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Scholarship has shown that writing groups are important sites of authority negotiation for student writers, yet little empirical research has examined how groups negotiate authority through conversation or how these negotiations influence students' developing expertise. Drawing on observations and interviews of an undergraduate thesis and a graduate dissertation writing group, I use the concept of "presentification" to analyze conversational moments in which group members referenced advisors, "making present" advisor authority to influence group collaborations. Specifically, I analyze these moments to show how writing groups can serve as low-stakes communities in which students negotiate their emerging sense of authority. I found that whereas less experienced writers looked to advisors to solve writing problems and used advisor authority to stand in for disciplinary expertise, more experienced writers voiced advisor guidance to help pose writing problems and negotiate their own stance as disciplinary experts. This study thus theorizes one process through which student writers negotiate emerging authority across sites of literate practice and in collaboration with others who may not themselves be members of the same disciplinary community.

This study explored the information literacy practices of undergraduate students conducting research for their Honors theses in their final year of study. Data was collected from 11 Honors students during several months through four rounds of open-ended, journal-style questionnaires and two rounds of interviews. Honors students' sense of confidence varied throughout the thesis process, and several practices were identified that influenced students' sense of self-efficacy. This study suggests that instruction librarians can help to increase students' self-efficacy by modeling advanced research strategies, designing opportunities for students to practice challenging research tasks that build on previous skills, and addressing the affective and self-regulatory aspects of conducting higher-level research.

Bachelor thesis supervision involves a supporting goal and an assessment goal, requiring more guidance versus more autonomy and freedom for students, respectively. This paper tests the hypotheses that the final grade of undergraduate bachelor thesis is positively related to a supervisor's (a) guidance given to and (b) affiliation with the bachelor thesis student/project. To assess these hypotheses, undergraduate students at the FHNW School of Business have been surveyed for three years about their perception and satisfaction with bachelor thesis supervision. This data (n = 189) was combined with student grades before the thesis and their final thesis grades. Our results show supervision to have a measurable impact on the bachelor thesis outcome and most effective when focused on guidance related to goal definition and methodological support. In other areas supervision can, to a certain degree, follow a more laissez-faire supervision style. [Image omitted.]

Students are generally required to demonstrate diverse skills when writing their bachelor thesis. Accordingly, examiners are expected to consider all these skills when assessing the thesis, regularly with one overall grade. In this study, we examine which criteria of a rubric contribute most to the overall assessment. The study is performed through quantitative analyses of 318 theses of undergraduate biology students. The analyses demonstrate that all criteria scores are predictive, but that "scientific quality" and "professional attitude" give the best prediction of thesis grade, together with "structure." The predictiveness of "scientific quality" and "professional attitude" correspond with the instructions given to examiners that these are important criteria to consider. Presentation-related criteria scores on "writing skills" and "expressing catchy and justifying titles" give the lowest prediction of grade. This study identifies that some criteria appear more predictive for low grades than for high grades, with "professional attitude" being a good predictor for low grades and "abstract" being a good predictor for high grades. We recommend similar analyses for students to help them prioritise the most relevant criteria, for supervisors to instruct students on these criteria, and for education managers to evaluate whether bachelor theses are assessed on the criteria they find most relevant.

Diagnosing teachers are teachers who perceive diagnostic information about students' learning process, interpret these aspects, decide how to respond, and act based on this diagnostic decision. During supervision meetings about the undergraduate thesis supervisors make in-the-moment decisions while interacting with their students. We regarded research supervision as a teaching process for the supervisor and a learning process for the student. We tried to grasp supervisors' in-the-moment decisions and students' perceptions of supervisors' actions. Supervisor decisions and student perceptions were measured with video-stimulated recall interviews and coded using a content analysis approach. The results showed that the in-the-moment decisions our supervisors made had a strong focus on student learning. Supervisors often asked questions to empower students or to increase student understanding. These supervising strategies seemed to be adapted to students' needs, as the latter had positive perceptions when their control increased or when they received stimuli to think for themselves.

This paper revisited the issue of transfer in an unexplored context: the transition from instruction-based writing to the bachelor's theses by English-major students in one university in China. To explore the extent to which the writing instruction prepared the students for thesis writing practice, we created two corpora of student writing: 591 assignments produced by 40 students in 3 writing-related courses offered in the curriculum and 40 bachelor's theses produced between 2014-2018. Based on the taxonomy of elemental genres in the Systemic Functional Linguistics, we compared the genre distribution in the two corpora via log-likelihood tests. Results revealed that two patterns of "continuity" and two patterns of "discontinuity" existed in the students' literacy journey. Also, framed within the theory of adaptive transfer, a focus-group interview was conducted with four thesis writers in an attempt to trace their transfer of rhetorical knowledge between the two rhetorical contexts. Findings demonstrated that the students consciously "reused" and "reshaped" a pool of rhetorical knowledge acquired from the writing courses to navigate the complex task of thesis writing. This paper then concludes with implications for L2 writing research, curriculum, and pedagogy.

This paper proposes a paradigm shift from the traditionally systematic, rigid structures of thesis writing courses to favor an inclusive, fluid, and flexible approach that both centers on student needs and meets the professional demands of future graduates. An intentional move to amend the thesis writing course would (1) create the conditions for students to have a greater stake in their own writing, (2) establish a sense of a cohort and scholarly community, and (3) integrate students into the professor's scholarly habits of writing. This comprehensive education approach is intended for application in upper-level undergraduate thesis courses. By increasing the student's share in the writing and research process as collaborators, instructors can model the behaviors of scholarship and intellectual community, position ourselves as mentors, and substantially increase our own academic productivity. To elaborate upon this approach, I reflect upon my experience as a preceptor in a Senior Seminar Bachelor's thesis course to provide a loose outline for fellow capstone thesis writing instructors.

From the end of the 1970s, all teacher education programmes have been a part of academic higher education in Finland. Thus, TE has been implemented in universities and all Finnish comprehensive and upper-secondary school teachers have a master's degree. Research methods courses have been an essential part of teacher education courses for over 40 years. Our results revealed that students in all educational programmes seem to prefer empirical methods to theoretical methods as a way of acquiring educational knowledge. In line with previous studies, an aversion to quantitative methods was also found in the present study. However, there were some exceptions to this overall view. Most of the students in our study recognized that teachers need research skills in their practical work. The students acknowledged that these kinds of skills are especially important when acquainting themselves with new research results in their professional field.

Chemical substances from theses are not widely accessible as searchable machine-readable formats. In this article, we describe our workflow for extracting, registering, and sharing chemical substances from the University of Alabama theses to enhance discovery. In total, 73 theses were selected for the project, resulting in about 3,000 substances registered using the IUPAC International Chemical Identifier and deposited in PubChem as either structure-data files or Simplified Molecular-Input Line-Entry System notations. In addition to substances being deposited in PubChem, an archive copy was also deposited in the University of Alabama Institutional Repository. The PubChem records for the substance depositions include the full bibliographic reference and link to the thesis full text or thesis metadata when the full text is not yet available. Excluding mixtures, we found that 40% of the shared substances were new to PubChem at the time of deposition. We conclude this article with a detailed discussion about our experiences, challenges, and recommendations for librarians and curators engaged in sharing chemical substance data from theses and similar documents.

Voice is considered essential in academic writing, and metadiscourse is an important device contributing to voice. This study explores the use of metadiscourse and voice construction in Bachelor of Arts (BA) theses written at the onset and final stages by university undergraduates majoring in English in China. A corpus consisting of the discussion sections in the first and final versions of 35 BA theses was built, annotated, and analyzed. Two academics from this university were then invited to evaluate 10 pairs of the texts and specify textual elements that conveyed voice and to provide further comments in a follow-up interview. Results showed that the students used significantly more evidentials, hedges, and boosters in the final versions. The reviewers perceived minor growth in voice strength from the sample texts, and they commented that both content-related features and metadiscourse contributed to voice. This study highlights the importance of cultivating undergraduates' awareness of voice construction and the use of metadiscourse in academic writing.

TeachLivE™, a mixed-reality simulated classroom technology, has been used in initial teacher education programs to provide repeatable experiential learning opportunities for students now for more than a decade and in more than 80 universities worldwide. However, no broad scale investigation has been conducted into how the platform has been used or what research has been generated as a result. The aim of this study is to provide insight into the types of TeachLivE™ research carried out since its inception and to identify trends and potential gaps in this research. Peer-reviewed academic primary research publications--journal articles (23), conference proceedings (12), and thesis dissertations (20)--were reviewed for participants, research methods, analysis, research design, data collection tools, and design approaches. Of the 102 articles identified as relevant, "instructional skills development" and "integration of TeachLivE™ in teacher education" were the most commonly researched topics. Findings indicate that preservice teachers were the most commonly studied group of participants, research methods were predominately qualitative, single-subject experimental research design was employed most often, and the most used data collection tools were surveys and observation. These findings highlight that the range of topics is increasing, with studies on in-service teachers in school-based contexts beginning to emerge as a new area of interest. This systematic review has implications for researchers and the developers of TeachLivE™. It provides valuable insight and recommendations for future studies in this emerging teacher education field, where technology is not simply used "in the classroom" but rather "as the classroom."

Purpose: The COVID-19 pandemic that hit the world has caused several changes in the higher education service sector, including the implementation of the undergraduate thesis examination, where direct interaction between students and examiners is avoided and replacing it with an online bachelor thesis exam. This study aims to develop a conceptual model regarding the variables that can affect student satisfaction with the quality of the implementation of online undergraduate thesis examinations in higher education. Design/methodology/approach: The research instrument consisted of 22 survey questions distributed to 583 students taking the thesis trial examination in the even semester of 2019/2020 who came from 12 different study programs. Factor analysis and structural equation modeling (SEM) were conducted to analyze the validity of the instrument and test the hypothesis. The results of the analysis show that the 22 instrument items used have been determined by sufficient variables to check the structure of each. Findings: SEM analysis results show that the three hypothesized variables (study program service, examiner performance and quality of video conference applications) positively and significantly affect the level of student satisfaction with the online undergraduate thesis examination 0.187, 0.177 and 0.177, respectively. The total effect of these three factors is 0.737. Research limitations/implications: This finding is a reference for those who want to improve the quality of the online undergraduate thesis examination in higher education. Originality/value: As the online thesis examination was implemented in higher education in Indonesia as a result of the implementation of the study and work at home policy by the Indonesian Ministry of Education, it is important to conduct research on the implementation of online thesis exams in Indonesia, especially to study the conceptual model of variables affect student satisfaction with the implementation of the online thesis exam. Because even though the implementation of online thesis exams on a large scale is new to some higher education in Indonesia.

The objectives of this study were to examine the EFL supervisors' written feedback focus, and language functions at selected public universities in Ethiopia. To address the objectives of the study, qualitative and quantitative approaches with concurrent mixed methods design was adopted. 55 supervisees were randomly selected out of 205 for the questionnaire survey. Besides, four supervisors were selected for interviews. Moreover, feedback comments on five theses drafts were utilized as data sources. To decide the language functions and feedback foci, frequency counts and percentages were used. Nonetheless, content analysis was used to analyze the interview data. The results showed that thesis supervisors used the directive feedback language function most prevailingly over the expressive function. Besides, the result indicated there was no balance of praise, criticism, and suggestions in the provision of feedback comments. The supervisors largely focused on content knowledge, followed by genre knowledge, and then linguistic accuracy and appropriateness (forms), respectively. Based on the results, supervisors were recommended to write their feedback comments in helpful and constructive ways based on the needs and preferences of their supervisees for the development of writing skills.

This article describes the effects of sequential non-residential writing retreats on graduate students the development of sustainable writing practices in the latter stages of writing theses and dissertations. Our study looks to understand how graduate students implement techniques of academic writing productivity. We collected data from three short, non-residential graduate student writing retreats in 2017. The retreats were hosted by a research support programme at a large public university in the United States (U.S.). We used a qualitative case study design and employed grounded theory. We analysed participant responses on exit evaluations and in interviews about their experiences in one or more retreats. Graduate students who participated in more than one retreat within a year expressed feelings of greater writing confidence and productivity, thus, exhibiting of the value of non-residential retreats to student thesis and dissertation writing processes. We found many graduate students have difficulty post-retreat maintaining writing habits. Our findings concur with existing studies about the benefits of retreats for academic writing productivity and expand on those studies to note that graduate student researchers can benefit from attending multiple retreats to build and sustain a regular writing practice among their campus community of writers.

Purpose: The undergraduate dissertation (UD) can be considered to be a reflection of the influence of the sustainable developmental goals (SDG) and the professional identity of the students. The purpose of this paper is to analyse the extent to which the topics of the UD reflect the SDG, considering, moreover, that they may be related to the professional identity developed by the students throughout the degree. Design/methodology/approach: This work researches the topic of 308 UDs graded as "Excellent" in the Faculty of Education of Bilbao (FEB), using a lexical analysis method. Findings: The results show two main branches: one associated with Childhood and Social Education Degrees (related to gender equality and socio-educational transformation); and another linked to the Primary Education Degree (language learning, innovation and new technologies). These analyses show the influence of the 5th (40.8%) and 4th (38.4%) SDGs in the topics chosen for the UDs. Research limitations/implications: The findings provide valuable insights into the current state of Education for Sustainable Development in the Faculty, but should be complemented with an analysis of the topics of all the UDs, to have a more real vision of the situation. Originality/value: This study analyses, for the first time, the topics of the UDs from the perspective of sustainability, taking into account the dissertations that reach a standard of excellence in the FEB. These results provide relevant information that can be very helpful to detect the specific needs for the design and implementation of an awareness-raising action that will lead to working on sustainability in a transversal way in the education degrees of the FEB.

This paper explores the literature around online and blended learning. The impetus came from a cohort of 60 students being led through their dissertation by an e-learning evangelist. Initially the pedagogy closely followed Salmon's Five Stage Model, Wenger's Community of Practice, and traditional Social Constructivism pedagogies. In hindsight, it has been realised that, in practice, these pedagogies have been eclipsed by Action Learning -- a far better fit to the emergent tutor and student experiences. It is suggested that where 'expert' students are working at the top of Bloom's taxonomy (criticality, creativity, evaluation, innovation), such as during the creation of a dissertation, action learning is a highly effective overarching pedagogy. Moreover, we propose a model of action learning that may work with massive participant numbers; like the MOOC, adding Massive to the existing acronym of action learning Sets: Massive Action Learning Set: MALS.

Research on the systematic literature review process is extensive, but a justified explanation of how a narrative literature review process progresses remains absent from the existing literature. The purpose of this study is to increase understanding about the narrative literature review process. By building on process theory and the literature on systematic literature reviews and by empirically examining the literature review processes for bachelor's theses in a European business school, we reveal that a narrative literature process is iterative, non-structured and multi-layered; contains several cumulative written outcomes; and is embedded in a social context wherein various official and non-official actors guide and support the beginning researcher. This study is a fresh attempt to explain the progress of a literature review process with help of process theory, thereby offering novel insights into the research on literature reviews in general and on narrative literature reviews across various fields of human sciences specifically.

This case study examines postgraduate students' practices, sources of knowledge, and difficulties and challenges in regard to providing genre-based peer feedback on their peers' academic writing at a research-oriented university in Macau. The analysis of multiple sources of data including the students' written feedback on their peers' thesis drafts, the thesis drafts, semi-structured interviews and stimulated recalls revealed that while the participants were able to provide genre-based feedback, most of the feedback focused on the linguistic features, content and organisation of the theses, and helped the students meet the institutional requirements of what constitutes a thesis. The study also found that the participants perceived giving genre-based peer feedback to be difficult and challenging. Their difficulties stemmed from a lack of specific knowledge about the thesis genre, their concerns about their own linguistic proficiency, their concerns about the usefulness and correctness of their feedback, and the effects their criticism would have on the writers' feelings and emotions.

Dissertations and theses with interactive digital components seldom fit neatly into the institutional format requirements designed for traditional humanities texts. This creates challenges for students, administrators, and librarians who are charged with preparing these works for library deposit. While disciplinary acceptance of digital dissertations in the humanities may be increasing across institutions, little attention is given to the mechanics of documenting and submitting such projects. Readers, also, are challenged to find and interpret digital projects that may not be entirely described in the accompanying paper. To address this, the authors examined a set of digital theses and dissertations at their institution to determine how these digital components might fit into traditional manuscript formatting guidelines. This article introduces the resulting set of local documentation guidelines for digital dissertations and theses aimed at improving access, preservation, and reproducibility.

This study is a content analysis of theses concerning cooperative learning prepared in Turkey between the years 1993 and 2014. A total of 220 theses which were accessible online (open access) at the site of Council of Higher Education (CoHE) were analyzed. The publishing classification form used in this study was prepared analyzing similar forms in the literature. Each thesis was subjected to content analyses using this form and the data were stored in electronic media. The data were analyzed and are presented in graphics, frequency and percentage tables, and in a descriptive manner. Results show that theses on the topic of cooperative learning increased in large numbers with the adoption of the 2005 constructivist learning curriculum. Results also show that most often quantitative methods were used, the effect of the method on academic success was studied, and percentage and frequency tables in particular were used as the data analysis technique.

This paper investigates the experimental studies which test the effectiveness of the concept mapping instructional strategy compared to the traditional teaching method. Meta-analysis was used to calculate the effect size of the concept mapping strategy on academic success. Therefore, the analysis includes experimental studies conducted in Turkey between 2000 and 2015 which compare the concept mapping instructional strategy and the traditional method. 216 master's and doctoral theses and 114 articles were found on the topic. Among these, 73 studies were selected which met the inclusion criteria. These were then combined through meta-analysis. At the end of the study, the concept mapping instructional strategy has been determined to have a significantly positive effect on the Turkish students' academic success (ES = 1,119; p<0,05). Considering the population of Turkey, the findings indicate that the effect of concept mapping instructional strategy in terms of academic success was higher than traditional method.

A recent study of honors curricula across the nation indicates that 75.6% of honors programs and colleges at four-year institutions have thesis or capstone requirements (Savage and Cognard-Black). In addition to institutions with thesis requirements, many more also have the option for students to complete theses. For example, an earlier study found that 94.3% of honors colleges offered the opportunity to complete an honors thesis (Sederberg). As Anderson, Lyons, and Weiner indicate, the origins of the honors movement in the United States included an emphasis on the completion of an honors thesis. While discipline-based modes of research and creative scholarship are the most common, alternatives to the traditional thesis rooted in experiential education have also been encouraged (Gustafson and Cureton). In short, the honors thesis in its several forms is an established element of honors education. Despite the centrality and prevalence of the honors thesis requirement, however, little research has been conducted to understand the preparation that students should have in order to write a thesis. Expectations for honors theses are generally high and often approximate the level of rigor one expects from masters-level students. Unfortunately, many students complete these projects without specific coursework to prepare them for projects at this level of rigor. A growing number of scholars have advocated for courses and curricula to provide students support as they develop honors theses (Anderson, Lyons, and Weiner; Coey and Haynes; Levinson and Mandel). While the arguments for these courses are strong and some report positive evaluations of these courses, there is scant empirical evidence for the success of such courses. This study draws on data from nearly four hundred students over a six-year period to demonstrate the effectiveness of curricular models in supporting students' completion of honors theses.

This paper presents a qualitative case study that involved three groups of English as a foreign language pre-service teachers at a Colombian private university. Each group attended tutoring sessions during an academic semester. Along these sessions, students were asked to work collaboratively in the editing process of some chapters of their thesis project through a corpus interface. Students wrote journals and participated in interviews about their experiences. Teachers also wrote journal entries to describe and interpret their observations from the meetings. Findings reveal the participants' identities that emerged from their group dynamics and their insights about their collaborative process when editing academic texts.

The purpose of the current study is to draw an outline of empirical research studies conducted on STEM education with a focus on student achievement, in addition to their creativity and problem solving skills, attitudes and interests towards STEM subjects. After an initial screening of several articles, papers and dissertations on STEM education, 33 studies are selected according to their fit into our research framework. These selected studies are exposed to analysis and synthesis processes in line with the stages of meta-synthesis research method to specify and present findings under the specified themes. The findings include the strong alignment between STEM education principles and international comparison studies, such as PISA/TIMSS, as well as a positive impact of STEM education on student achievement at school and on their attitudes towards individual STEM disciplines. There is also evidence to support that interventions that follow STEM education principles reinforce students' problem solving and creativity.

An honors senior thesis introduces students into a world of scholarship and professional activity in a way that no single course, either semester- or year-long, can do (Anderson, Lyons, and Weiner). Many honors educators consider honors thesis work to be the defining honors experience. For graduate schools, employers, and the students themselves, nothing demonstrates the value of an honors education quite like the senior thesis. The National Collegiate Honors Council (NCHC) understands the value and tradition of the honors senior thesis, listing it in the Basic Characteristics of a Fully Developed Honors College and recently publishing a thesis handbook in the latest addition to the monograph series (Anderson, Lyons, and Weiner). A mixed-methods approach in a survey of honors colleges and programs across the country could illustrate the value of an honors senior thesis numerically and perhaps also answer why the thesis is valuable. Educators depend on intuition and experiences to handle the challenges of an honors senior thesis, which can include lack of enthusiasm among thesis writers, unavailability of faculty to serve as advisors, and inadequate course preparation for the thesis. Strong research to supplement intuition and experience is needed to assure the tradition of the honors senior thesis as an essential component of honors education. Research on this topic would be a beneficial contribution to the body of literature on the value of honors education.

When a well-developed honors curriculum is paired with co-curricular opportunities, it serves to distinguish an institution's honors education. Together, these curricular and co-curricular experiences are described as best practices in the National Collegiate Honors Council's (NCHC's) "Basic Characteristics of a Fully Developed Honors Program." Although literature is available to describe honors curricula, and while the NCHC "Basic Characteristics" documents provide some guidelines for best practices in honors education, data are needed to support these guidelines and to determine what curricular models effectively frame and incorporate best practices. Questions remain, however, about variation across other structural characteristics that often interest educational researchers, such as size and institutional control by private or public interests. Researchers used data from the 2012-2013 NCHC Membership Survey to focus on eight measures from survey items that tap into nine curricular characteristics of honors programs: (1) thesis requirement; (2) capstone course; (3) a combined measure of the first two indicating the presence of either a thesis requirement or a capstone course; (4) service requirement; (5) service learning courses; (6) study abroad courses; (7) experiential education courses; (8) research-intensive courses; and (9) internships. The analysis presented in this paper examines the nine curricular and co-curricular measures identified, and explores the supposition that circulates in many NCHC conversations that there is great variability among NCHC institutional members in honors structure, curriculum, and other institutional characteristics. Researchers used "z"-tests of difference between proportions and also examined patterns of consistency within similar dimensions (e.g., private institutions with honors colleges and private institutions with honors programs). The study explores variation across not only honors organizational structure and broad degree classification (associate's degree institutions vs. those that offer baccalaureate and advanced degrees), but also across institutional control, i.e., private vs. public institutions, and institution size (total undergraduate full-time equivalent [FTE] enrollment). The findings point to two central conclusions: (1) Honors units at member institutions seem to value undergraduate research and senior-level experiences involving increased intellectual independence, as reflected in the widespread presence of thesis requirements, capstone courses, and research-intensive courses; and (2) The service and experiential learning components (including honors internships and study abroad courses) that are highlighted in NCHC best practices documents have much less consensus and implementation across United States honors.

Writing research proposal in educational setting is a very complex process involving variety of elements. Consequently, analyzing the complex elements from introduction to data analysis sections in order to yield convinced research proposal writing through reviewing reputable journal articles is worth-contributing. The objectives of this research are to improve students' ability in generating a research topic from reputable journal articles, developing thesis proposal draft, and writing comprehensive thesis proposal. A classroom action research administered at English Department University of Muhammadiyah Gresik Indonesia is adopted. The results reveal that the implementation of team-based discovery learning may improve students' ability in generating a research topic, developing research proposal draft and writing comprehensive research proposal. Several suggestions are addressed. First, although the syntax of the team based discovery learning is quite similar to the remaining strategies but it will not work more optimally if it is not followed by relevant sets of guiding questions reflecting the detailed content of each reputable journal article in each meeting. Second, learning innovations activities through intensive writing practices and consultations should be taken into account to foster the steps of discovery learning in group discussion process. Finally, the results of commonalities of strategies may be used as a reference to enhance students' ability in writing comprehensive research proposal.

Academic writing skills are crucial when students, e.g., in teacher education programs, write their undergraduate theses. A multi-modal web-based and self-regulated learning resource on academic writing was developed, using texts, hypertext, moving images, podcasts and templates. A study, using surveys and a focus group, showed that students used the learning resource on numerous occasions, a resource reachable outside in-person mentor sessions. Students declared that the resources had been important for finishing their degree projects. Mentors highlighted structure, multidisciplinary overview and linking possibilities. Using digital learning resources supporting students' academic writing is doubtless a developmental area in higher education.

Analyses of North American LIS program alumni survey data indicate that the completion of any end of program assessment (EPA) or capstone is associated with certain early-career success measures. Using data collected in the Workforce Issues in Library and Information Science 2 project (WILIS 2), we examined the type of EPAs (internships, portfolios, theses, etc.) completed by students and assessed whether there are relationships between their completion and the following outcomes: length of time to secure employment after graduation, acquisition of managerial or leadership roles, job/career satisfaction, and participation in professional and leadership activities. We also assessed the graduates' attitudes about whether these experiences were a beneficial part of their career preparation. These results should be of interest to faculty curriculum developers and program administrators in LIS programs worldwide, since they provide insight into the relative merits of EPAs and are based on aggregate data from 39 programs and over 3,000 graduates.

Like many other universities of its kind, the University of Maine (UMaine) has a centralized body, the Center for Undergraduate Research (CUGR), charged with engaging motivated students in independent learning and in the creation of new knowledge. UMaine furthermore has an honors college that is likewise committed to fostering undergraduate research, particularly research that is rooted in active learning under the guidance of a faculty mentor (University of Maine Honors College Mission Statement). Consistent with national trends, UMaine highly values the work that both CUGR and the honors college do in promoting undergraduate research. UMaine's current strategic plan lists the advancement of cutting-edge undergraduate research as one of its twelve primary objectives, and CUGR received a three-year, $300,000 presidential stimulus grant in spring 2012 that funds a number of research fellowships for students and faculty. The same strategic plan also articulates a commitment to strengthening the honors college, recognizing its similar importance in the development and implementation of novel models of undergraduate research that include preparing students for "meaningful jobs and for life" (University of Maine Blue Sky Plan 31). Though CUGR and honors both advance undergraduate research in significant ways at UMaine, the authors would like to argue that honors is especially well positioned to fulfill the strategic plan's goal of preparation "for life." On its website, CUGR contends that participation in undergraduate research will make individuals more "competitive" in a global society, which is an important objective. However, what the authors found through a recent honors undergraduate research experience was that honors research can make individuals more decent as well as competitive in a global society.

Submission of Electronic Theses and Dissertations (ETDs) by postgraduate students has become a common phenomenon in learning environments globally. The purpose of ETDs is to train postgraduate students as knowledge workers in online publishing and also extend their skills beyond word processing. The challenge however, is that many postgraduate students are not adequately equipped to design, develop and submit their theses and dissertations electronically. This article reports on a project based on the design and development of a self-paced Interactive Multimedia Application (IMA). The courseware is based on the ADDIE (Analysis, Design, Development, Implementation and Evaluation) instructional system design model to guide postgraduate students to learn to publish their theses and dissertations electronically. Qualitative research design with descriptive approach was employed for the study. Testing of this self-paced computer-based learning material revealed that postgraduate students could work through the IMA with minimal assistance, to become proficient in electronic publishing. The IMA revealed that the Application could be learned with little or no assistance from a facilitator or instructor; it also supports direct transfer and retention of knowledge and skills in ETDs preparation and submission.

This study investigates the relationship between the designated research project system independent variables of Labor, Travel, Equipment, and Contract total annual costs and the dependent variables of both the associated matching research project total annual academic publication output and thesis/dissertation number output. The Mahalanobis Taguchi System (MTS) pattern recognition methodology was utilized in the three-year, 3000+ research project case study to identify which research project system variables are responsible in both magnitude and degree for the associated publication and thesis and dissertation research project outputs. The selection of the MTS "abnormal" and "normal" data set boundary was specifically chosen in an attempt to define a "successful" from "unsuccessful" research project metric at the research unit, tenure track versus non-tenure track, and individual research project principal investigator organizational levels. The findings of the study are directly compared against the associated level budget percentages changes over the same time period. Through such concrete research system identification, research administrative personnel have the possibility of directly identifying both the research project system "impactors" as well as the association between likely effects of reduced or affected research system impacts on the research outputs themselves.

Citations are the notations in the text that identify the source of writer's claims, other researches and theories mentioned in the paper. Although most studies on citations have so far been focused on the linguistic forms of citation and how they are realised in different disciplines, I argue that these forms are not necessarily used in the same way by undergraduates who write theses before they graduate. This study examines how Indonesian and Australian students cite in their undergraduate theses in, respectively, Bahasa Indonesia and English. Data were collected from ten undergraduate theses in Bahasa Indonesia, and ten in English. The background study sections of theses were analysed. After all sentences in the background of each thesis are listed and the citations are identified, the relation between these citations and the student writers' arguments are analysed. Indonesian students used citations to support their opinions; however, their ways of using references fell into three categories. In contrast, Australian students used references to support and or to criticize an argument in various ways. Evidently, Indonesian students need to be exposed to various ways of citing other sources into texts so as to show their critical arguments.

Education researchers have long been interested in helping students develop effective inquiry questions to guide research projects. In this study, students in a journalism senior capstone used writing-studies informed practices such as middle-stakes, iterative writing prompts to enhance metacognition and critical thinking. Using prompts to guide students to periodically revise their inquiry questions and working thesis statements, students showed improvement in their written products as measured through holistic writing assessment measures. Despite measurable improvement, students' thesis statements were still lackluster, suggesting that programs should develop connected curricula that sequentially scaffold research methods, critical thinking, and writing skills across the major.

In this paper, we argue that posing new researchable questions in educational research is a dynamic process that reflects the field's growing understanding of the web of potentially influential factors surrounding the examination of a particular phenomenon of interest. We illustrate this thesis by drawing on a strand of mathematics education research related to students' justification schemes that has evolved rapidly during the past few decades. Also, we reflect on the possible boundaries of the domain of application of the thesis, and we hypothesize that it would apply equally to other strands of educational research. To support this hypothesis, we briefly consider how the thesis would be applicable in two additional research strands. We conclude by elaborating on three important implications of the thesis: (1) as new potentially influential factors about the phenomenon of interest are identified, findings from past research that had not accounted for those factors might prove to be insufficient or be put into question; (2) there are increased methodological challenges for researchers as they seek to design new studies that pay due regard to research advances about all relevant and potentially influential factors surrounding the phenomenon of interest; and (3) as a wider range of potentially influential factors get discovered and considered about a particular phenomenon, research knowledge becomes not only more refined, and presumably more accurate, but possibly more fragmented too.

A purpose-built online error detection tool was developed to provide genre-specific corpus-based feedback on errors occurring in draft research articles and graduation theses. The primary envisaged users were computer science majors studying at a public university in Japan. This article discusses the development and evaluation of this interactive, multimodal tool. An in-house learner corpus of graduation theses was annotated for errors that affect the accuracy, brevity, clarity, objectivity and formality of scientific research writing. Software was developed to identify the errors discovered and provide learners with actionable advice and multimodal explanations in both English and Japanese. Qualitative evaluation received in usability studies and focus groups from both teachers and students was extremely positive. Preliminary quantitative evaluation of the effectiveness of the error detector was conducted. Through this pedagogic tool, learners can receive immediate actionable feedback on potential errors, and their teachers no longer feel obliged to check for common genre-specific errors.

The "Hagen Cumulative Science Project" is a large-scale replication project based on students' thesis work. In the project, we aim to (a) teach students to conduct the entire research process for conducting a replication according to open science standards and (b) contribute to cumulative science by increasing the number of direct replications. We describe the procedural steps of the project from choosing suitable replication studies to guiding students through the process of conducting a replication, and processing results in a meta-analysis. Based on the experience of more than 80 replications, we summarize how such a project can be implemented. We present practical solutions that have been shown to be successful as well as discuss typical obstacles and how they can be solved. We argue that replication projects are beneficial for all groups involved: Students benefit by being guided through a highly structured protocol and making actual contributions to science. Instructors benefit by using time resources effectively for cumulative science and fulfilling teaching obligations in a meaningful way. The scientific community benefits from the resulting greater number of replications and teaching state-of-the-art methodology. We encourage the use of student thesis-based replication projects for thesis work in academic bachelor and master curricula.

This qualitative case study investigates the technology-enhanced constructivist learning environment (CLE) for developing undergraduate English-majors' research abilities at a Chinese university. The faculty group attempted at transforming an English Writing course into BA Thesis Writing, supported by a free online learning management system (Moodle) with multi-faceted scenario, resources, tools and management. Situated in the broader context of the 10-year curriculum reform, two BA Thesis Writing classes from two semesters were examined using observation notes, interviews and student products. Findings show the CLE has enhanced the students' problem-based learning (PBL) processes and research ability development in terms of problem awareness, information literacy, reasoning and research designing. The CLE contributed to the whole learning experience by continuous instructional support, forum discussions, and information resources and tools. However, faculty tended to avoid teaching such a course because it is not only demanding but it clashes with norms of Chinese higher education in terms of professional values, pedagogical philosophy and institutional culture. The paper concludes by assessing the reform efforts' overall gains and challenges, and its implications for future technology integration in foreign language learning and teaching in China.

Supervision meetings give teachers and students opportunities to interact with each other and to co-regulate students' learning processes. Co-regulation refers to the transitional process of a student who is becoming a self-regulated learner by interacting with a more capable other such as a teacher. During a task, teachers are expected to pull back their support and give opportunities to students to take responsibility. This study aims to explore the shifting patterns of co-regulation, feedback perception, and motivation during a 5-month research project. Participants were 20 students conducting research in pairs and six teachers who supervised these students. Two videotaped supervision meetings at the beginning and end of the research process and questionnaires on feedback perception and motivation were analysed. Results on co-regulation showed a constant and comparable level of regulation at the start and at the end of students' research projects. Feedback perception did not change, but motivation decreased significantly.

The function of academy depends on wide practices of institutionalization. Academy is not only responsible to instruct, but also it has to train generations that will take over its own institutionalism. Academic writing is the foremost tool of academy's own reproduction. The problem of this study is academic writing. Academic writing in Turkish graduate education, the culture of academic writing, and the research on the academic writing are unproductive as opposed its abroad counterparts. What is the current situation of culture of academic writing? What are the issues of academic writing among candidate scholars and what can be done to improve the situation? This study tasks itself to produce research-based answers to these questions. In this respect, this "retrospective study" examines, through plagiarism detection software ("Turnitin"), 600 graduate theses, written in the field of education between the years of 2007-2015. Findings of the study point serious concerns with regard to academic writing in the Turkish graduate education. It has been found that 34.5% the examined theses include plagiarism and the originality of theses has been found to be 28.7%. The study concludes by providing possible explanations to the situation and offers some ideas and mechanisms to improve the situation.

In the present study, we developed a chatbot that helps teachers to deliver writing instructions. By working with the chatbot, the post-secondary writers developed a thesis statement for their argumentative essay outlines, and the chatbot helped the writers to refine their peer review feedback. We conducted a preliminary analysis of the effect of a chatbot on these writers' writing achievement. We also collected several student testimonials about their chatbot experiences. Several important pedagogical and research implications for chatbot-guided writing instructions and the use of learning technology have been addressed.

We have integrated computer programming instruction into the required courses of our mathematics major. Our majors take a sequence of four courses in their first 2 years, each of which is paired with a weekly 75-minute computer lab period that has a dual purpose of both computationally exploring the mathematical concepts from the lecture portion of the course, while simultaneously teaching programming fundamentals. Building on this foundation, we give significant programming assignments to our upper-division students, requiring them to regularly use and apply their programming skills to investigate the mathematical topics.

The aim of this study is to examine post-graduate thesis completed on guitar in Turkey. For this purpose, a total of 89 theses were investigated in terms of selected research topics, study participants, and methods for analysis. For the selection of the thesis included in this study three criteria were used; first, theses from 1990 (beginning time for first completed theses on guitar topic) to 2013 period, second, reaching the full text of theses, and third permission of author. The number of thesis investigated in this study represents about 93% (105 at total) of whole completed theses from different institutions in Turkey. Descriptive survey and content analysis method were used for examination of theses. The results of study showed that while selected theses topics reflect more diversity and school related issues at Faculty of Educations (using guitar at school music, teaching methods, etc.), the piece analysis from different compositors was mostly selected study topic at Conservatories and the Fine Art Faculties which parallel to institutions mission. As a conclusion, there are some summarized results and recommendations for upcoming researches on this guitar or guitar education in the light of completed theses and related research literature.

This paper investigates Pakistani doctoral thesis acknowledgements from genre analysis perspective. A corpus of 235 PhD thesis acknowledgements written in English was taken from Pakistani doctoral theses collected from eight different disciplines. HEC Research Repository of Pakistan was used as a data sources. The theses written by Pakistani native PhD students, and submitted to Pakistani HEC recognized universities during the last five years, from 2008 to 2012, were selected for the collection of acknowledgements data. Swales' (1990) conception of genre analysis in its modified form was followed for the investigation of genre moves. In the initial stages, Hyland's (2004b) coding scheme was utilized but due to broad socio-cultural differences between Hyland (2004b) and the present study, some other models such as Al-Ali (2010) were also sought for the coding of certain generic components. The analysis revealed seven moves along with certain sub-units or steps. These seven moves and their steps resulted from socio-cultural norms, academic traditions and institutional practices of acknowledgement writing in Pakistan.

The use of information and communication technology (ICT) in education is a way to facilitate interaction and accessing information for learning in higher education. However, finding a set of structured e-resources to facilitate learning within specific courses is still a big challenge in most higher education institutions. This includes the problems and challenges for thesis courses in both undergraduate (Bachelor) and graduate (Master) level in Sweden. To overcome or reduce the problems and enhance quality of outcomes in thesis courses, the department of Computer and Systems Sciences (DSV) at Stockholm University has developed a Learning Support System, SciPro (Scientific Process), to support the thesis process. The aim of this study is to investigate learners' perspectives on the usefulness of structured e-resources in SciPro, to reduce challenges for finding information related to the thesis process. This was done based on an open online survey, carried out in 2012-2013 of students' perspectives at DSV. The study found the actual problems that students have encountered in the thesis courses and hence suggested a general model as a way forward to sort the e-resources to reduce the problems in the thesis process.

The paper takes 414 graduates from ZJU in 2011 and 2012, NIT as a case, analyzing the status of their writing of graduation thesis. It is found that a considerable number of students have problems in selection and report of topics, writing of each part and debating in the whole process of graduation thesis. In view of the situation, based on the effective measures and some practical experience by English majors in NIT, ZJU, it is suggested we should raise both teachers' and students' awareness and consciousness in the importance in thesis writing, establish quality management and monitoring system, strictly check selection and report of topics, give play to the library, have topic verification and application guide, being familiar with the writing requirements of the abstract, optimize English curriculum and make professional management features outstanding and enhance the students' and teachers' ability, thereby improving the writing of the graduation thesis and reflecting subject construction in English major.

Library and Information Studies (LIS) faculty members responded to a survey of their opinions on the use, advantages, and disadvantages of a variety of end of program assessments (EPAs) in LIS master's programs. Portfolio was the most widely preferred top choice for EPAs, but opinions ranged from preference for no EPA to preference for a combination of more than one type. In discussing types of EPAs, respondents were concerned with the value of the experience for students, the impact on faculty workload, and the assessment aspect of different types of EPAs. As programs continually revise their master's degree requirements, these data may provide useful professional opinions across the discipline.