Source: Dissertation Abstracts International, Volume: 40-10, Section: A, page: 5331. / Thesis (Ph.D.)--The Florida State University, 1979.

Source: Dissertation Abstracts International, Volume: 40-10, Section: A, page: 5331. / Thesis (Ph.D.)--The Florida State University, 1979.

Operation Involvement is an educational outreach program of The University of West Florida. It provides part-time employment to students enrolled full time at the University or one of the community colleges in Northwest Florida. These students are responsible, under supervision, for the development, implementation, and evaluation of programs aimed at the prevention of juvenile delinquency. / The study was conducted for two basic purposes. First, to establish a baseline for additional evaluative studies by acquiring descriptive data. Secondly, to provide data to guide program administrators in improving program design and implementation. To fulfill these purposes the following questions were asked: (1) To what extent were the educational goals of the program achieved as reflected by the attainment of objectives among the student participants? (2) To what extent did the program objectives affect the career performance of students following graduation? (3) To what extent were there differences between achievement of objectives while students were in the program and the effect of objectives on careers after graduation? Twelve objectives were established as criteria for measuring goal attainment. A 93-item rating scale was developed for use in determining the extent that the objectives were achieved. / Approximately two-thirds of all student workers who graduated from the program responded to the survey instrument. Data were treated by the use of frequency distribution, mean weighted scores, and t-tests. / The findings indicated that three of the program's four goals were achieved at a relatively high level as perceived by the respondents. / Recommendations were made to assist in strengthening certain aspects of the program and in regard to the need for incorporating into the structure and literature of Operation Involvement the program goals and objectives as developed in this study. / Source: Dissertation Abstracts International, Volume: 41-03, Section: A, page: 0958. / Thesis (Educat.D.)--The Florida State University, 1980.

The objectives of this study were to determine to what degree the perceptions about selected aspects of Pensacola Junior College held by the seniors of Escambia County public high schools were congruent with the information which the college personnel expected them to receive; and to what degree were the selected delivery systems used by Pensacola Junior College effective in reaching the seniors as perceived by the seniors and compared with the expectation of the college personnel. / Two survey instruments were designed to compare the perceptions of the seniors and the expectation of senior responses by selected personnel from Pensacola Junior College who were closely associated with this communication process. The instruments were identical except for the instructions. The seniors responded to the survey instrument as they perceived the information impacted on each of them. The personnel responded to each option by indicating the percentage of the seniors they expected to respond to each item. Replies to the surveys were analyzed and the researcher determined what percentage differences existed between the seniors and personnel expectations. These results were reported in graphical format showing the response of the seniors and personnel along with the percentage of difference. Conclusions were drawn relative to these disparities and recommendations given. / Source: Dissertation Abstracts International, Volume: 41-03, Section: A, page: 0955. / Thesis (Educat.D.)--The Florida State University, 1980.

Guidelines for Two-Year College Learning Resources Programs (1972) and Quantitative Standards for Two-Year Learning Resources Programs (1979) were adopted and published by leading national learning resources organizations as criteria recommended as useful for improving the quality of two-year college learning resources programs. Guidelines and Standards were developed by committees of learning resources people who relied on suggestions from interested practitioners in the field, and on the professional knowledge and opinions of members of the committees themselves. There is no requirement that Guidelines or Standards are to be used, and the decision to use them remains with the individual colleges. Therefore, the purpose of this study was to determine the extent to which Guidelines has been used and Standards would be used in two-year colleges in the United States. / The method of research was the descriptive survey sent to a random sample of two-year colleges in the United States. The survey instrument was developed by the researcher to determine the differences in the use of Guidelines and Standards among the chief learning resources officers of the three types of colleges surveyed, and to learn something about the purposes for which the criteria were used. / The researcher found that fewer than half of the respondents had made significant use of Guidelines or planned to make significant use of Standards. The researcher further found that fewer than one-third of the respondents felt that their college administrations supported the use of Guidelines or Standards as evidence of educational accountability or as evidence of a quality learning resources program. / Based on the findings, the researcher asked questions which may be summarized as follows: "Are the national learning resources organizations that adopted Guidelines and Standards satisfied with the extent of use and support indicated by the study, or do they see a need to revise the criteria to make them more useful?" / The researcher recommended that future revisions of Guidelines and Standards be based on needs identified by the colleges that will use the criteria, and that such revisions be aimed at analyzing the educational effectiveness of the learning resources programs at individual colleges as a basis for demonstrating more realistic evidence of need. / Source: Dissertation Abstracts International, Volume: 41-07, Section: A, page: 2967. / Thesis (Educat.D.)--The Florida State University, 1980.

This study investigated three major questions: (1) What staff development needs are identified by community college faculty?; (2) what staff development needs are identified by community college administrators?; and (3) how do the perceptions of faculty compare with the perceptions of administrators with regard to community college staff development needs? / The population for this study consisted of administrators and faculty members from the twenty-eight public community colleges in Florida. A seventy item questionnaire covered staff development needs in instruction, service, administration and training considerations. / Three critical areas of staff development need identified by community college faculty were: (1) creating an environment in which the student assumes responsibility for his own learning; (2) guidance and counseling; and (3) participative management. Three critical areas of need identified by administrators were: (1) developing programs for disadvantaged students; (2) knowledge about remedial and developmental programs; and (3) collecting and using data properly. This study found significant perceptual administrators. It also produced three major reasons for faculty apathy in staff development program participation: (1) lack of sufficient time; (2) lack of administrative support; and (3) lack of knowledge of the potential benefits of staff development. / Source: Dissertation Abstracts International, Volume: 41-09, Section: A, page: 3912. / Thesis (Ph.D.)--The Florida State University, 1980.

The purpose of this study was to determine the status of top-level black women administrators in two-year and four-year higher education institutions, and to determine the perceptions of top-level black women administrators regarding the perceived effect of race and sex on their career progression. / A STATUS OF WOMEN(STOW)-Form I was mailed to the chief executive officers at 322 institutions requesting them to identify their top-level black women administrators. Responses to the STOW-Form I were received from 262 institutions (81.3%), but only 183 institutions reported top-level black women administrators. One hundred and ninety top-level black women administrators were identified. A STATUS OF WOMEN-Form II was mailed to these 190 top-level black women administrators, and 170 responses were received (89.4%). / The respondents to STOW-Form I who were primarily Affirmative Action Officers or Assistants to the President, reported that women composed an average of 22.8% of the full-time faculty positions and an average of 10.1% of the administrative positions on their campuses. Most of the faculty and administrative positions, however, were held by white women. / STOW-Form II determined that black women were well distributed among the administrative groups. The majority were in the Student Affairs and Administrative Affairs categories. This study did not report any black women chief executives. / The majority of the respondents were in predominantly white, four-year, public institutions, and earned between $20,000-$29,000. The highest degree attained was a master's degree and was usually attained at a predominantly white institution. / Two-thirds of the women did not have tenure or faculty rank, had been employed in their present position for 5-9 years, and had held a lower or middle management administrative position in their previous job. / The perceptions of black women revealed that their administrative responsibilities matched their administrative titles, and that race and sex had a negative effect on their career progression. / Source: Dissertation Abstracts International, Volume: 42-06, Section: A, page: 2525. / Thesis (Ph.D.)--The Florida State University, 1981.

The purposes of this case study were (1) to provide a descriptive profile of students served by Bainbridge Junior College, located in rural southwest Georgia, (2) to examine the retention of these students at the college, and (3) to investigate the persistence of these students in postsecondary education. Community colleges in general tend to have higher attrition rates than four-year institutions. / The study was implemented in three phases: (1) examination of a sample of 585 student permanent records at the college, (2) mailed survey to a sample of 293 former students, and (3) planned interviews with persons identified as atypical high persisters in postsecondary education. Three instruments were developed by the investigator. Responses in Phase II were received from 116 former students or 41.4 percent of the sample. No atypical high persisters were able to be contacted for an interview. / The dependent variables, retention and persistence, were viewed as (1) college degree awarded, or (2) number of hours completed. Statistical tests of 16 hypotheses at the .05 level of significance analyzing retention/persistence with various demographic, academic, motivational, and college environmental variables yielded the following results. In Phase I, statistically significant relationships were found between retention at the college and the following variables: age, county of residence, academic load, type of program, time interval since receiving a high school diploma, high school grades and Scholastic Aptitude Test scores, and first-term college grades. The results were non-significant for the variables: sex, ethnic origin, and marital status. The findings in Phase II revealed statistically significant relationships between persistence in postsecondary education and the following variables: receipt of financial aid, socio-economic origin, parents' educational level, and positive student peer relationships. Non-significant findings were indicated for parental encouragement and non-classroom faculty interfaces. Phase III objectives were not able to be studied as only one person was identified as an atypical persister. Efforts to contact this person were not successful. / Source: Dissertation Abstracts International, Volume: 42-10, Section: A, page: 4315. / Thesis (Ph.D.)--The Florida State University, 1981.

This study assessed the degree of the relationship between a computerized method and a manual method of ranking AE Rating tasks for commonality in terms of (1) the agreement between manual and computer rankings of identical tasks, and (2) the comparative costs of two similar projects, one utilizing a computer, and the other utilizing the manual process. / Data were subjected to the Kendall Coefficient of Concordance and to the Spearman Rank Correlation Coefficient statistical tests; ten and eleven of the twelve sets of data achieved statistical significance at or above the .05 level for the two tests, respectively. In terms of practical significance, the two methods produced similar, statistically significant results. / A cost analysis resulted in the recommendation that the computerized method be selected for implementation in the Navy. / Source: Dissertation Abstracts International, Volume: 42-10, Section: A, page: 4317. / Thesis (Ph.D.)--The Florida State University, 1981.

The purpose of this study was to determine whether: (1) students in a selected major had a predominant cognitive learning style, (2) a particular cognitive learning style of students was related to academic achievement, (3) a match or mismatch of cognitive learning styles of students and cognitive learning styles of instructional settings was related to level of student achievement, (4) the two instruments used to categorize cognitive learning styles of students resulted in similarities in classification of students into learning style categories, (5) and instructors' cognitive learning styles were related to their instructional presentation style. The Witkin Group Embedded Figures Test and the Kolb Learning Style Inventory were used to classify 173 fashion merchandising students and six instructors into cognitive learning style categories. The Herold Teaching Strategy Observation Checklist was used to categorize six clothing/textile classes into instructional styles of field independent or field dependent. Results showed students in the selected field of fashion merchandising did have a predominant cognitive learning style. Fifty nine percent of the students were field dependent and 41% were field independent on the Witkin instrument. The Kolb Inventory showed 44.5% were Divergers, 30.6% were Accommodators, 14.5% were Assimilators, 10.4% were Convergers. No relationship was found between a particular cognitive learning style and academic achievement. No relationship was found between a match or mismatch of cognitive learning style of student and instructional setting and student achievement. The Kolb and Witkin instruments showed no similarities in classification of students into learning style categories. There was no significant relationship between personal cognitive learning style of teachers and their style of teaching. / Source: Dissertation Abstracts International, Volume: 46-04, Section: A, page: 0905. / Thesis (Ph.D.)--The Florida State University, 1985.