College of Education
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The collections in this community comprise faculty research works, as well as graduate theses and dissertations..
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Item MI LUGAR ES AQUÍ (MY PLACE IS HERE): LATINO MALE VOICES AND THE FACTORS CONTRIBUTING TO THEIR SUCCESS IN COLLEGE(2015) Rivera, Jason; MacDonald, Victoria M.; Curriculum and Instruction; Digital Repository at the University of Maryland; University of Maryland (College Park, Md.)In this collective case study, the voices of 10 academically successful Latino males were privileged to uncover the factors they believe contribute to their success in college. The participants in this study range in age from 18 to 24 and are from diverse Latino backgrounds including Bolivia, Brazil, the Dominican Republic, El Salvador, Mexico, Panama, and Peru. Each Latino male participant maintained a grade point average of 3.0 or greater and began his higher education experience at the local community college. Using extant literature on various forms of capital, care, and patterns of transition, a conceptual model created to explore how participants' describe and understand academic achievement. Through individual interviews, focus groups, a survey, and participant selected artifacts, the power of care and the importance of social capital and community cultural wealth emerge as salient factors in academically successful Latino male experiences. In this study, care was redefined by drawing on the scholarship of Noddings (2005), Gay, (2010), and scholars who articulate critical conceptions of care. Other salient factors that contributed to participants' collegiate academic achievement included Latino cultural traditions (i.e., familismo, consejos, and bien educado), caring teachers and professors, coaches and mentors, and the role of the community college and community-based organizations. This study also found that because of care, and the values inhered in caring relationships (i.e., trust, support, and care), participants were able to gain access to a variety of capital as well as other important resources (i.e., transition strategies such as code switching and discerning expectations) that they were able to leverage toward their academic achievement in college. Implications for theory, research, and practice are presented with an emphasis placed on creating caring spaces that cultivate and nurture the academic achievement of Latino males in higher education environments.Item Individual and School Characteristics as Predictors of Parental Involvement(2014) Grossman, Julie Adina; Strein, William O; Counseling and Personnel Services; Digital Repository at the University of Maryland; University of Maryland (College Park, Md.)Parental involvement in children's education is of critical importance in the U.S. educational system. Therefore, it is useful to identify effective predictors of parental involvement. The present study used multi-level analyses to examine how individual and school-level characteristics impact two forms of parental involvement (school-based and home-based parental involvement) in first grade and eighth grade. Several child/parent level characteristics significantly predicted parental involvement. Parent interaction/social capital demonstrated medium to large effects across both forms of parental involvement in both first and eighth grades. Many of the other child/parent level characteristics produced small effect sizes. Across both forms of parental involvement there were few school-level effects that were statistically significant. Those that were statistically significant were very small in magnitude. The results of the present study may serve to inform school practices and research in the field of parental involvement.Item Parental involvement of Asian American immigrant mothers: Investigating social capital, English proficiency, length of U.S. residency, and social class(2009) Shin, HaeJin; Holcomb-McCoy, Cheryl; Counseling and Personnel Services; Digital Repository at the University of Maryland; University of Maryland (College Park, Md.)The major purpose of the present study was to examine how the parent social and cultural contexts are related to Asian American immigrant mothers' educational involvement. This study investigated four parents' socio-cultural background variables: a) parent's social capital, b) parent's self-perceived English proficiency, c) parent's length of residence in the United States, and d) parent's social class status. In addition, the current study sought to determine the underlying dimensions of Asian American immigrant mothers' parental involvement in order to examine how parent social and cultural background factors influence each of the dimensions differently. The subjects for the current study were 597 nationally representative Asian American immigrant mothers who completed the parent questionnaire of the base-year Educational Longitudinal Study of 2002 (ELS: 2002). Five dimensions of parental involvement were identified in the current study sample of Asian American immigrant mothers. These include parent's engagement in social activities with her child, parent's positive school contact, parent's monitoring, parent's school contact for problems, and parent's participation at school functions. A series of multiple regression and logistic regression analyses were conducted to assess the relationships between parent's social and cultural backgrounds and each of five dimensions of the Asian American parental involvement. The results showed that Asian American immigrant mothers' social capital, English proficiency, and social class were significantly related to parent's engagement in social activities with her child. Further, mother's social capital, English proficiency, and social class status were significantly positively related to parent's monitoring. Of the various parent's social and cultural background variables, only parent's social capital significantly predicted Asian American immigrant mothers' positive school contact and participation at school functions. No relationship was found between parent social and cultural background variables and Asian American immigrant mothers' school contact for problems.Item Addressing the Hispanic Dropout Crisis: Predicting the Educational Persistence of Mexican-Descent Students Using Demographic and Process Variables(2008-12-18) DiPaula, John Joseph; Lucas, Margaretha S; Counseling and Personnel Services; Digital Repository at the University of Maryland; University of Maryland (College Park, Md.)ABSTRACT While there has been a concerted effort to close the achievement gap and decrease school dropout rates for more than 30 years, Hispanic students are still dropping out of school at two and a half times the rate of black students, four times the rate of white students and almost eight times the rate of Asian students (Kaufman, Alt & Chapman, 2002). The Hispanic dropout crisis has been recognized as a national problem and was addressed by the federal government through the No Child Left Behind Act of 2001, through its focus on closing the racial gap in graduation rates. Regrettably, data continues to suggest that this situation is not improving (U.S. Census Bureau, 2000). A more thorough understanding of the relationship between race/ethnicity and educational persistence is necessary to help create policies and practices to increase Hispanic graduation rates and close the graduation gap. Investigating deeper into this issue of Hispanics drop out, census data disaggregated by national origin, reveal that there are strong differences between nationalities and that Mexicans have the lowest rate of educational attainment among all Hispanic groups (U.S. Census Bureau, 2004). Due to the disparity in performance within the larger Hispanic population, this study will focus on the sub-group with the lowest educational attainment and highest drop out rate, Mexican youth. The purpose of this study is to investigate those input and process variables that may be influenced by school personnel in order to help increase Mexican-descent students' ability to persist in school toward graduation. The current study, in essence, will contribute to a better understanding of students' social support from adults at school (social capital) and the effect this has on students' educational expectations, attendance and persistence. The current study utilizes the Educational Longitudinal Study of 2002/2004 (ELS:2002/2004) dataset sponsored by NCES.