Students choose to attend liberal arts institutions for a number of different reasons, including small class size, breadth of academic material, and emphasis on life-long learning (Astin, 1999; Pascarella, Cruce, Wolniak, & Blaich, 2004). Those attending small liberal arts colleges have come to expect that they will have a higher level of…

National standards for learning foreign languages describe five area goals which are intertwined and interconnected in the K-12 learning environment; yet, absent from the literature are investigations on how K-12 teachers are able to implement and incorporate the "practices, products, and perspectives" of culture into world language…

Despite improvements in the rates of college admission over the past few decades, college persistence, retention, and graduation rates continue to be problematic for underrepresented students--students of color and students from low-income and/or first-generation families. This article presents a case study of a female, first-generation,…

The purpose of this study was to explore the formation of teacher identity among four teachers of students with autism spectrum disorder (ASD) and my own by examining our perspectives, influences, and experiences at different points in our careers and determining the similarities and differences that exist in our professional and educational…

The purpose of the study was to examine and describe the lived experiences of the adult African American woman who had lived in multiple foster care placements. Eleven adult African American women ages 22-25 participated in semi-structured, face-to-face interviews to tell their stories and provide data of the memories of the experience. The…

In attempting to use a realistic evaluation approach to explore the role of Community Parents in early parenting programs in Toronto, a novel technique was developed to analyze the links between contexts (C), mechanisms (M) and outcomes (O) directly from experienced practitioner interviews. Rather than coding the interviews into themes in terms of…

Infants with visual impairment often require additional interaction from adults to reinforce behaviors that lead to competency at mealtimes, but parental and professional confidence in teaching these skills is often limited. In the following collective case study, the authors, a speech/language pathologist (S/LP), occupational therapist (OT), and…

This study explores learner experiences regarding skills acquisition of a cohort of engineering doctoral students enrolled in a New Zealand university. Employing a qualitative methodology, we interviewed 28 PhD students about the range of experiences and exchanges that comprised their pathways to skill acquisition. Students reported that research…

The central purpose of this multiple-case study was to describe the professional identities of six general music teachers who identified as instrumentalists as undergraduates. The study builds upon research addressing why students choose music education (Bergee, et al., 2001; Bright, 2006; Gillespie & Hamann, 1999; Lee, 2003; Madsen &…

In recent decades, the composition of classrooms in the U.S. has reflected larger numbers of children who use English as their second language (ESL), including children of professional families from Indian backgrounds. The purpose of this qualitative study was to identify the perspectives of Indian parents regarding their children?s early…

This study documented curriculum decisions made by an eighth grade social studies teacher as he prepared students for their high-stakes test. When considering how to best meet students' needs, the teacher described tensions between the pressures of standards and testing and his commitment to cultural responsiveness. Perceptions about these…

In 2011, a small Midwestern school district referred an increasing number of 2nd-4th grade students, with reading problems due to phonetic and phonological awareness deficits, to the district's intervention team. Framed in Shulman's pedagogical content knowledge model and the International Dyslexia Association's phonological deficit theory of…

This exploratory study investigated the impact of learning experiences on the intellectual, spiritual and community lives of Kenyan alumni who have graduated from master's programs in Christian and public universities in Kenya between June 2006 and 2010. A purposive sample of twenty-three graduates from four universities was used to collect data…

This ethnographic study explored to what extent white students were able to critically understand the significance of their racial identity in more diverse demographic settings. It further looked at the discourse the students used to describe themselves, their cliques, and other groups with regard to race and racial identities. The participants in…

Background/Context: Schools have attempted to address stratification in black and Latino students' access to higher education through extensive reform initiatives, including those focused on social supports. A crucial focus has been missing from these efforts, essential to improving the effectiveness of support mechanisms and understanding why…