<p> This study investigates the impact of students&rsquo; participation in the certificate program offered by the Asian Studies Center (ASC) at the University of Pittsburgh on their perception of global competency and skills development for international careers. Undergraduate and graduate students who were enrolled in the ASC&rsquo;s certificate program as of March 16, 2012 (n=125) participated in an on-line student survey. Data are used to provide a descriptive analysis, significance tests, and a multiple regression analysis that examine six research questions.</p><p> The descriptive analysis explores students&rsquo; characteristics, satisfaction with the certificate program, international experience, foreign language capability, and the extent to which the certificate program increases their global competency and skills for international careers. Tests were conducted to examine whether the differences in pre-post increases in students&rsquo; perception of their global competency and skills development for international careers were statistically significant for all respondents as well as between disaggregated groups. The multiple regression analysis tests the correlation between three independent variables (courses taken in the certificate program, center activity participation, and students&rsquo; international experience) and each of the two dependent variables (students&rsquo; perception of increased global competency and students&rsquo; perception of improved skills for international careers).</p><p> Findings show that significantly different changes in students&rsquo; perception of their global competency and skills development for international careers exist before their participation in the certificate program and after their participation in the certificate program. Students who stayed 1-6 months in an Asian country have the most significant increases in their perception of their global competency after their participation in the certificate program. Senior students have the most significant increases in their perception of their global competency and skills for international careers after their participation in the certificate program.</p><p> Students&rsquo; international experience and courses taken in the certificate program are important variables related to their perception of increased global competency and improved skill for international careers. The effect of students&rsquo; international experience is greater than courses taken in the certificate program on their perception of their increased global competency and improved skills for international careers.</p>

<p> Prior research has been conducted examining the effects of multiple attributes' affect on persistence and graduation rates at higher education institutions (HEIs). This research has examined individual, family, peer, neighborhood, and institutional characteristics and their relationship with college graduation rates. There has been very little research conducted on the relationship of regional quality of life (QoL) on educational attainment. This study examined nine separate aspects (Income and Wealth, Housing, Educational Attainment, Work/Life Balance, Health Status, Personal Security, Environmental Quality, Social Capital, and Jobs and Earnings) of QoL to determine their relationship with the graduation rates at both two- and four-year HEIs. It was found that relationships exist between most of the social indicators of QoL and graduation rates. These findings lead to areas of interest that the stakeholders in higher education can consider when making policy changes that effect human capital development.</p>

<p> Developmental education policies in community colleges are being debated by the federal and state governments, foundations, and non-profit organizations. Much attention is being paid to community college students who need precollege level coursework in English and Mathematics. The Massachusetts' Department of Higher Education is actively promoting dialogue about community colleges, but one group remains outside of the policy conversation, namely students. They are subjects of educational research but have not been considered partners in policy dialogue. </p><p> The goal of this study was to examine and provide a forum for community college students to communicate their perspectives on the supports and barriers they face in their academic progress, and to identify ways to improve higher educational policy at the institutional and state level. Students enrolled in an eastern Massachusetts community college and who were placed into developmental courses were invited to participate in a Photovoice Project as co-researchers with the author. Participants took photos, discussed them, wrote captions, grouped their photos into themes, and presented their work in an exhibit. Each participant also took part in a focus group to examine supports and barriers raised during the Photovoice Project sessions. The resulting visual, narrative, and participant observation data were analyzed using narrative analysis methods: thematic analysis, structural analysis, dialogic/performance analysis, and visual analysis. This study offered developmental students an opportunity to provide feedback on the current ecologically based model of education policy, where national policy defines the conversation, which is narrowed by state policy and, finally, campus policy with the student in the center of concentric circles. The analytic framework of identity was used to understand developmental students' multiple identities, expressed in their photos, captions, group discussions, and interactions, and in turn to understand how these identities were nested in educational communities: the classroom, the peer group, and the institution. Participating students appeared to gain a new discourse identity as contributors to the policy conversation around educational policy. </p><p> This research produced three themes based on the contributions of the co-researchers, requests for transparency in placement testing procedures, opportunities for reinvention, and ongoing opportunities to be heard. Students were supported in moving forward when they had opportunities to share power with others in the community; they experienced frustration and disorientation when power was simply exercised over them. The value of involving students in a participatory, visual research methodology was also explored; students expressed support for these types of participatory "voicing" opportunities for all community college students, not just developmental ones. Marshall Ganz's theory of public narrative provided a lens for explaining why a method such as Photovoice could serve to include this at risk population in the policy debate. This study provides a lens for reassessing policies at the institutional and state levels. Policy implications include re-examining enrollment as the basis for determining community college funding and including a calculation based on student retention; providing training and certification for faculty teaching developmental courses at community colleges; transforming placement testing, fostering a more challenging curriculum where developmental students encounter college level work, and institutionalizing inclusion of student voices in policy development. </p><p> The limitations of this study include that, as an exploratory study, no direct conclusions can be drawn but the findings may be useful in broadening the ongoing community college policy debate and indicating potential areas for future research to improve academic progress of all community college students, including those deemed developmental. Including student voices, especially those most at-risk in the most American sector of public higher education--the community college--is a democratic, social justice, and social policy imperative.</p>

<p> Cross-border state distance higher education policy is a complex web of complicated and often contradictory regulations stretching across 50 states and 14 US territories. This study examined the applicability of strategic choice theory to state higher education policy innovation in the context of the adoption of polices that regulate the distance education operations of out-of-state, regionally accredited higher education institutions. Using Event History Analysis, the role of power structures and the political and social environment in which policy adoption decisions were made were examined alongside established policy adoption predictors. Significant applicability of strategic choice theory to state distance higher education policy adoption was identified. Findings indicate that cross-border distance higher education policy adoption diverges from established trends in state higher education policy adoption, and that public and non-public institutions have the potential to play key roles in shaping future policy adoption.</p>

<p>This study explored the implementation of social science English-taught undergraduate degree programs in Japanese universities and investigated the challenges they face. As higher education institutions in Japan seek to become more competitive, many institutions are introducing undergraduate degrees taught exclusively through the English language. Existing research in non-Anglophone countries has shown that programs differ in their rationales for implementation and in their design and characteristics, and therefore, experience different types of implementation challenges that inspire varied responses. However, in Japan, studies in the English language focusing on the implementation of English as a medium of instruction in higher education are few and concern only short-term and graduate programs. This study used a qualitative multiple-case study design to examine four-year social science undergraduate programs at three universities from the perspectives of those involved with the implementation process. Data were generated via 27 interviews with senior administrators, faculty members and international education support staff. </p><p> The results indicate that the rationales for implementing the programs at the case-study institutions are grounded in a desire to increase competitiveness, with a focus on developing the international competencies of domestic Japanese students. Program design is oriented towards international and Japanese students in the same classrooms and is influenced by the understandings of key program implementers. Structural challenges were found to be the most significant obstacles to program implementation. In particular, institutions struggle with issues relating to program coherence and expansion, student recruitment and program identity. Structural challenges are so prominent that the study proposes a new typology of challenges facing the implementation of English-taught programs in Japan. This typology includes challenges related to the constructed understandings of the programs as institutions within the university. Practical responses to the challenges consist of discrete actions with little movement made that affects the university more broadly. Five salient elements that play an important role in the implementation of all of the case-study programs were also identified. These comprise the presence of committed leadership, implementer orientation regarding the English language, the position of the program within its institution, student recruitment, and the clarification of outcomes and goals. </p>

<p> Students who declare a major follow a sequence of courses beginning with the introductory course in the major that is usually defined as a 100-level, or freshman level course. This introductory class is called a gateway class, as students must complete this course to register for the next sequence of courses within their major. This study examined and measured the relationship between first-time, full-time freshman, college students who attempted a gateway class within their declared major during their first semester of college and the retention of these students to their second semester. The study also analyzed retention rates for students who declared a major, completed a class, but not the gateway class in their major and the retention rate for these students. Finally, the study analyzed students who did not declare a major, completed a class, and the retention rate for these students. The findings in this study suggests first-time, full-time freshman students who declared a major and successfully completed the gateway class were more likely to persist, then students who were unsuccessful with the gateway class, or students who declared a major, completed a class, but not the gateway class in their major. To improve retention of first-time, full-time freshman students, the results of this study indicate changes are warranted in the way students are advised with regard to which classes they should complete in their first semester of college. </p>