After almost two semesters as a graduate student at the University of Vermont, I decided that I wanted to do more in my second year of graduate school. It was through conversations with my colleagues that I determined that stepping out of my comfort zone of student affairs and looking into academic affairs would help develop me as not only a student affairs professional but as an educator as well. During the fall semester of 2016, I participated in an independent study where I served as a Teaching Assistant for a university diversity requirement course titled “The Political Economy of Race”. For this course I worked directly with a faculty member in the Department of Economics to cultivate a holistic classroom experience for the students in the course. Throughout the course of the semester, I was able to witness many different dynamics that were helpful to not only the students but to the professionals in the room as well. Upon completing the semester, I determined that I wanted to do more research and explore the benefits of collaborative partnerships between faculty and staff on college campuses; my focus for this research was to be around partnerships between professionals in student affairs and academic affairs. Although there has not been a lot of research around this particular topic in Higher Education, it is beginning to be studied as colleges and universities are expected to produce more valuable experiences for students. Through both research and experiential learning, I have found that there are benefits to collaborative partnerships between academic and student affairs in Higher Education as well as drawbacks to these partnerships. I have also made recommendations for future collaborative projects between faculty and staff as well as recommendations for future research in this area. Overall, there is value in the collaboration of student and academic affairs; however, it is the duty of Higher Education professionals to understand that value and work more collaboratively to ensure that students are served holistically.

This research study was designed to examine the relationship between globalization as measured by the KOF index, its related forces (economic, political, cultural and technological) and the public provision of higher education. This study is important since globalization is increasingly being associated with changes in critical aspects of higher education. The public provision of education was measured by government expenditure and educational outcomes; that is participation, gender equity and attainment. The study utilized a non-experimental quantitative research design. Data collected from secondary sources for 139 selected countries was analyzed. The countries were geographically distributed and included both developed and developing countries. The choice of countries for inclusion in the study was based on data availability. The data, which was sourced from international organizations such as the United Nations and the World Bank, were examined for different time periods using five year averages. The period covered was 1970 to 2009. The relationship between globalization and the higher education variables was examined using cross sectional regression analysis while controlling for economic, political and demographic factors. The major findings of the study are as follows. For the two spending models, only one revealed a significant relationship between globalization and education with the R2 s ranging from .222 to .448 over the period. This relationship was however negative indicating that as globalization increased, spending on higher education declined. However, for the education outcomes models, this relationship was not significant. For the sub-indices of globalization, only the political dimension showed significance as shown in the spending model. Political globalization was significant for six periods with R2 s ranging from .31 to .52. The study concluded that the results are mixed for both the spending and outcome models. It also found no robust effects of globalization on government education provision. This finding is not surprising given the existing literature which sees mixed results on the social impact of globalization.

For the past several years, U.S. colleges and universities have faced increased pressure to improve retention and graduation rates. At the same time, educational institutions have placed a greater emphasis on the importance of enrolling more students in STEM (science, technology, engineering and mathematics) programs and producing more STEM graduates. The resulting problem faced by educators involves finding new ways to support the success of STEM majors, regardless of their pre-college academic preparation. The purpose of my research study involved utilizing first-year STEM majors’ math SAT scores, unweighted high school GPA, math placement test scores, and the highest level of math taken in high school to develop models for predicting those who were likely to pass their first math and science courses. In doing so, the study aimed to provide a strategy to address the challenge of improving the passing rates of those first-year students attempting STEM-related courses. The study sample included 1018 first-year STEM majors who had entered the same large, public, urban, Hispanic-serving, research university in the Southeastern U.S. between 2010 and 2012. The research design involved the use of hierarchical logistic regression to determine the significance of utilizing the four independent variables to develop models for predicting success in math and science. The resulting data indicated that the overall model of predictors (which included all four predictor variables) was statistically significant for predicting those students who passed their first math course and for predicting those students who passed their first science course. Individually, all four predictor variables were found to be statistically significant for predicting those who had passed math, with the unweighted high school GPA and the highest math taken in high school accounting for the largest amount of unique variance. Those two variables also improved the regression model’s percentage of correctly predicting that dependent variable. The only variable that was found to be statistically significant for predicting those who had passed science was the students’ unweighted high school GPA. Overall, the results of my study have been offered as my contribution to the literature on predicting first-year student success, especially within the STEM disciplines.

abstract: Organizational classifications are critical to a wide variety of stakeholders. Within the domain of higher education, researchers use established classifications for sample selection or within empirical models to account for unobserved organizational characteristics. Colleges and universities, as well as their political principals, often use classifications to form peer-groups and reference sets through which organizational performance is assessed. More broadly, classifications provide aspirational archetypes to an organizational field. Using American higher education as the empirical context, this dissertation introduces Latent Profile Analysis (LPA) as a method to identify the structure of an organizational field and to classify organizations within this structure. Using measures of model fit and concerns for interpretability, this investigation determined that 13 distinctive organizational designs are present in the field of American higher education. Derived groupings are compared to the 2018 Basic Classification from the Carnegie Classification of Institutions of Higher Education. Opportunities and challenges for operationalizing this derived classification are discussed. / Dissertation/Thesis / Doctoral Dissertation Public Administration and Policy 2020

Doctor Educationis / The #FeesMustFall (#FMF) movement which began in 2015 and continued in 2016 was initially a call for free tuition, but soon grew to include substantial academic demands, quickly spiralling into violence and destruction of property. This required university leaders to step into roles for which they were largely untrained and inexperienced –– even for those who were once among the ranks of the protesting students. Neither the operational systems nor the personnel had ever conceived of or anticipated such an unprecedented revolt, and the leadership had to summon all their intuition and acumen to navigate, deciding whether to merely defend their institutions or to concede to students’ demands. Did they manage the moment or lead it, and did they steel their institutions against similar future confrontations? This study used an interpretative phenomenological analysis (IPA) approach to answer the primary research question, and to understand the lived experiences of the participants, which aligned with the interpretive paradigm. Leadership theories and chaos and complexity theories were employed and provided the lens through which the data was collected and analysed. Semi-structured interviews were used as data collection methods with 29 participants. University leaders and staff who did not belong to the leadership band of universities, from six universities participated in the study. The findings revealed that South African university leaders are not adequately trained to lead during crises, and that leadership-enhancement programmes need to be developed to include this component in the training of future leaders for the higher education sector. It further revealed that the Department of Higher Education and Training should take a proactive role in training and supporting university leaders, as well as developing a national communication strategy. This research makes a contribution towards crisis leadership in the South African higher education sector by providing insights for both university leaders as well as the Ministry of Higher Education and Training, as well as proposing a model of crisis leadership.

Fundraising for higher education is a recent phenomenon in Uganda where the government has supported education for decades. Recent structural adjustment and liberalization policies mandated by the World Bank and the IMF and internal financial exigencies have necessitated funding diversification in higher education in Uganda and increased the need for private financial support. In developed countries like the United States, Canada, and increasingly, the United Kingdom, private support from alumni, individuals, corporations, and other stakeholders is a key component of higher education funding. This study used qualitative methodology and a holistic case study research design to explore the fundraising function at Makerere University. Tierney's organizational culture conceptual framework was used and data were collected through semi-structured interviews, an alumni questionnaire, document analysis, and observations. The findings include a governance and management structure that does not adequately support the fundraising function, strategies that are adapted to suit the Ugandan cultural context, perceptions of corruption and lack of transparency; and internal conflicts that limit communication and damage the image of the institution. The findings show that Makerere University is not strategically capitalizing on its position as the oldest and largest public university in Uganda and the region to mobilize private support. Reforms addressing the issues and seeking to enhance student and alumni experiences are contributing to fundraising success in various units. The reform efforts include transitioning to a collegiate system, procuring enterprise- wide financial and student services systems, faculty and staff sensitization, outreach and community engagement. The focus on the vision, mission and operationalizing the strategic plan presents an opportunity to dialogue with stakeholders and resonates with potential donors. The findings highlight a renewed spirit of resourcefulness that leverages old paradigms to integrate economic, cultural and social contexts to proffer innovative models of funding diversification.

Understanding the importance of resilience in academic performance as it pertains to adult online students is valuable to the people who provide services to, work with, and are a part of the population. The need to develop and enhance social programs that will improve outcomes for students with trauma-related disabilities is beneficial in increasing graduation rates and improving on the time it takes for adult online students to graduate. There is also a need for research focused on students with trauma-related disabilities because the literature in the field was found to be lacking in information. The purpose of the study was to investigate whether resilience level and age are predictors of academic performance among adult online learners with trauma-related disabilities. The data were collected using a demographic questionnaire and an online survey with students at two online universities. This quasi-experimental quantitative study used the post-traumatic growth theory as its theoretical foundation. A total of 110 participants completed the online demographic questionnaire and Resilience Scale. The analysis used a predictive equation of multiple linear regression with students' grade point average as the criterion variable and resiliency and age as predictor variables. The analysis indicated that there was no significant relationship between the variables. The study contributed to positive social change by reviewing the importance of fostering resilience in an academic setting, particularly for adult online students with trauma-related disabilities. Additionally, the study found no implication that age influences resilience, which means further studies do not need to focus on age as a variable in predicting resilience.

The purpose of this study was to examine the perceptions that differ among university personnel and students with disabilities regarding the vagueness in the legal definition of the term reasonable accommodations. The theoretical framework that guided this study was the social model of disability. Using a sequential mixed-method design, the first strand surveyed 98 students and 93 personnel; then 10% of each group participated in an interview or focus group. The main research questions explored the different accommodations offered by university personnel versus those that were used by students and the different perceptions of the term reasonable accommodations in accordance with ADA law. A chi-square test was used to analyze yes/no survey data and a t test was used for the Likert scale question. In the first strand there were statistically significant findings in distribution and perception of 35 specific accommodations, including advocacy and counseling. Both focus group and interview data were analyzed and themes emerged, such as specific accommodations. An important finding from the qualitative strand was that more than half the students thought they were not receiving reasonable accommodations while the majority of university personnel thought they provided reasonable accommodations. The key result was the lack of a clear consensus between students with disabilities and university personnel in definitions of reasonable accommodations. Disseminating the results of this research study can create positive social change in the legislative and academic arenas by creating a better understanding of the impact of the current standard of reasonable accommodations. One recommendation is the creation of federal and state level commissions to administer, manage, and maintain policies for colleges.

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