Rebecca Smith

The population of first-generation (FGEN) students in higher education is growing rapidly. While prior research often centers on perceived deficits within this group, recent research has begun to shift the narrative by focusing on the unique strengths and diverse experiences these students bring to the academic environment. Transformative leadership, a framework introduced by Carolyn Shields, emphasizes challenging inequitable practices and structures in ways that foster individual or collective transformation. This explanatory sequential mixed-methods study utilizes that framework to explore both the perceptions of and the impact of transformative leadership for FGEN students, particularly in terms of fostering positive relationships, enhancing support networks, increasing persistence, and strengthening their sense of belonging. The findings connect to both institutional and programmatic recommendations as well as explicit pedagogies for faculty and college classrooms. We seek to offer practical recommendations for integrating these strategies both inside and outside the classroom to better support FGEN students’ leadership development.

The purpose of this qualitative study was to envision a framework for how to authentically care for students, particularly within a COVID sociopolitical context. Our research question examined: What could a framework of sociopolitical care look like? This research utilized Noddings' (1998, 2012) care theory, critical theories, and indigenous pedagogy to envision care that centers the student within a broader relational community. Major issues addressed Noddings' (1988) care framework has provided meaningful guidance for educators seeking to care for their students. In it, she argues for a reframing of the aims of education around care, modeling, dialogue, practice, and confirmation. However, for reasons surfaced by the twin pandemics of the COVID-19 and systemic and institutionalized racism, the limits of Noddings' ethic of care has come into full relief. While Noddings is careful to create some space for student agency in how she conceptualizes care, the process of caring is initiated by the teacher and is focused on a unidirectional relationship whereby the teacher cares for the student. In this paper, we explore the construct of care within Teacher Education, focusing on the role of care in the early months learning during the early months of the COVID-19 Pandemic. Previous work examined how the context of the COVID-19 pandemic impacted how we consider and define the elements of care (Smith, Sutton, & Tierney, 2022). Through our examination of literature and our data, we identified the need to adopt a framework for sociopolitical care that centers issues of equity, power, positionality, and the cultures, relationships, and communities often marginalized in normative frameworks of care. Doing so, we also identified the need to disrupt conventional views of who is acting and who is being acted upon in relationships of care. Our research question, "What could a framework of sociopolitical care look like?", is an initial attempt to explore these issues.

The purpose of this research project was to explore doctoral student learning and development as scholarly practitioners through one innovative method: a course-based self-study. This self-study empowered doctoral candidates in three key forms of data collection: 1) two project-based course assignments; 2) a survey on course-based student learning; and 3) a self-reflection on learning in the self-study. Results indicate positive impacts in addressing real-life problems and in connecting students to cohort members. The application of skills and knowledge in a course-embedded self-study connects to the Carnegie Project on the Education Doctorate (CPED) principles of creating scholarly practitioners and also developing activist leaders who build coalitions and focus on researching real life social justice issues. This study can serve as an exemplar for similar EdD programs who are developing scholarly practitioners.

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This mixed methods study examined preservice teacher perspectives on the impact of using untethered lecture capture (ULC) as an instructional technology in a teacher preparation course, both on learning experiences as students and confidence using technology as teachers. Results found statistically significant (p < .05) increases in confidence using technology as a teaching tool. Additionally, Darling-Hammond et al.'s (2018) Teacher Preparation for Deeper Learning framework was utilized to analyze qualitative data to explore the impact of ULC on preservice teacher learning. Challenges and recommendations for effective implementation of ULC, based on participant feedback, are provided. This study contributes to research on using technology in teacher preparation programs to enhance the teaching and learning process for preservice educators and is grounded in the TPACK model (Mistra & Koehler, 2009).