You are strengthening your abilities for comprehending and consuming literature as masters students so that you may uti

3: In the past 15 years, what have been the ACED doctoral program’s retention and graduation rates? Comment by Microsoft Office User: Determine/confirm when doc went fully online

Significance of the Study

Attrition among doctoral students is substantial (Lovitts, 2001, 2005); for online doctoral programs, the attrition rate ranges between 50% and 80% (Terrell et al, 2009). The rates of attrition represent real losses among students, faculty, programs, and institutions, all of which invested in some manner into these doctoral students.

Various scholars (CITE) have suggested community and connectedness function as facilitators for doctoral student persistence and degree completion. By examining how doctoral students in my own program experience community and connectedness, I

A thought —– At 55 credit hours and $293 per hour, total tuition is $16,115, minimum. Each cohort of 10 matriculating doctoral students theoretically generates $52,740 per academic year, and at least $161,150 over the course of their programs. Demonstrating a program’s economic viability validates the request to the provost in filling faculty lines for the department. Neoliberal HE….

Review of the Literature

Why doc students leave (lovitts)

Persistence in online doctoral (Rackinson-Szapkiw, Spaulding, & Spaulding; Rockinson-Szapkiw, Spaulding, & Bade, 2014)

Community and Connection(Bollinger & Inan) (Berry) (Tinto, 1997) (Rovai, 2002 – two articles – to define connectedness)

Tinto – integration is defined two ways – social mean “relationships that result from day to day interactions and involvement in a variety of activities at institutions”; and academic integration “occurs with sharing of information, perspectives, and values common to member of the community” [language from Rockinson-Szapkiw]

Method

For this study I will use an integrated mixed-methods case study approach; a case study is understood as a “intensive descriptions and analyses of a…bounded system [Smith, 1978] such as an individual, program, event, group, intervention, or community,” according to Merriam (2001, p. 19). Using multiple data sources to generate knowledge, a case study approach allows for the in-depth investigation of phenomena in real-world contexts (Merriam, 2001; Yin, 2018). As I am examining one doctoral program, the boundaries of the case are defined by the currently enrolled students and by the program’s institutional data for retention and graduation rates.

An integrated mixed-methods approach employs both qualitative and quantitative methods in answering overarching questions (Efrat Efron & Ravid, 2020). This approach is appropriate for this action research proposal as the overarching question is how ACED doctoral students experience community and connectedness with, and among, fellow students and faculty.

I plan to use mixed methods as each paradigm’s data collection/generation and data analysis methods are required to answer the research questions. I will use a phenomenological approach to answer Research Question 1, which asks How do early candidacy ACED doctoral students describe their experiences of community within the program? Phenomenology, which seeks to understand the essence of participants’ lived experiences and the knowledges derived from that experience (Thomas & Pollio, 2002), is an appropriate approach as participants have a shared experience of being in the ACED doctoral program. I will use phenomenological approach with early candidacy doctoral students to understand how they experience community within the ACED doctoral program.

Question 2 asks What level of connectedness do late candidacy ACED doctoral students report? To answer this question, I will conduct descriptive research using the Doctoral Student Connectedness Scale, developed by Terrell et al. (2009). This instrument is an 18-item survey using Likert-type scale and is designed to measure participants’ senses of connection and support during the dissertation phase. The instrument measures two factors: faculty-to-student connectedness and student-to-student connectedness. As such, I plan to use the instrument as a diagnostic for how late-candidacy learners experience connectedness.

Research Question 3 asks In the past 15 years, what have been the retention and graduation rates of the ACED doctoral program? To answer this question, I will conduct descriptive researching analyzing institutional enrollment data that tracks ACED doctoral program students, year-over-year for a 15-year span. From this, I will calculate retention and graduation rates for the program. Comment by Microsoft Office User: Determine/confirm when doc went fully online

Positionality

As educational action research investigates one’s own practice, the role as investigator becomes “more complex” (Efron & Ravid, 2020, p. 63). As such, objectivity, which is assumed and central in quantitative research, becomes less clearly defined, as a practitioner-researcher’s subjectivities enmesh with, while also being products of, the context in which they work. Recognizing this tension, I

As the practitioner-researcher, I occupy a liminal space. I am the newly-installed program coordinator, a faculty member teaching in the program, and the researcher examining this case in which I am deeply embedded. With this liminal space come competing demands.

As a researcher interviewing participants, I also am a faculty member who is facilitating one of the first courses ACED doctoral students take in their program and I am the program coordinator who is responsible to establishing and maintaining contact with doctoral students. Therefore, I am aware prospective interview participants may feel uncomfortable being candid about their experiences. To this point, I am reflecting – in this planning phase – on what may be a better method for generating interview data. For example, instead of conducting in-person interviews, I may ask participants to write anonymous reflections.

Rigor and Quality

For the qualitative portion of this case study, To build rigor and quality into my study, I will use the following strategies:

Field Journal

As I progress through this study I will maintain a field journal to record my decision-making related to the study’s execution, as well as to record observations related to the doctoral program. I envision observations stemming from interactions with fellow faculty and students, both current and prospective.

Member Checking

I will send participants their respective transcripts and ask them to check it for their veracity (Merriam, 2009). Additionally, after analyzing the data, I will send summaries of the analyses to the participants, asking them to again check for their veracity.

Adequate Time with Participants

I will be able to conduct multiple interviews with participants, so as to avoid reducing their experiences to one interview that very well may be a function of how the participant is fairing on that one, particular day. Therefore, I will conduct multiple interviews with participants to ensure adequate time with them and their data (Merriam, 2009; Seidman, 2013).

Reflexivity

The final strategy I will employ to help build rigor and quality into this study is to engage with my own position as the practitioner-researcher. In doing so, I will engage in reflexivity, defined as “the process of reflecting critically on the self as research” (Lincoln & Guba, 2000, p. 183). The first step in this will be writing a subjectivity statement. The second and repeating are to continually engage in reflexivity by keeping a journal. I will explicate my own thinking, biases, fears, and aspiration, such as to make these known to myself.

Data Collection and Generation

For this study, I propose generating a corpus of data across sources – students and me – and across types, both qualitatively and quantitatively, as noted above.

Field notes

I will be recording field notes throughout this study’s phases. The purpose of the field notes is two-fold: First, field notes will help me record my decision-making processes across the study’s phases; second, I will use field notes to record my observations and reflections about the phenomenon itself, including the learners, the facilitation of the doctoral courses, and my own work as the program coordinator.

Interviews

An overarching goal of this study is to understand how ACED doctoral students experience community and connectedness in the ACED doctoral program. To gain this understanding, I will conduct interviews with early candidacy doctoral students.

In-depth interviews allow participants to share their lifeworlds, or lived experiences (Van Manen, 1990, pp. 18-19). Through exploring these lived experiences of individuals, researchers can build an understanding of the organization of which the individuals are a part (Seidman, 2013). As such, in-depth interviews will generate not only an understanding of each participant’s individual lived experience of community and connectedness in the program, but also will help me understand the ACED doctoral program as an organization in which participants exist.

Doctoral Student Connectedness Scale

Informed by Rovai’s (2002) work on connectedness and a sense of belonging in the classroom, Terrell et al. (2009) developed the Doctoral Student Connectedness Scale to “understand the limited-residency doctoral students’ feelings of connectedness toward each other and the faculty” (p. 113). The scale measures doctoral student sense of connectedness with other students and faculty while in their dissertation phases.

Given my program’s fully online modality, doctoral students navigate their early candidacy phases at-distance. Although the coursework is asynchronous, they do benefit from the structure coursework provides and the regular contact with other students and faculty coursework affords. Once students move into late candidacy, however, they lose any semblance of formalized interaction and connection with other students in the program. The only formal contact is with a student’s dissertation chair, assuming the student identified and confirmed their dissertation chair and committee members during their last semester of coursework.

The dissertation phase can feel lonely and overwhelming, as a student begins the difficult work of developing a proposal (CITE). This time of isolation is precisely when community and connectedness can make the difference between a student’s persistence or attrition (CITE).

Examining the ACED late candidacy doctoral students’ sense of connectedness with the Doctoral Student Connectedness Scale (Terrell et al., 2009) will function as both a descriptive and a diagnostic insight into how these students’ sense of connectedness as they navigate the dissertation wilderness.

Retention and Graduation Rates

Working with the Office of Institutional Research, I will gather enrollment data for the past 15 years for the ACED doctoral program. I will track enrollment by individual student.

Data Analysis

Field notes

Thematic analysis

Interviews

Thematic analysis

Doctoral Student Connectedness Scale

Retention and Graduation Rates

Calculating enrollment by enrolled student over the past 15 years.

Timeline

Implications

Students

Program

Institution

6

References

Cross, K. P. (1981). Adults as learners: Increasing participation and facilitating learning. Jossey-Bass.

Efrat Efron, S., & Ravid, R. (2020). Actional research in education: A practice guide (2nd. Ed). Guildford.

Kelley, M. J. M., & Salisbury-Glennon, J. D. (2016). The role of self-regulation in doctoral students’ status of all but dissertation (ABD). Innovative Higher Education, 41(1), 87-100. doi:10.1007/s10755-015-9336-5

Lincoln, Y. S., & Guba, E. G. (1985). Naturalistic inquiry. Sage.

Lovitts, B. E. (2001). Leaving the Ivory Tower: The Causes and Consequences of Departure from Doctoral Study. Rowan & Littlefield.

Lovitts, B. E. (2005). Being a course course-taker is not enough: A theoretical perspective on the transition to independent research. Studies in Higher Education, 30(2), 137-154.

Lovitts, B. E. (2007). Making the implicit explicit: Creating performance expectations for the dissertation (1st ed.). Stylus.

Lovitts, B. E., & Nelson, C. (2000). The hidden crisis in graduate education: Attrition from Ph.D. programs. Academe, 86(6), 44-51.

Merriam, S. B. (2009). Qualitative research: a guide to design and implementation. Jossey-Bass.

Rovai, A. (2002). Development of an instrument to measure classroom community. Internet and Higher Education, 5(3), 197–211.

Seidman, I. (2013). Interviewing as qualitative research (4th ed.). Teachers College Press.

Smith, L. M. (1978). An evolving logic of participant observation, educational ethnography and other case studies. In L. Shulman (Ed.), Review of research in education. Peacock.

Spaulding, L. S., & Rockinson-Szapkiw, A. J. (2012). Hearing their voices: Factors doctoral candidates attribute to their persistence. International Journal of Doctoral Studies, 7, 199-219.

Terrell, S. R., Snyder, M. M., & Dringus, L. P. (2009). The development, validation, and application of the Doctoral Student Connectedness Scale. Internet and Higher Education 12, 112-116.

Thomas, S. P., & Pollio, H. R. (2002). Listening to patients: A phenomenological approach to nursing research and practice. Springer.

Van Manen, M. (1990). Research lived experiences: Human science for an action sensitive pedagogy. SUNY Press.

Yin, R. K. (2018). Case study research and applications: Design and methods (6th ed.). Sage.

· My purpose is to provide inspiring individuals with information on what it takes to become a supervisor, manage issues in a work environment, and acquire the skills to be an effective leader.

· Research Questions

· What is a supervisor's purpose?

· What are the steps to becoming a supervisor?

· How to approach issues as a supervisor in a work environment?

· How to assess issues and comply with all policies, regulations, and procedures in the workplace?

· How to attain the right skills and qualities to be a successful leader?

· What does it take to be a leader in the workplace?

Lastly, analyze what skills are required to succeed as a manager. Management skills may have a positive impact on your personal life, your career path, and your interpersonal interactions. The ability to effectively manage an organization is essential to its success and achievement of its goals and objectives. The objective and vision of the organization may be pushed forward by a manager who cultivates practical management abilities.

I believe my planned study's findings would be considered trustworthy. It will guarantee that my bias does not skew the results. To demonstrate the validity of my results, qualitative researchers might establish an audit trail that details the steps they took to gather the data and explains how and why certain conclusions were reached. 

The ethical considerations of my study are to enhance individuals' lives through comprehending real-world occurrences, examining successful solutions, and analyzing behaviors. For people to understand supervisory challenges and the necessary abilities for success are essential to learning the critical function of a supervisor.

Efron & Ravid (2020) Figure 4.2