Ed.D., Antioch University, 2024, Education

The teaching profession has historically been defined by an “overwhelming presence of whiteness” (Sleeter, 2001, p. 101), leading to experiences from Black, Indigenous and Teachers of Color (BITOC) often being neglected and undervalued. This action-oriented research project employed poetic inquiry techniques to capture the full experiences of BITOC participants speaking their stories in their voices through poetry. The centering of BITOC experiences is crucial to shifting the paradigm from mere survival and retention towards what aspects of the BITOC experiences support them to flourish and thrive in private/independent schools. This study examined poetry as a generative practice for building community, healing, self-reflection, and providing affirmations for BITOC in their independent school settings. Critical race theory (CRT) served as the theoretical framework of this study, specifically the centering of the counter-narratives of BITOC. Their stories are centered and amplified as integral sources of knowledge and experience, while exploring an embodied and generative practice to support their thriving. This study seeks to contribute towards an equitable and inclusive teaching profession which embraces and acknowledges BITOC experiences. This dissertation is available in open access at AURA (https://aura.antioch.edu) and OhioLINK ETD Center (https:// etd.ohiolink.edu).

Committee: Y. Falami Devoe Ph.D. (Committee Chair); Stephen Brookfield Ph.D. (Committee Member); Joaquin Muñoz Ph.D. (Committee Member) Subjects: Education; Minority and Ethnic Groups; Teaching

Doctor of Musical Arts (DMA), Bowling Green State University, 2024, Contemporary Music

This paper explores the intersection of U.S. graduate music student experiences and mental health. A literature review discussing nineteenth-century mechanist piano pedagogy practices, Carl Seashore's Measures of Musical Talent, the impact of neoliberal capitalism on students, and an overview of current U.S. studies on university music student mental health underscore the need for further inquiry into the student experience. I held eight semi-structured interviews with current or former U.S. graduate music students focused on their experiences as a music major. Through poetic inquiry and qualitative content-coding, the interview transcripts were analyzed and organized into poetic portraits representing the collective essence of the lived experiences of the interviewees. The set of eight poems, “Portraits of a Wonderful Musician,” explores uncovered codes including: identity, self-perception, pressure, expectations, urgency, anxiety, the pursuit of perfection, guilt, depression, criticism, comparison, and burnout. Grounded in phenomenology, this paper foregrounds the subjective lived experiences of those interviewed and demonstrates how these rich understandings can inform current music education trends and practices. Poetic inquiry and coding revealed a correlation between traditionalist pedagogical practices and students exhibiting fixed mindset traits, which are associated with the negative lived student experiences. Influenced by the historical, social, and cultural constraints of music pedagogies, teachers and students can benefit from student-centered learning approaches, deliberate practice strategies, and modeling growth mindsets to proactively challenge detrimental traditions.

Committee: Solungga Liu D.M.A. (Committee Chair); Monica Longmore Ph.D. (Other); Ryan Ebright Ph.D. (Committee Member); Laura Melton D.M.A. (Committee Member) Subjects: American Studies; Education; Education History; Education Philosophy; Educational Sociology; Educational Tests and Measurements; Epistemology; Higher Education; Mental Health; Music; Music Education; Pedagogy; Performing Arts; Philosophy; Social Research; Sociology

Doctor of Philosophy, The Ohio State University, 2024, Arts Administration, Education and Policy

How might teacher educators build a reflective and supportive community of practice with pre-service teachers? How might a visual (intermedia) journaling practice support critical and reflective thinking? How might an arts-based intermedia approach to analysis inform teacher educator pedagogical methods? These questions evolved and emerged throughout my research process during this dissertation study. As an artist/researcher/teacher I used an arts-based research paradigm to guide an emergent research practice focused on understanding the potential of arts-based reflective practice in an art teacher education program. The study was conducted with two groups of undergraduate student participants enrolled in pre-service teacher education coursework. Parallaxic praxis, emerging from a/r/tography, was a guiding research methodology and pedagogical approach used to maintain a creative, living inquiry throughout the study. This methodology supported opportunities and potential for the researcher and participants to generate arts-based study data and engage in performative processes documenting their experience with creative reflective practices. The learnings from the first participant group informed decisions and activity design for participant group two. Participants actively engaged in self-directed and co-designed intermedia reflective activities throughout the cycles of the study. Along the way, poetic inquiry surfaced as a central method for analysis and to generate research renderings, primarily in the form of found poems. The research renderings were conceptualized into a research exhibition designed to be experienced through multiple modalities including an exhibition in an art gallery and a virtual online exhibition. This dissertation illustrates where the research process led me as the researcher, and my students, as participants. Through the renderings in the research exhibition, the process of analyzing data using poetic inquiry highlights benefits and cha (open full item for complete abstract)

Committee: jt Richardson (Advisor); Shari Savage (Committee Member); Richard Finlay Fletcher (Committee Member); Norah Zuniga-Shaw (Committee Member) Subjects: Art Education; Education; Fine Arts; Teacher Education; Teaching

Master of Arts, The Ohio State University, 2021, Art Education

This research aims to explore the potential of reflective teaching in higher education during a time of great uncertainty. This research also examines the possibilities of critical dialogue in a spatially disconnected classroom. Even though the pandemic of 2020-2021 has thrown the entire world into an extended period of crises, education has not stopped. When classrooms become sites of hidden vulnerabilities, undecidedness and disconnection, how can a teacher continue to focus on facilitating critical pedagogy and meaningful education? Through an investigation that utilizes teacher reflective participatory action research questions and solutions that bridge theories of critical dialogue with a higher education classroom in the pandemic is shared.

Committee: Christine Ballengee Morris (Advisor); Jennifer T. Eisenhauer Richardson (Committee Member) Subjects: Art Education; Education; Teaching

Master of Arts, The Ohio State University, 2021, Arts Policy and Administration

This thesis seeks to challenge the prevalence of interpersonal racism in the workplace and the existence of substantial racist workplace policy in organizations that both harmfully affect non-white employees in organizations and makes developing anti-racist policy in the workplace difficult. This thesis utilizes poetic inquiry as a methodological practice to explore the relationship between racism, work culture, and work policy in nonprofit and arts organizations. The poems crafted in this inquiry are responses to literature exploring the impacts and historical contexts of white supremacy and racial discrimination in relation to the operational strategies of public and nonprofit arts organizations. This literature establishes a foundation for future inquiries about work culture, workplace policy, race, social hierarchy, cultural analysis, and art. The metaphor of “home” literature is used to describe this literature. Home literature is the group of theoretical frameworks and writings that a researcher grounds their expertise in and is formulated based on one's core research interests. The literature reviewed covers the topics of defining professionalism, understanding theory concerning race and power, and specifying critiques on racism in the workplace. The authors covered in this review of literature are Judyth Sachs, Gloria Ladson-Billings, William F. Tate, Kimberly Crenshaw, Cheryl Harris, David Theo Goldberg, Stefano Harney, Fred Moten, Achille Mbembe, Roderick A. Ferguson, Victor Ray, Ericka Brown, Lu-in Wang, Zachary Brewster, Courtney L. McCluney, Adia Harvey Wingfield, and Renee Skeete Alston. In the methodology portion of the text, the rationale for the use of poetic inquiry is explained. The is a separation made between poetic inquiry and poetry as research, two concepts this research embodies. It is also explained what separates arts-based research from other forms of qualitative methodological practices. The form of poetic inquiry used in this resear (open full item for complete abstract)

Committee: James Sanders III/Ph.D. (Advisor); Richard Fletcher Ph.D. (Committee Member) Subjects: Art Education; Arts Management

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

Whether it is claiming a radical self-love for one's body or dissatisfaction of one's body, the experiences of African American women and their bodies cannot be divergent from the sociocultural contexts in which they live. Seeking to reveal how gender, race, and sexual orientation impact the lived experiences of African American women and their bodies, this study will bring attention to and provide a more nuanced understanding of the historical and sociocultural ramifications of the Black female body. Historically, inadequate attention has been given to an intersectional approach to understanding the experiences of the Black female body. It is understood that Black women are a marginalized population. This marginalization is rooted in race, gender, age, sexual orientation, and class. What influence do these interlocking oppressive forces have on the way African American women live and view their bodies? Utilizing a participatory research model, participants chronicled their experiences with their bodies in pictures and words through interviews, narratives, and photographs. Addressing body image from an intersectional approach, this research adds to existing literature and gives womanist breadth and depth to this discussion of body experience framed within the sociocultural context. The women, “sisters,” in this study shared stories of liberation, healing and resistance challenging assumptions of Black womanhood. This dissertation is available in open access at AURA: Antioch University Repository and Archive, http://aura.antioch.edu/ and OhioLINK ETD Center, https://etd.ohiolink.edu/

Committee: Philomena Essed PhD (Committee Chair); Elizabeth Holloway PhD (Committee Member); Jameta Barlow PhD, MPH (Committee Member) Subjects: African Americans; Black Studies; Gender Studies

Doctor of Philosophy (Ph.D.), Bowling Green State University, 2017, Media and Communication

In American culture, we are greatly influenced by the mass media. Much of what we hear and believe to be true about our society is formulated via electronic mediums. However, there is often a distorted or misguided approach being passed from one source to the other. In the United States, men and women of the armed forces are heroes that we proudly support. Yet, many veterans are returning home post war to an environment in which they find difficulty adjusting, specifically those diagnosed with Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder (PTSD). These veterans are a part of the most vulnerable populations in our society, and as such deserve to be heard in a way that authenticates their experiences. This research examines creative expression using arts-based methods and poetic inquiry in particular to highlight veteran voices, and is utilized to counter misrepresented portrayals of veterans in the media. I argue that organizations centered on arts based methods are using their media platforms to not only raise awareness, but also to provide a different voice of representation that allows the veterans to create and convey messages regarding their own lived experience. The goal of this research is to provide an understanding of the discursive divide between veteran self-identity and the media representations of veterans with PTSD.

Committee: Sandra Faulkner (Committee Co-Chair); Alberto Gonzalez (Committee Co-Chair); Radhika Gajjala (Committee Member); Mark Munson (Other) Subjects: Armed Forces; Art Education; Communication; Mass Media; Mental Health; Rhetoric; Therapy

Ph.D., Antioch University, 2015, Leadership and Change

Young, Gifted and Brown is a journey of two directions converging. It is a study of Puerto Rican Diaspora in higher education, specifically, students making sense and meaning of their everyday. It is also a study of how I have related to them as a professor. Together, this is a story: research done creatively, toward the development of Critical Pedagogy for Puerto Rican Diaspora. The research question is: what has made the Puerto Rican Diaspora in the United States flourish and their lived experience meaningful? How can a diasporic people connect with and affirm their roots in an educational system far from home? The answer is rooted in creativity: how does poetry provoke students to teach each other about their experiences and to learn with each other through sharing their own poetry? This Dissertation was composed through poetic performance ethnography, from which I have developed my findings from students' reflections on their lives through the AutoEthnoPoetic. The process is deeply informed by Eugenio Maria de Hostos' moral social and Jose Marti's poetic pedagogy as well as race critical educational theories, including Culturally Relevant Pedagogy. Through an AutoEthnoPoetic journey through puertorriquenidad, “Puerto Rican-ness,” or sense of being Puerto Rican, there are lessons for students and educators on how poetic performance ethnography can facilitate success and alegria (happiness) and inspire, motivate, and celebrate in an education system where diaspora are present. This Dissertation contains three MP3 files and 13 MP4 files. The electronic version of this dissertation is available in open access at AURA: Antioch University Repository and Archive, http://aura.antioch.edu/ and Ohiolink ETD Center, www.ohiolink.edu/etd

Committee: Philomena Essed PhD (Committee Chair); Carolyn Kenny PhD (Committee Member); René Antrop-González PhD (Committee Member); Ulrika Schmauch PhD (Other) Subjects: Aesthetics; American Studies; Community College Education; Curriculum Development; Educational Sociology; Educational Theory; Ethnic Studies; Higher Education; Hispanic American Studies; Latin American Studies; Pedagogy