Matching Items (66)
Description
Students across the United States lack the necessary skills to be successful college students in Science, Technology and Math (STEM) majors and as a result post-secondary institutions are developing summer bridge programs to aid in their transition. As they develop these programs, effective theory and approach are critical to developing successful programs. Though there are a multitude of theories on successful student development, a focus on self-efficacy is critical. Summer Bridge programs across the country as well as the Bio Bridge summer program at Arizona State University were studied alone and through the lens of Cognitive Self-Efficacy Theory as mentioned in Albert Bandura's "Perceived Self-Efficacy in Cognitive Development and Functioning." Cognitive Self-Efficacy Theory provides a framework for self-efficacy development in academic settings. An analysis of fifteen bridge programs found that a large majority focused on developing academic capabilities and often overlooked development of community and social efficacy. An even larger number failed to focus on personal psychology in managing self-debilitating thought patterns based on published goals. Further, Arizona State University's Bio Bridge program could not be considered successful at developing cognitive self-efficacy or increasing retention as data was inconclusive. However, Bio Bridge was tremendously successful at developing social efficacy and community among participants and faculty. Further research and better evaluative techniques need to be developed to understand the program's effectiveness in cognitive self-efficacy development and retention.
ContributorsTummala, Sailesh Vardhan (Author) / Orchinik, Miles (Thesis director) / Brownell, Sara (Committee member) / Shortlidge, Erin (Committee member) / Barrett, The Honors College (Contributor) / School of Life Sciences (Contributor)
Created2015-05
Description
This paper features analysis of interdisciplinary collaboration, based on the results from the Kolbe A™ Index of students in the Nano Ethics at Play (NEAP) class, a four week course in Spring 2015. The Kolbe A™ is a system which describes the Conative Strengths of each student, or their natural drive and instinct. NEAP utilized the LEGO® SERIOUS PLAY® (LSP) method, which uses abstract LEGO models to describe answers to a proposed question in school or work environments. The models could be described piece by piece to provide clear explanations without allowing disciplinary jargon, which is why the class contained students from eleven different majors (Engineering (Civil, Biomedical, & Electrical), Business (Marketing & Supply Chain Management), Architectural Studies, Sustainability, Anthropology, Communications, Philosophy, & Psychology).
The proposed hypotheses was based on the four different Kolbe A™ strengths, or Action Modes: Fact Finder, Follow Through, Quick Start, and Implementor. Hypotheses were made about class participation and official class twitter use, using #ASUsp, for each Kolbe type. The results proved these hypotheses incorrect, indicating a lack of correlation between Kolbe A™ types and playing. The report also includes qualitative results such as Twitter Keywords and a Sentiment calculation for each week of the course. The class had many positive outcomes, including growth in the ability to collaborate by students, further understanding of how to integrate Twitter use into the classroom, and more knowledge about the effectiveness of LSP.
The proposed hypotheses was based on the four different Kolbe A™ strengths, or Action Modes: Fact Finder, Follow Through, Quick Start, and Implementor. Hypotheses were made about class participation and official class twitter use, using #ASUsp, for each Kolbe type. The results proved these hypotheses incorrect, indicating a lack of correlation between Kolbe A™ types and playing. The report also includes qualitative results such as Twitter Keywords and a Sentiment calculation for each week of the course. The class had many positive outcomes, including growth in the ability to collaborate by students, further understanding of how to integrate Twitter use into the classroom, and more knowledge about the effectiveness of LSP.
ContributorsStevens, Jenna Marie (Author) / Seager, Thomas (Thesis director) / Jenses, Camilla (Committee member) / Civil, Environmental and Sustainable Engineering Programs (Contributor) / Herberger Institute for Design and the Arts (Contributor) / Barrett, The Honors College (Contributor)
Created2015-12
Description
One of the salient challenges of sustainability is the Tragedy of the Commons, where individuals acting independently and rationally deplete a common resource despite their understanding that it is not in the group's long term best interest to do so. Hardin presents this dilemma as nearly intractable and solvable only by drastic, government-mandated social reforms, while Ostrom's empirical work demonstrates that community-scale collaboration can circumvent tragedy without any elaborate outside intervention. Though more optimistic, Ostrom's work provides scant insight into larger-scale dilemmas such as climate change. Consequently, it remains unclear if the sustainable management of global resources is possible without significant government mediation. To investigate, we conducted two game theoretic experiments that challenged students in different countries to collaborate digitally and manage a hypothetical common resource. One experiment involved students attending Arizona State University and the Rochester Institute of Technology in the US and Mountains of the Moon University in Uganda, while the other included students at Arizona State and the Management Development Institute in India. In both experiments, students were randomly assigned to one of three production roles: Luxury, Intermediate, and Subsistence. Students then made individual decisions about how many units of goods they wished to produce up to a set maximum per production class. Luxury players gain the most profit (i.e. grade points) per unit produced, but they also emit the most externalities, or social costs, which directly subtract from the profit of everybody else in the game; Intermediate players produce a medium amount of profit and externalities per unit, and Subsistence players produce a low amount of profit and externalities per unit. Variables influencing and/or inhibiting collaboration were studied using pre- and post-game surveys. This research sought to answer three questions: 1) Are international groups capable of self-organizing in a way that promotes sustainable resource management?, 2) What are the key factors that inhibit or foster collective action among international groups?, and 3) How well do Hardin's theories and Ostrom's empirical models predict the observed behavior of students in the game? The results of gameplay suggest that international cooperation is possible, though likely sub-optimal. Statistical analysis of survey data revealed that heterogeneity and levels of trust significantly influenced game behavior. Specific traits of heterogeneity among students found to be significant were income, education, assigned production role, number of people in one's household, college class, college major, and military service. Additionally, it was found that Ostrom's collective action framework was a better predictor of game outcome than Hardin's theories. Overall, this research lends credence to the plausibility of international cooperation in tragedy of the commons scenarios such as climate change, though much work remains to be done.
ContributorsStanton, Albert Grayson (Author) / Clark, Susan Spierre (Thesis director) / Seager, Thomas (Committee member) / Civil, Environmental and Sustainable Engineering Programs (Contributor) / Barrett, The Honors College (Contributor)
Created2014-12
Description
While public transit systems are perceived to produce lower GHG emission intensities per passenger miles traveled (PMT) and per vehicle miles traveled (VMT), there is a limited understanding of emissions per PMT/VMT across cities, or of how emissions may change across modes (light, metro, commuter, and bus) and time (e.g., with changing electricity mixes in the future). In order to better understand the GHG emissions intensity of public transit systems, a comparative emissions assessment was developed utilizing the National Transit Database (NTD) which reports energy use from 1997 to 2012 of rail and bus systems across the US. By determining the GHG emission intensities (per VMT or per PMT) for each mode of transit across multiple years, the modes of transit can be better compared between one another. This comparison can help inform future goals to reduce GHG emissions as well as target reductions from the mode of transit that has the highest emissions. The proposed analysis of the NTD and comparison of modal emission intensities will be used to develop future forecasting that can guide public transit systems towards a sustainable future.
ContributorsCano, Alex (Author) / Chester, Mikhail (Thesis director) / Seager, Thomas (Committee member) / Civil, Environmental and Sustainable Engineering Programs (Contributor) / Barrett, The Honors College (Contributor) / School of Sustainability (Contributor) / School of Human Evolution and Social Change (Contributor)
Created2014-12
Description
Collaborative learning has been found to enhance student learning experiences through interaction with peers and instructors in a way that typically does not occur in a traditional lecture course. However, more than half of all collaborative learning structures have failed to last very long after their initial introductions which makes understanding the factors of collaboration that make it successful very important. The purpose of this study was to evaluate collaborative learning in a blended learning course to gauge student perceptions and the factors of collaboration and student demographics that impact that perception. This was done by surveying a sample of students in BIO 282 about their experiences in the BIO 281 course they took previously which was a new introductory Biology course with a blended learning structure. It was found that students agree that collaboration is beneficial as it provides an opportunity to gain additional insight from peers and improve students' understanding of course content. Also, differences in student gender and first generation status have less of an effect on student perceptions of collaboration than differences in academic achievement (grade) bracket.
ContributorsVu, Bethany Thao-Vy (Author) / Stout, Valerie (Thesis director) / Brownell, Sara (Committee member) / Wright, Christian (Committee member) / Barrett, The Honors College (Contributor) / School of Life Sciences (Contributor)
Created2014-05
Description
Life cycle assessment (LCA) is increasingly identified as the proper tool/framework for performing cradle to grave analysis of a product, technology, or supply chain. LCA proceeds by comparing the materials and energy needed for materials extraction, benefaction, and end-of-life management, in addition to the actual lifetime of the product. This type of analysis is commonly used to evaluate forms of renewable energy to ensure that we don't harm the environment in the name of saving it. For instance, LCA for photovoltaic (PV) technologies can be used to evaluate the environmental impacts. CdTe thin film solar cells rely on cadmium and tellurium metals which are produced as by-products in the refining of zinc and copper ore, respectively. In order to understand the environmental burdens of tellurium, it is useful to explore the extraction and refining process of copper. Copper can be refined using either a hydrometallurgical or pyrometallurgical process. I conducted a comparison of these two methods to determine the environmental impacts, the chemical reactions which take place, the energy requirements, and the extraction costs of each. I then looked into the extraction of tellurium from anode slime produced in the pyrometallurgical process and determined the energy requirements. I connected this to the production of CdTe and the power produced from a CdTe module, and analyzed the production cost of CdTe modules under increasing tellurium prices. It was concluded that tellurium production will be limited by increasing hydrometallurgical extraction of copper. Additionally, tellurium scarcity will not provide a physical constraint to CdTe commercial expansion; however it could affect the price reduction goals.
ContributorsMacIsaac, Kirsten Breanne (Author) / Seager, Thomas (Thesis director) / Fraser, Matthew (Committee member) / Wender, Ben (Committee member) / Barrett, The Honors College (Contributor) / Chemical Engineering Program (Contributor)
Created2013-05
Description
Team dynamics: a system of behaviors and psychological processes occurring within a social group (wiki). This definition classifies it as pertaining to a social group, so how do team dynamics vary from one specific social group to another? Social groups are created for many different reasons, some inherent (such as families) and some created intentionally with knowledge of what is being done (such as athletic teams, class project groups, and groups in the workforce). The way these groups interact and work as a team shapes how efficient they can work and how well they are able to achieve set goals. Therefore, in order to predict how well a particular group or team might perform in a routine project, it is useful to analyze the way they work together on a regular basis. Certain aspects of different groups, such as gender, age, level of competition, and type of activity, cause them to work together in different manners. Do any of these factors cause a particular group to work better as a team? Or do they just cause them to work differently?
ContributorsDunn, Travis Griffin (Author) / Lawrence, Christopher (Thesis director) / Seager, Thomas (Committee member) / Weaver, Edwin (Committee member) / Civil, Environmental and Sustainable Engineering Programs (Contributor) / Barrett, The Honors College (Contributor)
Created2013-05
Description
We, a team of students and faculty in the life sciences at Arizona State University (ASU), currently teach an Introduction to Biology course in a Level 5, or maximum-security unit with the support of the Arizona Department of Corrections and the Prison Education Program at ASU. This course aims to enhance current programs at the unit by offering inmates an opportunity to practice literacy and math skills, while also providing exposure to a new academic field (science, and specifically biology). Numerous studies, including a 2005 study from the Arizona Department of Corrections (ADC), have found that vocational programs, including prison education programs, reduce recidivism rates (ADC 2005, Esperian 2010, Jancic 1988, Steurer et al. 2001, Ubic 2002) and may provide additional benefits such as engagement with a world outside the justice system (Duguid 1992), the opportunity for inmates to revise personal patterns of rejecting education that they may regret, and the ability of inmate parents to deliberately set a good example for their children (Hall and Killacky 2008). Teaching in a maximum security prison unit poses special challenges, which include a prohibition on most outside materials (except paper), severe restrictions on student-teacher and student-student interactions, and the inability to perform any lab exercises except limited computer simulations. Lack of literature discussing theoretical and practical aspects of teaching science in such environment has prompted us to conduct an ongoing study to generate notes and recommendations from this class through the use of surveys, academic evaluation of students' work and ongoing feedback from both teachers and students to inform teaching practices in future science classes in high-security prison units.
ContributorsLarson, Anika Jade (Author) / Mor, Tsafrir (Thesis director) / Brownell, Sara (Committee member) / Lockard, Joe (Committee member) / Barrett, The Honors College (Contributor) / School of Politics and Global Studies (Contributor) / School of Life Sciences (Contributor)
Created2015-05
Description
This thesis contains three chapters, all of which involve using culturally inclusive education to explore the experiences of religious undergraduate biology students. The first chapter is an essay entitled "Toward Culturally Inclusive Undergraduate Biology Education," which describes a literature review performed with the aim of characterizing the landscape of cultural competence and related terms for biology educators and biology education researchers. This chapter highlights the use of 16 different terms related to cultural competence and presents these terms, their definitions, and highlights their similarities and differences. This chapter also identifies gaps in the cultural competence literature, and presents a set of recommendations to support better culturally inclusive interventions in undergraduate science education. The second chapter, entitled "Different Evolution Acceptance Instruments Lead to Different Research Findings," describes a study in which the source of 30 years of conflicting research on the relationship between evolution acceptance and evolution understanding was determined. The results of this study showed that different instruments used to measure evolution acceptance sometimes lead to different research results and conclusions. The final chapter, entitled "Believing That Evolution is Atheistic is Associated with Poor Evolution Education Outcomes Among Religious College Students," describes a study characterizing definitions of evolution that religious undergraduate biology students may hold, and examines the impact that those definitions of evolution have on multiple outcome variables. In this study, we found that among the most religious students, those who thought evolution is atheistic were less accepting of evolution, less comfortable learning evolution, and perceived greater conflict between their personal religious beliefs and evolution than those who thought evolution is agnostic.
ContributorsDunlop, Hayley Marie (Author) / Brownell, Sara (Thesis director) / Collins, James (Committee member) / Barnes, M. Elizabeth (Committee member) / School of Human Evolution & Social Change (Contributor) / School of Life Sciences (Contributor) / Barrett, The Honors College (Contributor)
Created2019-05
Description
In response to a national call within STEM to increase diversity within the sciences, there has been a growth in science education research aimed at increasing participation of underrepresented groups in science, such as women and ethnic/racial minorities. However, an underexplored underrepresented group in science are religious students. Though 82% of the United States population is religiously affiliated, only 52% of scientists are religious (Pew, 2009). Even further, only 32% of biologists are religious, with 25% identifying as Christian (Pew, 2009; Ecklund, 2007). One reason as to why Christian individuals are underrepresented in biology is because faculty may express biases that affect students' ability to persist in the field of biology. In this study, we explored how revealing a Christian student's religious identity on science graduate application would impact faculty's perception of the student during the biology graduate application process. We found that faculty were significantly more likely to perceive the student who revealed their religious identity to be less competent, hirable, likeable, and faculty would be less likely to mentor the student. Our study informs upon possible reasons as to why there is an underrepresentation of Christians in science. This further suggests that bias against Christians must be addressed in order to avoid real-world, negative treatment of Christians in science.
ContributorsTruong, Jasmine Maylee (Author) / Brownell, Sara (Thesis director) / Gaughan, Monica (Committee member) / Barnes, Liz (Committee member) / School of Life Sciences (Contributor) / W.P. Carey School of Business (Contributor) / Barrett, The Honors College (Contributor)
Created2018-05