Our study draws from the UW’s College of Education Civic Lessons and Immigrant Youth project, an in-depth case study of students during their high school civics courses, which poses questions regarding citizenship and immigration. Using cross-referenced and transcribed interview transcripts, our small-scale study uses student questionnaire items from thirty-three immigrant and non-immigrant students. We trace our inquiry to Children of Immigration, a research text presenting the psychology concept of “social mirroring”, defined as students’ accountability for societal and institutional perceptions in the formation of their self-identities. Our research questions are: When asked to define American and immigrant identities, what themes exist in the attributes or explicit connotations students make? What are the themes in student perceptions based on immigrant and non-immigrant experiences? What perception themes might reveal connections to student questionnaire statements of being an American or not? Our primary focus will assess data on sentence completion items: “Americans are…”, Americans should…”, “Immigrants are…”, and “Immigrants should…”. We will organize sentence responses as negative, neutral, positive and mixed and categorize responses for repetitions, similarities, and differences into Microsoft Excel. Next, we will create graphic representations of common themes. Our research aims to call attention to perceptions and expectations that exist among high school students which may not be as freely expressed in classroom settings and which may reveal nuances of social conflict or tension that students absorb into their social mirroring. Our study has implications for immigrant students and their families who often grow to have strong generational ties to U.S. culture and a sense of belonging in the U.S. The implications of our study reveal participant expectations of “Americans” and “immigrants” which can be assessed as actionable items for broader discussion in civics classrooms and U.S. society at large.

Writing is an emotional endeavor; tutoring is as well. Tutors must kindle frank, complex conversations between two strangers, with differing expectations, different interpersonal styles, and (often) much at stake. How can the tutor make a writer feel safe enough to talk candidly? How might the tutor weather the frightening moments when s/he doesn’t know what to say next? The emotions of tutoring catch many new tutors by surprise and pose an ongoing challenge to veteran tutors, who even risk burnout. The dynamic and intimate territory of a writing session has no roadmap. Strategies from the literature may suddenly fail, and one’s sense of comfort and skill as a tutor may vanish. With such unpredictability, tutors cannot merely follow rules; they must use their discretion, guided by reflection and self-assessment. As researchers, we asked whether tutors’ self-assessment techniques benefited their tutoring work or (conversely) made it emotionally unsustainable. We were interested in differentiating between ‘constructive’ and ‘destructive’ styles of self-assessment and wanted to investigate whether constructive self-assessment might help tutors cope with the highly-variable emotional dimension of tutoring. Our first set of data comes from two 90-minute focus groups wherein 20 tutors were asked to freewrite self-assessments and then analyze and compare their self-assessment styles in facilitated small-group conversations. Preliminary findings from these think-aloud protocols gives important insight into the ways tutors are benchmarking their successes and failures. Further data will come from surveying tutors on the range of emotions they commonly experience before, during, and after sessions, and from completing in-depth interviews with a smaller number of tutors to reflect on the temporal interplay of self-assessment and emotion within particular sessions. This research has potential applications for any highly-interpersonal work where success is a matter of responsiveness, emotional-attentiveness, and continuous learning rather than a matter of following pre-determined rules.

This study examines the competitive market of higher education by studying the impact that university heritage has on students and their parents, who are both crucial stakeholders in the college selection process. The growing competition among higher education institutions has made the close examination of student and parent attitudes necessary, so that colleges and universities can successfully engage and attract students. Previous research has shown that academic reputation and prospects of graduation significantly influence students' college selection process. However, the components of university heritage and its influence on stakeholders’ decision has not been thoroughly investigated in the academic literature. Whereas, a recent study has analyzed the impact that university heritage has on international students, the main targets of this research are students and parents in the United States. This research mainly examines the components of university heritage perceptions of parents as compared to prospective students. Another area of focus is to understand how much importance parents place on the history and heritage of universities as compared to students. In order to fulfill the objectives of this research, two focus groups will be conducted in Tacoma. One group will involve parents of prospective students and the other will involve students. The results of this study will be analyzed and presented at the Undergraduate Research Symposium at the University of Washington. 

This study intends to explain the disparity in student performance and academic achievement in school districts in Washington by measuring the degree to which parents and the community are involved in school district activities and agenda setting. I theorize that there is a direct and positive correlation between the academic success of a school district and the presence of a highly active chapter of the National Parent Teacher Association (PTA), or a local Parent Teacher Organization (PTO). PTAs and PTOs encourage the communities the school district serves to take a more enterprising role in integrating their resources, information, and expectations into guidelines for classroom and administrative work. Until now, there has been relatively little quantitative data collected to measure the relationship between public K-12 education and parent groups. If the influence of PTAs and PTOs is positively associated with a district’s academic success, we can suggest additional emphasis on parent and community outreach programs as a policy strategy aimed at narrowing the achievement gap between school districts.

This paper addresses how dismissive attitudes towards art education in popular opinion and mass media directly affect the marginalization of the arts in United States primary and secondary schools. In comparison to the science, technology, engineering, mathematics (S.T.E.M) model favored by educational funding, art programs are considered insignificant and useless. Considering the long term results of diminishing art education, this paper will examine the repercussions that a discipline hierarchy will have in regards to future social and economic components. I argue that the arts have a vital place in prospective industry and economic endeavors and that S.T.E.M alone will not be advantageous without the inclusion of art to the model. Research shows that schools that value art education as a fundamental aspect of curriculum show benefits of fewer classroom management issues, greater attendance, and higher standardized test scores. Art should be integrated as a viable learning tool in every facet of S.T.E.M to create an active learning environment as opposed to passive learning space. By examining popular opinion and trends in media directed towards art education, while also factoring in cognitive studies and critical theory, I show that the importance of art education is not defined by its content or subject matter. Rather, the way the students engage individually and personally with art, stimulating circular thinking and fostering the capacity for creative thought and ingenuity.

The learning community has grown in recent years as an educational method that more effectively educates students by applying theories of community to the learning environment, creating an important bridge in student experience. Learning communities offer a sharp contrast to the more standardized educational system and must be deeply analyzed to understand their relevance and usefulness to students. The Community, Environment, and Planning (CEP) major at the University of Washington is a unique, intentional, student-designed and student-governed learning community that has existed in a state of constant evolution since its inception in 1993. In this research project, I draw on learning community theory to ask how well CEP has developed its capacity as an effective learning community and how CEP’s informed practices can be more broadly applicable in a higher educational context. This research uses Mitchel and Sackney’s framework of learning community capacities to analyze the program’s efficacy and develop a base of informed practices. As part of this research, I developed a history of CEP, drawing from a review of historical documents and key informant interviews. This history gives context to two years of participant observation in the program. My results show that CEP is performing at a high capacity but, like any learning community living system, has room for growth and improvement. Yet, it is clear that CEP's informed practices could apply to other higher education learning communities and even be incorporated into the standard educational system.