to Understand Undergraduate Research and Writing Longitudinally”

In her longitudinal case study of a single undergraduate, College Writing and Beyond (2007), Anne Beaufort investigates several knowledge domains contributing to students’ development as writers. As a team of librarians and writing faculty in research and teaching partnership, we hope to build on Beaufort’s work by examining and elaborating the role of research with respect to writing development by sharing findings from our own longitudinal study of undergraduates’ development as writer-researchers. Specifically, we are interested in the ways in which undergraduates’ research interfaces with their writing practices as they advance through their general education coursework and various disciplines. How do students perceive and articulate their understanding of writing and research, respectively and/or in interaction with one another? Have students’ understandings of writing and research changed since their first year? How so? To what do students attribute their shaping influences? To what extent, for example, are students’ understanding of writing and research influenced by the faculty with whom they study? In this panel, we present findings associated with a set of student case studies based on collaboratively coded and analyzed student interviews, triangulated with student process and literacy narratives as well as faculty interviews. Findings to date concern the unexpected role of students’ work with primary data (e.g., interviews) as well as differences among students’ reading practices, understandings of source authority, and dispositions. These findings have implications for students’ research and writing as well as for how faculty and librarians might teach research, including in response to certain challenges posed by information literacy in the digital age

Using Narrative Jurisprudence to Develop a Narrative Approach to Deliberative Ethical Argument in Composition.

This study provides composition instructors and their students with a more robust understanding of ethical argument, one that uses a narrative approach in order to make sense of how writers reason and argue by means of values, emotions, and particulars. Introducing the term “deliberative ethical argument,” this dissertation argues that such argument merits more attention in composition pedagogy because of its potential to enrich students’ argumentative agility and to address some instructors’ concerns with argument as reductive, unengaging, dispassionate, or aggressive. The dissertation draws on scholarship concerning legal narratives (“narrative jurisprudence”) because legal narratives function in ways that are analogous to and participate in deliberative ethical arguments. In particular, the study first turns to Bernard Jackson’s narrative approach to explain how specific narratives make ethical arguments; how narrative structure influences ethical arguments’ plausibility; and how widely circulating narratives can clarify what a writer is arguing and its persuasiveness. The study thus complements argumentative instruction in composition textbooks, which often includes personal essays, judicial opinions, and other readings that make ethical arguments by means of narratives but overlooks these narratives’ argumentative import. Second, the study enhances the Jacksonian narrative approach in order to help students recognize and think through the implications of various argumentative strategies: representations of persons and emotions; strategic employment of multiple models of narrative structure; uses of narrative silence; and drawing on or challenging other popular narratives. Finally, the study considers how a narrative approach complements a common approach to writing instruction on ethical argument – the principles-and-values approach – thereby demonstrating how students might more rigorously and complexly think about and assess values in their own and others’ arguments. In terms of pedagogical applications, the narrative approach can assist students in making greater conceptual sense of specific instances of argument (e.g., details, word choices) and the wider work these instances accomplish (e.g., definitionally). It also can help students be more critical readers: of narratives, of what is implicit or absent in arguments, and of the relationships among multiple arguments. Finally, the narrative approach provides students with additional tools with which to argue with more diverse audiences.Ph.D.English & EducationUniversity of Michigan, Horace H. Rackham School of Graduate Studieshttp://deepblue.lib.umich.edu/bitstream/2027.42/89617/1/dlsch_2.pdfhttp://deepblue.lib.umich.edu/bitstream/2027.42/89617/2/dlsch_1.pd

Ecological Impacts of the Space Shuttle Program at John F. Kennedy Space Center, Florida

The Space Shuttle Program was one of NASAs first major undertakings to fall under the environmental impact analysis and documentation requirements of the National Environmental Policy Act of 1969 (NEPA). Space Shuttle Program activities at John F. Kennedy Space Center (KSC) and the associated Merritt Island National Wildlife Refuge (MINWR) contributed directly and indirectly to both negative and positive ecological trends in the region through the long-term, stable expenditure of resources over the 40 year program life cycle. These expenditures provided support to regional growth and development in conjunction with other sources that altered land use patterns, eliminated and modified habitats, and contributed to cultural eutrophication of the Indian River Lagoon. At KSC, most Space Shuttle Program related actions were conducted in previously developed facilities and industrial areas with the exception of the construction of the shuttle landing facility (SLF) and the space station processing facility (SSPF). Launch and operations impacts were minimal as a result of the low annual launch rate. The majority of concerns identified during the NEPA process such as potential weather modification, acid rain off site, and local climate change did not occur. Launch impacts from deposition of HCl and particulates were assimilated as a result of the high buffering capacity of the system and low launch and loading rates. Metals deposition from exhaust deposition did not display acute impacts. Sub-lethal effects are being investigated as part of the Resource Conservation and Recovery Act (RCRA) regulatory process. Major positive Space Shuttle Program effects were derived from the adequate resources available at the Center to implement the numerous environmental laws and regulations designed to enhance the quality of the environment and minimize impacts from human activities. This included reduced discharges of domestic and industrial wastewater, creation of stormwater management systems, remediation of past contamination sites, implementation of hazardous waste management systems, and creation of a culture of sustainability. Working with partners such as the USFWS and the St Johns River Water Management District (SJRWMD), wetlands and scrub restoration and management initiatives were implemented to enhance fish and wildlife populations at the Center. KSC remains the single largest preserve on the east coast of Florida in part due to NASAs commitment to stewardship. Ongoing Ecological Program projects are directed at development of information and knowledge to address future KSC management questions including the transition to a joint government and commercial launch facility, enhanced habitat management requirements for wetlands and scrub, potential impacts of emerging contaminants, and adaptation to climate change including projected sea level rise over the next 50-75 years

Researching Students\u27 Conceptions of Information Literacy

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“Partnering to Understand Undergraduate Research and Writing Longitudinally”

In her longitudinal case study of a single undergraduate, College Writing and Beyond (2007), Anne Beaufort investigates several knowledge domains contributing to students’ development as writers. As a team of librarians and writing faculty in research and teaching partnership, we hope to build on Beaufort’s work by examining and elaborating the role of research with respect to writing development by sharing findings from our own longitudinal study of undergraduates’ development as writer-researchers. Specifically, we are interested in the ways in which undergraduates’ research interfaces with their writing practices as they advance through their general education coursework and various disciplines. How do students perceive and articulate their understanding of writing and research, respectively and/or in interaction with one another? Have students’ understandings of writing and research changed since their first year? How so? To what do students attribute their shaping influences? To what extent, for example, are students’ understanding of writing and research influenced by the faculty with whom they study? In this panel, we present findings associated with a set of student case studies based on collaboratively coded and analyzed student interviews, triangulated with student process and literacy narratives as well as faculty interviews. Findings to date concern the unexpected role of students’ work with primary data (e.g., interviews) as well as differences among students’ reading practices, understandings of source authority, and dispositions. These findings have implications for students’ research and writing as well as for how faculty and librarians might teach research, including in response to certain challenges posed by information literacy in the digital age