Document Tag: faculty

Structure and flexibility: systemic and explicit assignment extensions foster an inclusive learning environment (2024)

Many educators strive to create inclusive classrooms where students receive not only knowledge but also empathy from their instructors. When students face unexpected challenges due to illness, academic pressure, or exhaustion, they often seek extensions on assignments. Instructors insert their own biases when they decide who is eligible for an extension. An explicitly communicated penalty-free extension system can eliminate this bias, create an inclusive learning environment, and disinter extension requests from the hidden curriculum. Students used an “extension without penalty” system (EWP) in a large introductory biology course. Mid-semester qualitative data collection helped design an end-of-the-semester quantitative survey about students’ perceived benefits. Assignment submission data, EWP use frequency and grades were directly extracted from the learning management system. Students preferred a two-tier extension system with ideal and extension due dates. The EWP system was used by 78% of the students, but half of them only used it once. Students reported benefits in stress reduction, handling of sickness and emergencies, and improved performance in other courses. Exploratory results indicate there were additional benefits in some areas for first-generation college students. Using the extension due dates did not impact student grades. This study uses evidence to debunk common misconceptions about assignment extensions.

“The struggle bus is full.”: How College Faculty Interpreted and Navigated Institutional Policy Shifts Amid COVID-19 (2024)

Perhaps no other time in United States higher education’s history did institutional policies change as quickly as they did during the COVID-19 pandemic. However, no studies have emerged from the pandemic era that address how faculty members navigated these changing policies, many of which were meant to increase safety and student success. This study examines weekly meetings of eight faculty teaching a course for students on academic or financial aid warning during spring 2021. In meetings, faculty reflected on institutional policies as it impacted safety and student success, and findings suggest policy intent was good, but the impact of the policies was not conducive to faculty mental health or student success. Additionally, many COVID-era policies conflicted with existing policies, especially financial aid, placing faculty in difficult situations as policy interpreters. Finally, many new policies had no precedent, therefore, faculty had no guidance on policy interpretation or implementation. Implications for research, policy, and practice are addressed.

An exploration of trauma-inclusive pedagogy and students’ perceptions of academic success (2023)

While trauma-inclusive approaches to student learning have been well documented in K–12 contexts, postsecondary education has done little to incorporate trauma-inclusive pedagogy into college classrooms. Using a sample (n = 529) of graduate and undergraduate students at a public rural-serving regional serving university, this study aims to explore differences in students’ perception of academic success in courses where trauma-inclusive practices were used and courses where these practices were not. Findings provide evidence that students felt more successful in courses where trauma-inclusive practices were used. Additionally, researchers were able to demonstrate that differences in perceptions of success were more pronounced between students who have been exposed to traumatic life experiences, particularly in the course where participants felt the least successful. Implications for future research, practice, and models of educational development are discussed.

College Students and Class Attendance: How Poverty and Illbeing Affect Student Success through Punitive Attendance Policies (2023)

This study examines the prevalence of poverty and illbeing among students attending a large urban university and investigates how these challenges affect attendance, including how failure to meet attendance requirements may negatively influence course outcomes for these students. Through an anonymous survey, 520 students responded to questions asking about professor inflexibility, food insecurity, housing insecurity, depression, anxiety, and chronic illness. Over half of survey respondents reported having some degree of food and housing insecurity, and over half reported having anxiety, depression, or chronic illness. A multiple regression analysis demonstrated that punitive attendance policies disproportionally impact students living in poverty and those who experience anxiety, depression, or other forms of chronic illness. Several students reported that inflexible attendance policies have led them to a lowered grade, course failure, or course withdrawal to avoid failure, even when they otherwise had a passing grade. Examining professorial power through French and Raven’s six power bases, I invite faculty to think about the ways in which their power intersects with students and the opportunities that course policies provide to actively contribute to social mobility for students facing opportunity gaps.

My Professor Cares: Experimental Evidence on the Role of Faculty Engagement (2022)

We provide experimental evidence on the impact of specific faculty behaviors aimed at increasing student success for college students from historically underrepresented groups. The intervention was developed after conducting in-person focus groups and a pilot experiment. We find significant positive treatment effects across a multitude of short and longer-run outcomes. Specifically, underrepresented students in the treatment report more positive perceptions of the professor and earned higher course grades. These positive effects persisted over the next several years, with students in the treatment more likely to persist in college, resulting in increased credit accumulation and degree completion.