The purpose of this study is to measure the effects of the Leadership Inspiration Facilitation Team (LIFT) program on the life effectiveness and locus of control of a group of sixth grade students at Schultz Middle School. The participants consisted of 36 sixth grade students, ages 10 to 12 years, from a single public middle school. The participants attended a two-day summer adventure-based ROPES camp. The Review of Personal Effectiveness and Locus of Control (ROPELOC) instrument was administered at the beginning (pre-test), the end (post-test), and six months later (follow-up). The twelve domains of life effectiveness have been identified, including active involvement, cooperative teamwork, leadership ability, open thinking, quality seeking, self confidence, self efficacy, social effectiveness, stress management, time efficiency, coping with change, and overall effectiveness. Two domains of locus of control were identified: external and internal. Composite ROPELOC, subscale, and gender data were all analyzed using t-tests of independent samples. The analysis showed no significant improvement in participants? composite ROPELOC score between the pre, post, and follow-up. However, there was an increase between the pre and post, although the increase was not at a significant level. Significant increases in participants? scores were found in three of the 14 ROPELOC subscales: cooperative teamwork, coping with change, and external locus of control. Significance for cooperative teamwork was found between the pre-test and post-test. Significance for coping with change and external locus of control was found between the pre-test and follow-up, as well as between the post-test and follow-up using a significance of .05. Gender was found to have made no difference in composite ROPELOC scores. Participants in the LIFT summer program have increased self-perceptions of life effectiveness at the immediate conclusion of the program. The degree of significance has yet to be determined, and the length of significance is still in question. Researchers maintain that positive youth development is a complex myriad of interventions. Positive youth development has taken a proactive shift to promote healthy development outcomes for all youth, in addition to reducing long-term negative outcomes of at-risk youth and has emerged into its own as an independent field of study. In addition, positive youth development is resulting from the combination of several factors that lead to the development of more comprehensive models and the development of programs which address multiple behaviors and that involve families and community.

Science, technology, engineering, and mathematics (STEM) are important fields in today’s world. Educators can incorporate informal STEM learning opportunities into their curriculum by taking students on field trips. In this research, 210 Mississippi STEM education centers were identified, and 50 completed a survey about their programs. 17 Mississippi STEM clubs were identified and 14 completed surveys. 81 Mississippi STEM K-12 educators also completed surveys about field trips and STEM programs offered near them. A Google Map, a Geodatabase, shapefiles, and Google Spreadsheets were created to manage these data. Maps were created displaying locations of STEM centers, responses from STEM centers and educators, and areas of the state where there is high interest in collaboration to create new programs. The deliverables of this research will be incorporated to the first STEMocused website for the state of Mississippi. This website could help teachers identify more informal STEM opportunities for their students.

This dissertation examines the link between cooking and learning. It first examines John Dewey’s pedagogical philosophy in which he asserts that the kitchen laboratory was an ideal learning environment to teach and learn about a broad range of subjects, an illustration of Dewey’s philosophical notions about true experiential education. Second, there is an examination of a Home Economic Department and its historical role in teaching cooking which introduces the issues of cooking and learning in the post secondary, higher education context. Finally to determine whether Dewey’s kitchen-based pedagogical approach applied in higher education, a pedagogical experiment was undertaken in which cooking was integrated into a college-level humanities course on food and culture. Reported as a case study, the ‘experiment’ was to recreate Dewey’s University of Chicago Laboratory School’s curriculum with 28 college-aged students in a kitchen laboratory at the University of Vermont. This qualitative research yielded results that suggest that Dewey’s methodology is a highly effective pedagogy at the college level and enhances students’ learning about the role of food in their own and in other cultures. Finally, these findings make the case for including more interdisciplinary, experientially based learning opportunities in higher education, generally, and for using food laboratories as a site for such learning opportunities.

The following study was conducted over 21 months in the South Pacific. I served as Academic Coordinator for World Learning’s SIT’s Study Abroad program in Samoa for three semesters. While overseeing independent study projects, facilitating working relationships, and promoting cross-cultural communication among the American and Pacific Islander/Samoan tertiary students, I concluded that -- through cultural immersion, experiential education and deliberate, academically fostered communication and discussion both Western and Indigenous identities are capable of converging to better mutual and lasting understanding. I spent ten months in Samoa completing my field research and five months in New Zealand completing my library research. Over the course of three academic semesters, this study evolved through my volunteer work with the group Rotaract Samoa, my research and teaching experiences with an experiential education programme, and indirectly incorporating 36 American students from various US tertiary institutions participating in the SIT Study Abroad’s Pacific Communities and Social Change semester in Samoa, and over 120 Pacific Island students and staff on the University of the South Pacific (USP) campus in Alafua, Samoa. Encouraging American students to foster relationships with indigenous peoples offered insights into the process and progress of the students’ shared interactions. Students were uncomfortable and awkward in their initial associations, however, over time, through the program’s immersion techniques, the students learned valuable lessons, about Samoan culture and themselves as human beings. I found the use of experiential education programmes and convergence methodology in multicultural learning environments ultimately promoted multi-perspective, culturally responsive student development. I collected my data through interviews, participant-observations, surveys, questionnaires, volunteering and teaching. I analysed my data using a self-reflexive anthropological perspective.

This phenomenological study sought to identify the common attributes of meaningful learning experiences as found in an outdoor education program. The pragmatic educational philosophy of John Dewey provides the rationale for the essence of meaningful learning in our schools and this research identifies the attributes of educative reflective experiences that are also meaningful learning experiences. Thirteen students enrolled in the Wilderness Writing Program, offered during the fall semester of 2003 at Brigham Young University in Provo, Utah, made up the focus group of this study. Their participation in four outdoor recreational activities and their reflections about their experiences became the basis of this research. Through written journal entries, focus group discussions, observations, and writing assignments, this study took a qualitative approach to identifying patterns of attributes that appeared to occur in meaningful learning experiences. This study found that meaningful learning experiences were identified by participants who experienced a period of awkwardness followed by a purifying process, or sublimation. A reflective period allowed for reconstruction of a person 19s view of himself or herself and this was closely tied with feedback from others in the group. The findings of this study can give educators specific components that appear to be crucial ingredients to meaningful learning experiences.

There has been a limited amount of research on the use of experiential education with music therapy students. Most of the research conducted has focused on the experiences of graduate level students. The purpose of this mixed methods study was to understand the potential effect of experiential music therapy education on undergraduate and graduate equivalency students' reported empathy and self-esteem. Five undergraduate and five graduate equivalency students were enrolled in a music therapy course in which they were asked to role-play the therapist and the client in mock music therapy sessions. Undergraduate participants completed the Davis Interpersonal Reactivity Index (IRI) and the Janis-Field Feelings of Inadequacy Scale (Janis-Field) as pre and posttest measures. Undergraduates also provided responses to elicited journal questions and participated in a semi-structured telephone interview. Graduate participants completed the IRI and the Janis-Field as a posttest measure after the completion of the semester, provided responses to elicited journal questions, and participated in a semi-structured telephone interview. There were no significant changes from pretest to posttest for undergraduate students and no significant relationships between the posttest scores of undergraduate and graduate participants. Qualitative data analysis for undergraduate and graduate students indicated that participants were able to identify changes in their own empathy and self-esteem as a result of the role-playing experiences. Implications for further research are discussed. / Music Therapy

This thesis seeks to advance a curriculum which provides learners with educative experiences required to promote an ecological literacy. This particular type of literacy enables individuals and communities to understand their connectedness to all systems, to appreciate the finite carrying capacity of the planet, to predict consequences of human activity, and to ultimately create sustainable communities through action, or praxis. The proposed curriculum is a vision of public education in Manitoba, borrowing examples of experiences throughout the world which are then adapted to meet the ecological, social, and political realities of this province. It is a utopian-inspired curriculum as it seeks to shed current restraints imposed by contemporary educational practices in Manitoba. By removing certain constraints, this philosophical inquiry can then be used to provoke a dialogue as to how we might transform learners into agents of social and ecological change. / October 2016

Master of Arts / Department of Communication Studies / Sarah Riforgiate / Internships provide students with valuable learning experiences in their chosen fields. Considering that one of the most important components of students’ learning experiences during an internship is learning how to socialize and assimilate into organizational settings, an internship stage model should be able to account for this particular process – organizational assimilation. This study contends that existing internship stage models overlap and can be enhanced by organizational assimilation theory (Jablin, 1987). Therefore, this qualitative study includes data from 13 semi-structured interviews with students who participated in formal internships in order to explore students’ assimilation experiences during the course of their internships. Additionally, how interns view the host organization’s identity and its impact on their assimilation experience was examined. Findings indicate that students are more adaptive to socialization than individualization in terms of their responsibilities and roles during organizational assimilation. Further, the concept of organizational identity was so complex and intricate that students could not grasp their host organizations’ identity during the course of their internships; instead, through their organizational assimilation experience, participants learned the culture of the organizations.

Doctor of Philosophy / Curriculum and Instruction Programs / Michael C. Holen / There is a call for education, including teacher education, to transform from solely transmitting knowledge to creating dynamic learning opportunities for students to experience real-world situations so they can develop the skills and competencies necessary to navigate a changing and unpredictable world. Service-learning is proposed as one strategy to facilitate this transformation. Therefore, the purpose of this qualitative case study was to describe how individual or group service-learning experiences might impact the attitudes and beliefs of pre-service teachers in a teacher education course. This study was guided by two research questions: How do pre-service teacher participants describe their individual or group service-learning experiences within the context of a required teacher education course? In what ways do participants' attitudes and beliefs towards service-learning vary, based on individual or group service-learning experiences? The service-learning experiences for this study were designed using experiential educational theory and a blended framework from service-learning common goals (academic enhancement, personal/professional growth, and civic learning) and common components (academic material, critical reflection and relevant service) (Ash, Clayton, & Moses, 2009). Fourteen pre-service students agreed to participate in the study. Two sources of data were identified, (a) individual semi-structured, face-to-face interviews and (b) critical reflective journals written by participants. Findings suggest that service-learning experiences reinforce academic content including experiential education. Personal and professional growth and an understanding of diversity can result from service-learning experiences. Teacher involvement in the local community was viewed by participants as important for student-teacher relationships and to improve connections between the school and the community. Participants of the study viewed critical reflection as a fundamental component in service-learning. Self-identified personality type can impact how each participant described their individual or group service-learning experiences, including benefits of social interaction and collaboration. Individual and group service-learning present different challenges in implementing effective experiences. Participants’ beliefs and attitudes did not vary based upon individual or group service-learning experiences. In conclusion, incorporating the experiential pedagogy of service-learning in teacher education programs can better prepare pre-service teachers for the very unpredictable nature of teaching.

This thesis is a study of outdoor education, in the deliberative tradition of curriculum inquiry. It examines the intentional generation and distribution of knowledge, beliefs, and attitudes through organised outdoor activities, both as a research interest, and as a critical perspective on outdoor education discourse. Eight separate but interrelated research projects, originally published in 11 refereed journal articles, develop and defend the thesis statement: The problem of determining what, if any, forms of outdoor experience should be educational priorities, and how those experiences should be distributed in communities and geographically – that is who goes where and does what – is inherently situational. The persistence of a universalist outdoor education discourse that fails to acknowledge or adequately account for social and geographic circumstances points to serious flaws in outdoor education research and theory, and impedes the development of more defensible outdoor education practices. The introduction explains how the eight projects cohere, and illustrates how they may be linked using the example of militaristic thinking in outdoor safety standards. Chapters 1 and 2 defend and elaborate a situationist approach to outdoor education, using the examples of outdoor education in Victoria (Australia), and universalist approaches to outdoor education in textbooks respectively. Chapters 3 and 4 expand on some epistemological implications of the thesis and examine, respectively, the cultural dimensions of outdoor experience, and the epistemology and ontology of local natural history. Chapters 5 and 6 apply a situationist epistemology to personal development based outdoor education. Traditions of outdoor education that draw on person-centred rather than situation-sensitive theories of behaviour are examined and critiqued. Alternatives to person-centred theories of outdoor education are discussed. Chapters 7 and 8 use situationist outdoor education to provide a critical reading of nature-based tourism. Chapters 9, 10, and 11 return to the theme of safety in the introduction and Chapter 1, and examine the safety implications of a situationist epistemology. Closing comments briefly draw together the conclusions of all of the chapters, and offer some directions for future outdoor education research.