Alexandria Mahon (Learning and Instruction)

Zoom Link: https://buffalo.zoom.us/j/98568301728?pwd=eHZyN2xjR2RoR1NYTFNJbmw1NmJyUT09

This study examined 15 New York City Charter School teacher’s perceptions of the phenomenon of college-readiness through interviews conducted during Spring 2021. The combined perceptions indicate that student effort, study skills, interpersonal skills, college-level coursework, and reading and writing skills are top components of college readiness and are achieved through rigor, project-based learning, collaboration and discussion, the incorporation of reading, writing and research skills, as well as classroom systems promoting student ownership. Yet, teachers identified impediments to achieving college readiness, including societal factors, availability of opportunities, rigor, reading fluency, student ownership, and competing understandings of college readiness within school systems.

Abdalsslam Abdalla (Educational Leadership and Policy)

Zoom Link https://buffalo.zoom.us/j/97650092184?pwd=M0cwSWlGZHRhZDBLZityaVd5QlBSdz09

For decades, the empire of higher education has seen a growth in international student mobility toward the U.S. as their top destination, along with other transnational activities that together feature the internationalizing trends in postsecondary education globally and in the U.S. Undoubtedly, international students as assets to the host institutions and broader communities have continued to make cultural, academic, and economic contributions. Without a systemic reform for aspiring “global” campuses to transform the environments, however, the growing international student mobility has left various challenges to higher education institutions with missions and goals to lead the world and become globally inclusive. Often disconnect remains between the actual policies and practices and the aspirations to enhance the higher education environments to integrate equity, diversity, and inclusion into their missions, goals, student support programming and services, and campus climate (Lee et al., 2021).

Grounded in ecological perspectives, the multiple qualitative case studies intend to answer the quest to benchmark and actualize inclusive excellence in international higher education in the U.S. and to contribute to literature that can guide for college engagement and success varied stakeholders including higher education administrators, student affairs professionals, academic faculty, and students. This project employs content analysis of policies and practices of institutions regarded as “global” leaders and analyses of semi-structured interviews of student participants in a “global” campus. Findings of this ongoing project intend to be transferred in ways to assess and transform existing environments to better support the international population and also their allies.

Allegra Giovine (Information Science)

Zoom Link https://buffalo.zoom.us/j/96202625175?pwd=NXlJK0Eya1NYWStNQkpiZE5QV0xTdz09

What does it take to build shared understandings that support coordinated political action across a diverse set of stakeholders? This paper considers public understanding of federalism in Myanmar (Burma), a country in which new conversations about devolved governance are emerging in the wake of the 2021 military coup. Over the past decade, elite levels of political discussion have shown more acceptance of federalism as a system of government that could unify a country fractured by ethnic and other divisions since its founding in 1948. However, informed understandings of federalist governance structures have not had the opportunity to emerge among non-elite members of society, and public perception of federalism as disintegration and secession remains strong. Despite the tragedies unfolding after Myanmar’s recent coup, the subsequent protest movement and armed conflict against the military regime are creating new spaces for interethnic and interfaith alliances and understanding, as well as experimentation with local governance structures.

After providing a brief introduction to this research context, this paper reviews active learning techniques that have been used to increase non-elite understandings of federalism. These techniques include deliberative polling, which has already been used with promising results in Myanmar, and simulation, which has been used to teach federalism in US classrooms. Building on insights from these techniques, I propose two research designs for pilot programs to increase knowledge of federalism and trust among diverse stakeholders in Myanmar. The first design (R1) modifies the deliberative polling methodology to evaluate the role that intergenerational conversations might play to enhance learning and trust. R1 is motivated by widespread anecdotal evidence that younger generations in Myanmar have more positive understandings of diversity, and now, indeed, much practical experience mobilizing diverse coalitions in protest and resistance. R1 would invite young adults and adults (age 16+) to participate in an educational lecture followed by moderated small group informed discussions (intergenerational or same-generation) of federalism and diversity. Data analysis will include comparison of pre- and post-event surveys and qualitative analysis of group discussions. The second design (R2) evaluates the impact of participant-created drawings to enhance learning and trust. R2 is motivated by the use of graphical materials in current federalist training in Myanmar, the communicative power of maps in particular to show alliances emerging in the present moment, and insights from other research contexts on the enhanced learning benefits from active participant drawing. R2 would invite a similar pool of participants to participate in an educational lecture followed by a semi-structured interview to elicit knowledge and attitudes about federalism and diversity with reference to graphical materials (participant-generated or presented from lecture materials). Data analysis will include comparison of pre- and post-event surveys and qualitative analysis of interviews. The paper concludes with a necessary discussion about the ethics, security concerns, and logistics that must be considered before embarking on research with transformative potential in a fragile context.