Outside the R1: Equitable data management at the undergraduate level

Universities within the California State University System are given the mandate to teach the students of the state, as is the case with many regional, public universities. This mandate places teaching first; however, research and scholarship are still required activities for reaching retention, tenure, and promotion, as well as important skills for students to practice. Data management instruction for both faculty and undergraduates is often omitted at these institutions, which fall outside of the R1 designation. This happens for a variety of reasons, including personnel and resource limitations. Such limitations disproportionately burden students from underrepresented populations, who are more heavily represented at these institutions. These students have pathways to graduate school and the digital economy, like their counterparts at R1s; thus, they are also in need of research data management skills. This paper describes and provides a scalable, low-resource model for data management instruction from the university library and integrated into a department’s capstone or final project curriculum. In the case study, students and their instructors participated in workshops and submitted data management plans as a requirement of their final project. The analysis will analyze the results of the project and focus on the broader implications of integrating research data management into undergraduate curriculum at public, regional universities. By working with faculty to integrate data management practices into their curricula, librarians reach both students and faculty members with best practices for research data management. This work also contributes to a more equitable and sustainable research landscape.

DEALING SMOOTHLY WITH STUDENT ACTIVISM: REFLECTIONS OF ACTIVISTS AND ADMINISTRATORS IN SRI LANKAN STATE UNIVERSITY SYSTEM

Activism is natural in any context. Similarly, in Sri Lanka student activism has been a prolonged issue in the state university system. As many sources mentioned, it has been deeply embedded in the system, thus eradicating activism is impossible. Therefore, we need to find some strategies to break the early development of activism and to weaken the impact. However, the local authorities have simply labeled student activism as a political matter and ignored them for years in Sri Lanka. Past studies have extensively discussed the negative consequences of activism, yet the prevention strategies are rarely spoken. Therefore, this study aims to seek strategies to deal with activism smoothly. Since the art of handling conflicts is subjective, this study employed the phenomenological approach under the qualitative strategy. A sample of administrators and student activists was selected using purposive and snowballing sampling techniques. In-depth interviews were conducted to collect data and they were analyzed thematically. Mediation strategies were revealed from both activists' and administrators’ perspectives. Accordingly, this study revealed that activists expect a fair, respectful, friendly, humanistic, and genuine approach from the administrators' end. Administrators seek more autonomy and democratic governance when dealing with activism and they revealed some unique issues of their side. Two-Way communication, flexibility in mechanisms, humanistic approaches, more participation are the concerns where both parties are well thought out. All the identified strategies will be useful in handling activism smoothly in the future.

Course Design and Academic Outcomes in Quantitative Literacy After Eliminating Required Remediation

In Fall 2018, remedial mathematics courses were eliminated from the 23-campus California State University system under Executive Order 1110. Incoming first-year students were placed into college credit-bearing mathematics courses with options for corequisite support. This study examines the academic outcomes for students at California State University Monterey Bay in a college credit level quantitative literacy (QL) mathematics course with optional corequisite support during the 2018-2019 academic year. Taken together, the results of this study suggest that required remediation is not necessary for success in college-level QL. The corequisite support model also has potential to support more equitable outcomes for all students. However, further study is needed to identify institutional, departmental, and pedagogical best practices for effective corequisite support in QL.

The Great Sham of the California State University System

The Great Sham of the California State University System

A Statewide Study of Perceptions of Directors on the Availability of Online Student Support Services at Postsecondary Institutions

As a state university system planned for growth in the availability of distance education degrees, the presidents and the provosts decided to include consideration for the availability of student support services. To ensure availability of student support services for online students, college and university systems in the state developed and implemented a self-reporting tool, the Online Student Support Scorecard to measure the availability of those services at both the college and the university levels. Although institutions were offering many of the services identified in the scorecard as essential, institutions were struggling to provide some of the services. Differences also were identified between the types of services available at the state college system compared with the university system.

Characteristics of academic adaptation and cognitive functions of students with disabilities

The correlation of the characteristics of academic adaptation and cognitive functions of students with disabilities will make it possible to develop the best strategies in implementing the principle of equal educational opportunities in higher educational institutions for all students. The purpose of this study is to analyze the relationship between the characteristics of academic adaptation and the cognitive functions of students with disabilities and without health restrictions. It is assumed that there is a specificity of cognitive functions and academic adaptation of students with HIA and without restrictions that contribute to academic adaptation and academic success. The study involved 419 students, including 32 (7.8%) students with disabilities. The following methods and techniques were used. The components of academic adaptation were measured using the academic adaptation scale (Shamionov R.M., Grigoriev M.V., Grinina E.S., Sozonnik A.V.). Methods included in the Practice-Moscow State University system were used to evaluate cognitive functions. To study the features of student thinking, the test "Complex analogies" was used, which allows you to identify verbal abilities (thinking by analogy). The assessment of the ability to concentrate and switch attention was carried out using the test "Red-black tables" (F.D. Gorbov). Assessment of students' logical thinking was performed using the Quantitative Relationships test. To evaluate the formal logical abilities and abilities for cognitive learning of students, the Standard Progressive Raven Matrices technique was used. Socio-demographic indicators were measured using the developed questionnaire. As a result of the study, the similarity of indicators of personal, emotional-evaluation, cognitive and motivational components of academic adaptation was established. The severity of psychophysiological (t=3.25; p<0.01) and communicative (t=2.05; p<0.05) components is lower in students with disabilities. Significant differences have been established in the main indicators of attention switching. Lower indicators of attention switching (t=2.82; p<0.02), low pace (t=2.39; p<0.03), accuracy (t=2.27; p<0.04) and productivity (t=2.63; p<0.02) were identified. The relationship between the characteristics of academic adaptation and cognitive functions is predominantly reduced not to the function itself, but to the general performance, time spent on solving certain problems. The higher success of studies at the university of those who have the ability to understand abstraction and complex logical (r=0.219; p<0.01) connections has been confirmed. Conclusions were drawn on the need to create conditions for the implementation of the principle of equal opportunities in the process of teaching students with disabilities in terms of individualizing the educational trajectory, creating conditions for improving communicative competence and mechanisms of psychophysiological self-regulation.