Bachelor of Fine Arts (BFA), Ohio University, 2022, Dance

This creative research project explores how embodied knowledge in dance deals with structures of authority, power, relationship, and collectivity as they manifest in practices of group movement improvisation. Through critical reference, expert interviews, and experimental workshops, the research discusses how "togetherness" is facilitated and negotiated through the lens of group improvisation in dance. The research highlights how elements of group improvisation practices can be used as tools for shifting habitual or traditional ways of structuring authority into new, collective ways of "being in togetherness," using the term "generative practices" to develop these concepts.

Ph.D., Antioch University, 2020, Leadership and Change

This dissertation illuminates how the experience of growing up during the Chilean dictatorship (1973–1990) affected the individual's sense of self as citizen and the impact on their sense of democratic agency, civic-mindedness, and political engagement in their country's current democracy. To understand that impact, the researcher chose to study her own generation, the “Pinochet-era” generation (Cummings, 2015) and interviewed those who were part of the Chilean middle class, who despite not being explicit victims of perpetrators, were raised in dictatorship and surrounded by abuse of state power including repression, disappearance, and imprisonment. The theoretical frame of the Socio-Political Development Theory (Watt, Williams, & Jagers, 2003) helped to understand the process that participants went through and how they moved from an A-Critical Stage, with a complete absence of awareness and understanding about what was happening in their world at the time of the coup d'Etat, to a stage of critical consciousness surrounded by empathy for those who were suffering human rights violations which were the main drivers to latter participate in a liberation process. This development of a critical consciousness was influenced—among others—by specific family and social context which promoted transgenerational (Uwineza & Brackelaire, 2014) and intergenerational dialogue (Reyes, Cornejo, Cruz, Carrillo, & Caviedes, 2015) processes, where values, heritage, and ways of acting were transmitted. The narrative approach helped to elicit stories about participants' life events from the coup d'Etat to present. Through the exploration of 15 narrative interviews it was also possible to collect participants' memories and observe how they currently manifest their civic commitment and social responsibility. Their collective memory, influenced by a collective grief (Metraux, 2005b), still lingers over 40 years later and helps us to understand their life-long commitment and passion to fight (open full item for complete abstract)

Doctor of Philosophy, The Ohio State University, 2006, Educational Policy and Leadership

This descriptive quantitative online survey research explored the relationships among Teachers' Sense of Efficacy, Collective Inclusion Efficacy, Technologyand other predictor variables to determine their saliency in relationship to the criterion variable Teachers' Sense of Inclusion Efficacy. Data were collected from a random sample of general and special educators in all teaching positions, across all grade levels, in urban, rural and suburban Ohio school districts. Descriptive quantitative statistics, frequencies, means, standard deviations, percentages, reliability coefficients, correlation coefficients, principal component analyses, multiple regression analyses, and a one-sample t test, were used to analyze the relationships and interrelationships among the predictor variables and the criterion variable. The results provided rich contextual and situational data. The predictor variables, Teachers' Sense of Efficacy, Collective Inclusion Efficacy, and Attitudes Toward Inclusion, had strong or moderate relationships with the criterion variable Teachers' Sense of Inclusion Efficacy. Analyses of the data support the new scales developed and used in this study to assess teachers' personal and collective efficacy for the inclusion of students with disabilities in the general education classroom. The Teachers' Sense of Inclusion Efficacy Scale (I-TSES)was adapted from the 12-item Teachers' Sense of Efficacy Scale (TSES) (Tschannen-Moran & Woolfolk Hoy, 2001), and the Collective Inclusion Efficacy scalewas adapted from the 12-item Collective Efficacy scale (Goddard, 2002). Further research and application of these new scales should help inform schools, colleges, and departments of education (SCDEs) of the need to ensure that teachers are prepared to integrate technology to teach every student in the 21st century.

EdD, University of Cincinnati, 2012, Education, Criminal Justice, and Human Services: Urban Educational Leadership

The challenge of ensuring educational equity, closing the achievement gap between African American students and White students attending public schools has gone on for half a century. As we enter the twenty-first century, neither educational reforms enacted by the public school system nor legislative actions, the No Child Left Behind (NCLB) Act of 2001, with its accountability mandate have produced solutions that will insure that African American children are equally educationally prepared to pursue a post-secondary education or to enter the workforce with marketable skills that would allow them to compete for jobs which offer competitive salaries more than a step above minimum wage. In fact the gap is widening (Ladson-Billings, 2006; Lee and Orfield, 2005). It has been suggested that public schools must change how they improve student learning outcomes and consider developing outside relationships (Elmore, 1996). There has been growing agreement on the importance of community involvement in schools (Epstein and Sheldon, 2005; Noguera, 2003; Sanders 2003). Researchers are continually examining what affect community involvement may have on the academic outcomes of children attending schools in urban communities. However, examining perceptions and beliefs of residents in predominantly African American communities and what variables may influence individuals in those communities to commit to working collectively for the educational success of children in their neighborhood required investigation. Using one-on-one in-depth interviews, field observations and documentation, this qualitative study examined long-term and short-term residents, and community organizational representatives' views from one community on perceived collective efficacy. This study utilized the conceptual framework of Bandura, (1982) and Sampson et al., (1997) Collective Efficacy construct. The findings suggest that using a qualitative approach provides data for studying perceived collective effic (open full item for complete abstract)

Master of Arts, The Ohio State University, 2012, East Asian Languages and Literatures

China's sociological world is somewhat lacking of research that explores the collective consciousness during collective rights defense of the manufacturing industry's internal migrant workers. This is even truer of research that looks at the collective consciousness of Qingdao's internal migrant workers. Additionally, Chinese civil society organizations are in their infancy, and there are few organizations that aid internal migrant workers in their rights defense, especially in China's northeast region. There is even less research that attempts to understand the effectiveness of these organizations in aiding workers' right defense. Using Political Process Theory as its analytical framework, this study has two main aspects: 1) survey methodology that explores the collective consciousness in rights defense of internal migrant workers in Qingdao's manufacturing sector and 2) case analysis methodology that seeks to understand effects of Qingdao's LMN Organization on Internal migrant workers' rights defense. This study has found that the regional consciousness of Qingdao's internal migrant workers possesses a dualistic quality, they have a strong rights defense consciousness, and their collective action has shown a trend toward cross-factory cooperation. LMN Organization, the subject of the case analysis, has not only played a large role in the success of internal migrant workers' right defense, but it has also played a role in mobilizing workers for rights defense. However, LMN Organization exists in an exploitable crack in the surrounding political environment, and because of this, its future development is uncertain.

Master of Arts (MA), Ohio University, 2010, Sociology (Arts and Sciences)

This study examines dynamics and patterns of online collective action in China regarding large-scale grievances of landless farmers whose land was illegally expropriated by the local government for industrial development and construction. Such illegal land expropriation resulted in various conflicts between local officials and farmers due to the farmers' common fear of losing their sole survival source and the local government's inadequate compensation for their land loss. The two representative cases of such grievances and conflicts– which I call the Wang Shuai Incident in He Nan Province and the Wu Baoquan Incident in Nei Menggu Autonomous Region – were initiated and mobilized by organizers, netizens, and news media through the Internet. Qualitative content analysis is used for this study to examine available media outlets and public forum discussions from the seven selected Chinese websites that were extensively involved in the two cases. By applying framing theory to online ollective action, this research compares different framing tactics of the two initiators and the media, resulting in contrasting Outcomes. This study demonstrates that concise framing and continuous media attention in conjunction with the unprecedented accessibility of the Internet are central to mobilizing public support for online collective action. These techniques and technologies are part of a new trend signifying a critical evolution in the realm of grassroots activism in China.

Doctor of Philosophy, Case Western Reserve University, 2012, Management

In today's networked environment, online forums emerge as a popular form of social structures that have greater opportunities for learning in various organizational contexts. A plethora of studies have investigated the phenomenon to identify antecedent of its success, such as individual characteristics and organizational structure. However, how such antecedents get involved in collaborative learning processes and influence their outcomes has been largely understudied. Furthermore, the learning process in online forums has been simply presumed as a kind of general organizational learning, despite its unique situation of learning from strangers. This dissertation study focuses on online forums' highly motivated for problem-based learning and explores a dynamic process of such learning, namely Open Collective Inquiry (OCI). Presuming that dialogue embodies open collective inquiry processes, this study investigated characteristics of OCI dialogues that influence distinct types of inquiry outcomes using a grounded theory method. In particular, the current study highlights what participants do for OCI and how they do it through their dialogue. Based on distinct purposes for dialogic actions, six action domains were identified that constitute OCI processes: action domains to initiate inquiry, to maintain commitment, to guide inquiry process, to frame a problem, to negotiate solutions, and to confirm workability. These action domains were interrelated to shape OCI processes. Varying extent to which participants performed purposes of these action domains was found to influence distinct types of outcomes, such as full closure, partial closure, non-closure, and degraded closure. To derive a more systemic account of how participants of OCI perform such purposes, three dimensions of dialogic action were proposed: action performed, content of action, and argumentative components. These dimensions were used for characterizing essential dialogic actions in each action domain for su (open full item for complete abstract)

Doctor of Education, University of Akron, 2011, Secondary Education

Self-regulated learning refers to students taking responsibility for what and how they learn in the classroom, and how it affects their thoughts and actions in their academic requirements. This action research case study sought to investigate the use of self-regulated learning (SRL) strategies and beliefs of secondary high school juniors enrolled in the International Baccalaureate English A1 curriculum at an urban secondary school. The focus of this study was students' behavior and beliefs through LASSI testing, phenomenological interviews, student journaling, classroom observations, and artifacts in an authentic classroom setting in the final semester of their junior year. The self-regulated learning strategies of Zimmerman and Pons (1986) were the foundation for this study in an attempt to align the SRL strategies and student beliefs with the International Baccalaureate student profile. Data were gathered through LASSI testing, triadic interviews, student journaling, external observations, and artifacts (an assigned research paper), and the results triangulated with the International Baccalaureate student profile and mission of "learning to learn." Emerging themes became apparent and were explored as the interview process continued at 3-week intervals. The emerging self-efficacy beliefs and strategy use elicited future questions as the results were analyzed and new interview questions were formulated. LASSI testing results were compared with students' interviews and journaling, as well as their reflection letters concerning their research projects. The SRL strategy of collective efficacy, or social assistance from peers, is considered to be the key factor in achieving academic success by all the subjects. The successful students employed forethought and goal-setting, and strategic planning, and found particular intrinsic value in their academic tasks. They valued student engagement, social assistance, and self-control processes. Their volition, or will to succe (open full item for complete abstract)

Master of Arts, The Ohio State University, 2007, Graduate School

Master of Arts, The Ohio State University, 1970, Graduate School

Master of Arts, The Ohio State University, 1968, Graduate School

Master of Arts, The Ohio State University, 2007, Graduate School

Doctor of Education (Educational Leadership), Youngstown State University, 2024, Department of Teacher Education and Leadership Studies

This mixed-methods case study explores the establishment, change, and sustainability of grading practices among high school teachers. Through Q-methodology, this study investigates teachers' perspectives on grading, their motivations for adopting alternative practices, and the challenges they face in implementation. The study's findings reveal that teachers primarily rely on personal experience and limited training to develop grading practices. Social networks among teachers can play a crucial role in influencing the adoption of alternative grading practices. Additionally, collective leadership and professional development can help foster a culture of innovation and support for change. However, resistance to change and the dominance of traditional practices remain significant challenges.

Master of Business Administration, The Ohio State University, 1963, Graduate School

Master of Business Administration, The Ohio State University, 1970, Graduate School

Doctor of Education (Ed.D.) in Organizational Leadership , Franklin University, 2024, International Institute for Innovative Instruction

In an ever-diversifying country, the landscape of the American classroom is shifting, requiring educational leaders and teachers to possess curriculum knowledge, cultural intelligence, and self-efficacy to understand students' cultural differeces. This study aims to offer specific insights into four schools in the suburban Midwest working to improve the historically low achievement of Hispanic students. Utilizing a non-experimental correlational quantitative approach grounded in Social Cognitive Theory (Bandura, 1986) and Cultural Intelligence Theory (Earley & Ang, 2003), this study examined the relationship between Hispanic students' academic outcomes and individual cultural intelligence and collective teacher efficacy. The findings of this study have several practical implications for educational practice, especially in high-poverty schools serving diverse student populations. Fostering an environment that promotes continuous professional development in cultural intelligence is crucial. Although cultural intelligence was not found to have a statistically significant impact on student achievement in this study, the broader literature suggests its importance in culturally diverse settings. The weak yet positive correlation between collective teacher efficacy and student achievement highlights the need to build a strong, supportive school culture. This study contributes to the body of research on educational equity and provides practical insights for improving academic outcomes for Hispanic students.

Doctor of Philosophy, The Ohio State University, 2024, Public Policy and Management

How government delivers public services can have broad societal effects, beyond the impact on programmatic outcomes. Such societal effects are particularly likely in the delivery of public education, as educational concerns drive residential and school choices, and public schools are the second largest public employer in the United States. My dissertation explores how innovations in the way we administer public education may affect societal inequities by race, gender, academic ability, and socioeconomic status. The first essay examines how the emergence of online “virtual” public schooling, which families within a state can access regardless of where they live, has affected school-based segregation by race and poverty. The second essay examines the impact of the sudden closure of a large virtual charter school on district segregation by race and academic ability. Finally, the third essay estimates the impact of introducing teacher collective bargaining—which empowers teachers in the management of public schools—on the diversity of staff and employment and pay of women. Overall, this dissertation explores how education administration affects with whom students interact in school and who has access to quality public sector jobs—all of which, in turn, have well documented long-term impacts on children.

Master of Science, The Ohio State University, 2024, Computer Science and Engineering

The Message Passing Interface is the de facto standard in high-performance computing (HPC) for inter-process communication. MPI libraries employ numerous algorithms for each collective communication pattern whose behavior is largely affected by the underlying hardware, communication pattern, message size, and number of processes involved. Choosing the “best” algorithm for every possible scenario is a non-trivial task. MPI libraries primarily depend on heuristics for algorithm selection on previously unseen clusters, often resulting in evident slowdowns. Although offline micro-benchmarking tools can exhaustively identify optimal algorithms for all configurations, this is an excessively time-consuming approach. Machine Learning (ML) emerged as an alternate approach. However, most ML-based approaches employ online methods that introduce additional runtime overhead, which makes this impractical at scale. To address this challenge, we propose a pre-trained ML framework that eliminates runtime overhead. Our model requires only a quick inference for each new cluster without necessitating model retraining. Our model's training utilizes tuning data from a broad range of architectures, promoting its versatility and our proposed system exhibits up to 6.3% speedup over default heuristics on systems of up to 1024 cores while significantly speedup over default heuristics on systems of up to 1024 cores while significantly minimizing model overhead in comparison to existing methodologies.

Doctor of Philosophy, The Ohio State University, 2024, History

The origins of modern coalition warfare trace back to the Mediterranean theater of World War II. It was there on the treacherous battlefields of North Africa and Sicily where Anglo-American forces learned to harmonize joint and combined forces under a modular and largely experimental integrated theater headquarters for the very first time. Overcoming significant setbacks between 1942 and 1943, the Allies laid the foundations of a resoundingly effective military organization—a multinational coalition built around the distinctly modern principles of unity of command, combined and joint operations, partner integration as well as robust liaison, logistics, and administrative support. These synergistic elements constituted nothing less than an embryonic Allied victory formula, a theater-level template they would export wholesale to great effect in northwestern Europe and whose legacy lives on in western alliances and battlefield coalitions to this day.

Doctor of Philosophy, The Ohio State University, 2024, Psychology

Systemic racism – the institutional and structural exclusion of and bias against people of color – negatively affects people of color. The present research seeks to address how beliefs about the permanence of systemic racism impacts people of color. Across three studies we find that Black Americans who perceive systemic racism to be permanent show decreased intentions to engage in collective action aimed at reforming current systems. Results indicate that this may not be the case for collective action aimed at dismantling or replacing current systems; Black Americans' intentions to support more revolutionary social justice is not diminished by beliefs in a permanent system. Furthermore, in Study 4 we demonstrate that this relationship may operate through efficacy. Participants who believe systemic racism is permanent are more likely to perceive action to be less effective and therefore indicate lesser intentions to participate.