Three recent graduates of the North Carolina State College of Education were recognized for their scholarship with outstanding paper awards at the university's May 2024 Commencement Ceremony.
Luke Borden Carman ’24PHD won the award in the Department of STEM Education, Courtney Samuelson ’23PHD won the award in the Department of Teacher Education and Learning Sciences, and Dana Thomas ’23PHD won the award in the Department of Educational Leadership, Policy, and Human Development.
You can learn more about these recent graduates and their papers in the articles below.
luke borden carman
PhD in Learning and Teaching in STEM Mathematics and statistics education concentration
Supervisor: Assistant Professor of Mathematics Education robin anderson Associate Professor of Mathematics Education Wakowiak Temple
Luke Boden Carman has always been interested in how people with different expertise and different powers can learn together across different settings and roles, and his student teaching experience has been I realized that learning can be a unique situation for it to occur.
When he came to North Carolina State College of Education to pursue his doctoral degree, he was inspired to think about how student teachers, cooperating teachers, and university faculty learn in the same space, and specifically what mathematics education might look like. I was excited. More fair.
Carman explored these ideas in an award-winning paper titled “Student Instruction, Power Structures, and Equitable Mathematics in Teacher Learning Communities of Practice in Third Spaces: A Qualitative Critical Case Study.”
“I am very honored to receive this award from the university this year. Only one person can receive it.
Although I was able to list my name as an author on the paper, I was not able to receive this award.
Very supportive community. This includes my committee (Temple's Dr. Robin Anderson).
Walkowiak, Cindy Edgington, Sammy Marshall, Byun Sung-hwan), my family and friends,
To my fellow graduate students and mathematics educators who participated in this project:
They are members of a learning community,” he said.
Carman's doctoral thesis investigated how learning took place in a group of pre-service teachers, cooperating teachers, and mathematics teacher educators in the Third Universe Learning Group, known as the Mathematics Education Group, and explored how learning communities We focused specifically on how we address issues of equity. and how sociopolitics and teacher learning power structures shaped learning opportunities for participants.
Findings demonstrate that shared facilitation is important in helping participants learn about equity, as facilitators bring experiences and artifacts from other communities of practice into the conversation, and that participants can demonstrated that they frequently engage with sociopolitical power structures in ways that strengthen the
Findings also showed that forms of third-space engagement, such as collective and joint facilitation responsibilities, reduced the hierarchy of teacher learning.
“Experienced teachers and university faculty who welcome student teachers into the profession also need to learn alongside novices in order to become effective teachers and improve their own pedagogies,” Carman said. “Bringing all of these learners together was an incredibly enriching opportunity to learn from a truly thoughtful community of math educators.”
As she prepares to graduate and take on her role as Director of Community School Partnerships at Student U, Carman draws on her dissertation research and lessons learned in the College of Education to explore ways to bring parents, students, and teachers together. Excited to think. , school staff, community members, and partners come together in one space to develop more collaborative and effective community schools.
“I will put much of what I have researched into practice. In addition, my time at North Carolina State University will give me the ability to synthesize research on community schools and the skill set to visit schools and support local staff.” “This is exactly what I do when I support the Community School Coordinator at the University,” he said.
courtney samuelson
PhD in Teacher Education and Learning Sciences Literacy and English language arts concentration
Supervisor: Associate Professor of Literacy Education Dennis Davis
Courtney Samuelson is passionate about teacher education and wants to support and prepare new teachers with the knowledge and skills to engage in culturally responsive literacy instruction for diverse student populations. Ta.
So she enrolled at North Carolina State College of Education to pursue her Ph.D., learning how to better prepare and support teachers to meet the needs of students who struggle with reading. Specifically, we wanted to investigate why reading interventions in public schools fail to adequately support teachers in fostering the assets of culturally and linguistically diverse students.
She had the opportunity to explore this subject through her award-winning dissertation entitled “Conflicting Priorities: An Ethnographic Case Study of Literacy Practices and Multilevel Support Systems in Upper Elementary School.”
“I am honored and grateful to receive this award,” Samuelson said. “I believe that my doctoral dissertation is just one piece of the impressive body of research that my fellow teacher education and learning sciences doctoral graduates have conducted this year. and to improve equity for culturally and linguistically diverse students.”
Saumeulson's paper is a case study that uses Cultural Historical Activity Theory (CHAT) to explore instructional and intervention practices in an elementary school that is working to implement a Multi-Tiered Systems of Support (MTSS) framework and provided insight into the role of support. , interpersonal and cultural-institutional factors that influence instructional decisions and students' literacy experiences.
Findings showed that conflicting priorities and responsibilities influenced the implementation of MTSS programs, impacting upper elementary school students' literacy learning, practices, and identities. These conflicting demands contributed to inconsistent MTSS program implementation and created challenges in providing reading and writing support to students.
“My in-depth research has highlighted the myriad challenges and demands that elementary school teachers face in meeting the diverse literacy needs of their students, particularly the teacher shortages and subsequent instructional support that have resulted. That's the case for teachers working in schools who are facing a lack of education during the COVID-19 pandemic,” Samuelson said. “The bright and wonderful 4th and 5th grade students in my study did not always receive the support they were promised or needed through the MTSS program. It highlights the need for literacy support and intervention systems in schools to better empower and guide teachers to plan and create meaningful literacy experiences for their students.”
Samuelson, who is currently an assistant professor of education at Methodist University, continues to support educators' literacy practices through teaching and research, and said her time in the College of Education helped prepare her for this role.
“My doctoral studies in the School of Education have equipped me with the knowledge and passion to pursue this work. I look forward to engaging in research to further understand and rethink literacy instruction and intervention practices. ” she said.
Dana Thomas
PhD in Educational Leadership, Policy and Human Development Opportunity, equity and justice in higher education concentration
Advisor: Dean and Alumni Distinguished Graduate Professor joy gaston gales
In 2019, Joy Gaston Gales, Alumni Distinguished Graduate Professor and advisor to Dana Thomas in the School of Education, received a letter from Laura Clark, Alumni Distinguished Graduate Professor in the Physics Department, about the physics major she was conducting. I received a request to involve educational researchers in a study about what experiences are like. Course-based, experimental minilabs shaped their self-awareness and discipline. Specifically, Clark was interested in researchers interested in studying the factors that support or hinder the persistence of students who have traditionally been excluded or marginalized in physics.
Thus began Thomas and Clark's collaboration, which ultimately culminated in Thomas' award-winning paper, “The Contextual Experiences, Perceptions, and Beliefs of College Physics Majors Enrolled in Physics Courses Incorporating Interactive Teaching Approaches. This led to the “exploration of intention.''
“I am so honored and grateful to receive this award! It means so much to me,” Thomas said. “My specific thesis topic was shaped by conversations with Dr. Clark and Dr. Gales, reading the literature, and spending a lot of time thinking about how best to address the overarching research questions at hand. Through the things I put in, it emerged over time.”
This dissertation is comprised of three studies, each of which examines the identification effects that influence the experiences, beliefs, perceptions, and intentions of undergraduate physics students enrolled in courses that incorporate interactive instructional approaches. Focuses on factors.
The first two studies examined the contextual dynamics of students' physics ability beliefs, sense of belonging, disciplinary identity, and continuance intentions over time, and the third study examined the contextual dynamics of students' physics beliefs, sense of belonging, disciplinary identity, and continuance intentions, and the third study We investigated the lived experiences and development of disciplinary identity of physics students with a different identity. Dynamics within physics learning environments.
Our findings show that short-term malleability in students' beliefs about their physics abilities is related to the extent to which they feel recognized by others as exemplary physics students, and that, in the long-term, they are more malleable. Students with higher physics ability beliefs were shown to convey a greater sense of belonging. And I plan to continue majoring in physics. Additionally, this study found that Black and Latinx students, as well as women, reported a lower sense of belonging to their physics major compared to men and students who identified as White or Asian. found.
Now, as the Dean of Biological Sciences for Advising and Evaluation in the North Carolina School of Biological Sciences, Thomas uses what he learned about research methods, tools, and theoretical frameworks in the College of Education to inform his approach not only academically but also as an advisor. We provide information. teachers and administrators.
“The doctoral program provided me with opportunities and connections that will serve me well for the rest of my career. Being able to complete the program as a part-time student suited my professional trajectory and I am grateful for it. ” she said.
