Utilizing a quantitative approach, the researcher examined the extent to which undergraduate students participating in a college work experience program agreed with statements relating their experience in the program to the characteristics of high impact practices and the career readiness competencies. Additionally, the researcher determined which characteristics of high impact practices were statistically related to each career readiness competency. The characteristics of high impact practices are: high performance expectations, investment of time and effort, interactions with faculty and peers, experiences with diversity, receipt of constructive feedback, opportunities for reflection and integration of learning, real-world applications, and demonstration of competencies. The career readiness competencies are: problem solving, communication, teamwork, digital technology, leadership, professionalism, career management, and intercultural fluency. College work experience programs are not formally recognized as a high impact practice. Moreover, there is limited existing research regarding the impact of these programs on career readiness and the connection between high impact practice characteristics and career readiness competencies. Results of this research revealed that all high impact practice characteristics except one (interactions with faculty and peers) had means, medians, and modes representing agreement. In addition, all career readiness competencies had means, medians, and modes signifying high levels of agreement. Using a series of multiple regressions, specific high impact practice characteristics were found to be statistically related to each career readiness competency. This research contributes to higher education discussions regarding high impact practices and career readiness.

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The purpose of this study was to describe the lived experiences of doctoral engineering students' socialization with their advisors and colleagues. Using snowballing sampling methods, eleven students with research or teaching assistantship from three engineering programs from a large University in the Southeastern US agreed to participate. Face-to-face interviews were audio-recorded, descriptively transcribed, and analyzed using a variation of Colaizzi's method. Participants experienced difficulty adjusting to the workplace norms of the PhD program, which some did not start with clear expectations. Some participants lacked work experience before starting, but were thankful for support from more experienced doctoral students. Most participants were also frustrated by unreasonable time demands and heavy workload around deadlines. Participants were hesitant to share concerns with their advisors, fearing repercussions. Through trial and error and assistance from labmates, participants learned to work independently and become problem solvers. Participants from one rapidly changing and competitive field of engineering experienced additional stressed as they tried to keep pace with scholarly advances and publish more research. Participants' experiences corroborate some prior research about doctoral student socialization, but suggest that engineering their socialization was guided by a constellation of role models and not primarily by their advisors. Also contrary to prior research, even though most participants were international students, they did not experience significant difficulties with cultural adjustment to the US. Their cultural adjustment was aided by large number of other doctoral students from their region of the world and the fact that they had little time to venture out of their labs. Suggestions for future research are discussed.

National employment data forecasts a significant need for graduates in the STEM disciplines for middle-income American jobs. If the American labor force is to keep pace with the global economy, it is critically important that American higher education increase STEM degree production. Currently, minority populations lack access and thus opportunity for success in higher education, but, among them, Hispanic peoples account for about 59 million Americans, are the youngest demographic, and have the highest growth rate of any ethnic group. Hispanic students are inadequately represented in higher education enrollment numbers, graduation rates, graduate degree attainment, and STEM degree attainment. While only 14% of American institutions of higher education are designated as Hispanic Serving Institutions (HSIs), 64% of Hispanic American college students attend an HSI. As a result, HSIs are in a unique position to improve student success in STEM disciplines. A statistical analysis of the grades of Hispanic and White students in introductory STEM courses at three Florida HSI universities, University of Central Florida, Florida International University, and Florida Atlantic University, and two non-HSI universities, University of West Florida and Florida Gulf Coast University, revealed 1) White students significantly outperformed Hispanic students in CHM 2045 at UWF, FGCU, and UCF and 2) White students significantly outperformed Hispanic students in MAC 2311 at UWF and FGCU and 3) Hispanic students at the HSIs (FAU and FIU) earned significantly higher grades in CHM 2045 compared to the Hispanic students at non-HSIs (UWF and FGCU). All other comparisons revealed no statistically significant difference in mean course grades.

The present dissertation investigates elements of domain formalization, resource allocation, and student success in higher education to conceptually design a university-wide system to assist in strategic planning efforts. The proposed system is a program-level tool with a modular design to allow scalability and generalizability across the entire university. Higher education strategic planning decisions are under investigation by stakeholders and transparency is needed. University resources allocation models are often outdated lack to adequately support program-level decisions. Further, with the dynamic nature of technology, domain knowledge components are evolving rapidly. This complicates the situation as updating curriculum takes additional time and resources. Using the University of Central Florida's (UCF) School of Modeling, Simulation, and Training (SMST) as a case study to build and validate the system, I investigate Modeling and Simulation (M&S) domain knowledge, skills, and abilities (KSAs) using a series of natural language, text mining, and machine learning techniques to model topics within domain-specific texts including publication abstracts, job postings, and graduate course descriptions. From there, I use this information to identify and enumerate terms used to develop M&S ontology and expert models for the future university-wide system. This investigation benefits both the M&S field of study, clarifying ill-defined domain components and it helps inform the design of university-wide strategic planning systems.

This thesis examined the potential literacy practices, of students who self-identify as multiracial, that occur in the composition classroom within higher education. Because literacy by nature is contextualized and ideological it is important that we understand how identity plays a crucial role in literacy practices. Race is a social construct that has influences on identity as well as the literacy narratives of students in higher education, and although there has been research on literacy as it relates to monoracial students there is a lack of scholarship on what it means for a student to identify with more than one race in higher education and how this identity influences their literacy practices. This thesis employs both New Literacy Studies and Critical Race Theory as a lens to identify how space is, or is not, created for the multifaceted identities of multiracial students to come forth. In order to identify how space is created for multiracial students I collected course syllabi and major assignments utilized in second semester composition courses at the Universtiy of Central Florida I also conducted interviews with three students who self-identify as multiracial. I found that although space is created for multiracial student agency within the composition classroom this is problematized by the existence of multiracial microaggressions. I argue that multiracial microaggressions are an allusion to systemic racism in institutions of higher education; they are an example of how institutions of higher education can continue to perpetuate disparities even though they seek to promote diversity and inclusion. In order to continue to move towards inclusion, instructors need to know more about multiracial student experiences and the implications of these experiences within the composition classroom.

According to my literature review and my reflection of its meaning, few studies have been conducted that explore the adjustment and acculturation experiences of female international students in US colleges and universities specifically on Saudi female students. Therefore, this study explored the academic and socio-cultural experiences of Saudi female students before and after arriving in the US. Furthermore, this study identified the sources of acculturative stress and Saudi female students' successful strategies for coping with these stressors. Eight Saudi female students participated in one-on-one semi-structured interviews and Moustakas' (1994) transcendental phenomenology was utilized in analyzing students' voices. During the data analysis process, there were five themes that emerged from the data, including sociocultural expectations and issues, motivation for studying abroad, challenges, coping strategies, and adaptation. The results of this study provided recommendations for American and Saudi higher education administrators and faculty concerning how to help Saudi female students adjust to American culture and campus life and provide appropriate academic environments for this growing population.

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