Education reform has been at the forefront of educational research for decades, depicted by government initiatives and policy, research, and pedagogical changes and recommendations. When considering elements of educational change, policy, best practices, and individual merit and retention have also been heavily in the spotlight, such as "A…

Research has illustrated the role visual design plays in effective communication and instruction. However, more research has yet to investigate how online course designers (i.e., anyone who designs online courses) add visual appeal to online courses. This study explored the visual design process in online course development. It examines how…

Over the last decade, secondary schools around the United States have rapidly adopted ethnic studies courses. For instance, California's governor mandated ethnic studies as a high school graduation requirement in 2021 (Magcalas, 2023). According to scholars, ethnic studies courses offer educational experiences that disrupt the erasure and…

[This paper is part of the Focused Collection on Curriculum Development: Theory into Design.] A level of curricular design, called "design tactics," is identified to fill a gap in the research literature between the broad principles that guide curriculum development and the detailed writing of specific activities and lessons. The use of…

The growth in the tech industry in recent years has increased business major students' interest in software programming and app development. However, the traditional way of teaching these courses involves intensive coding exercises and little interaction among students. These methods often discourage the students due to the slow learning curve and…

As with many higher education institutions, Fresno State struggles with graduation rates. The overall six-year graduation rate for first-time, full-time freshmen hovers around 50 percent. The graduation gap between the two largest ethnic groups, White (55.6) and Hispanic (43.5), was 12.1 percentage points in 2012. This article reports on the…

We report on the development of a life sciences curriculum, targeted to undergraduate students, which was modeled after a commercially available physics curriculum and based on aspects of how people learn. Our paper describes the collaborative development process and necessary modifications required to apply a physics pedagogical model in a life…

This paper illustrates an approach for using university-wide service-learning student outcomes to assess student work for the purpose of improving service-learning student and faculty learning and course design. The author and a colleague used this approach to study the author's service-learning course. The results of this study generated an…

As district leaders search for the best ways to improve student learning with the Common Core State Standards, California districts are leading the way as early implementers of the new standards. The ideas and lessons emerging from their work can help other educators maximize the effectiveness of their own implementation efforts. This brief…

The purpose of this study was to examine the effects of professional development (PD) on the infusion of engineering design into high school curricula. Four inservice teachers with backgrounds in physics, chemistry, industrial education, math, and electrical engineering participated in the 2006 National Center of Engineering and Technology…

California has embarked on a major new wave of curriculum reform with the adoption of the Common Core State Standards (CCSS), the new English Language Development (ELD) standards, and the Next Generation Science Standards (NGSS). The adoption of the CCSS builds a legacy of standards-based education reform in California that began with the…

Beyond for-credit offerings, some library and information science (LIS) schools are exploring MOOCs as a means to promote lifelong learning and professional development. Using web surveys and descriptive content analysis methods, this paper empirically addresses if, in LIS programs, MOOCs can fill a role and serve new populations of learners…

California has embarked on a major new wave of curriculum reform with the adoption of the Common Core State Standards (CCSS), the new English Language Development (ELD) standards, and the Next Generation Science Standards (NGSS). The adoption of the CCSS builds a legacy of standards-based education reform in California that began with the…

This article discusses academic freedom that is currently under threat at many public two-year schools, which serve almost one-half of the nation's first-year college students. The growing reliance on part-time faculty exacerbates the problem, with many adjuncts feeling muzzled for fear of losing their jobs. The problem of academic freedom at…

This paper discusses utilizing course objectives to drive the change of existing 10-15 week undergraduate courses into 8-week courses that feature blended learning tools. To begin the redesign process, instructors and a faculty mentor revisit course objectives for currency, and with an eye toward blended course restructuring. The restructuring is…