The purposes and processes used for synthesizing research findings and completing literature reviews for the purpose of evaluating knowlege claims in the field of special education will be covered in this course.

Examination of ethnographic theory, methods, and techniques of researching language, literacy, and culture in educational settings. It involves conceptualizing and conducting a full ethnographic study and learning how to use reflection on the fieldwork experiences to construct (or deconstruct) and articulate the theoretical basis, methods, and findings of your research. The course is organized to highlight both knowledge acquisition and reflection. Year-long course. Prerequisite: Doctoral status, 9 credits of study in Doctoral program.

Students will be introduced to foundational philosophies and strategies for qualitative data analysis, coding their own data sets in weekly workshop and discussion settings. Strategies will be presented for setting up and organizing a database, coding and sorting data into categories, modifying and refining the scheme, aggregating data into larger themes or patterns, establishing audit trails, triangulating among data sources, participants and methodologies, and establishing trustworthiness of the data set.

This course takes a multi-dimensional approach to conflict and learning, with a focus on international settings, welcoming participants with both domestic and international interests. Participants examine the current practices and policy issues associated with education in post-conflict situations, including the interface between new external forces and the conventional demand for education, and the relationships among education, human rights, gender, development, cultural change, and peace-building.

Introduction to IRT models for analyzing polytomous and multidimensional data which are becoming popular in school, state, and national assessment programs. Prerequisites: EDUC 736

This doctoral seminar is designed to support in-depth exploration of critical approaches to discourse analysis as a basis for research on language and literacy in educational settings.

This seminar provides a mixture of group planning, support and guided individual study for those students in international education who are ready to work on a specific research topic for their M.Ed. thesis/project.

A seminar course for advanced students in psychometric methods. Possible topics include performance-based assessment, standard-setting, computer-based testing, automated test construction, large-scale assessment issues, and test translations methodology.

Participants examine views regarding what constitutes policy success and failure, build competencies to make policies more viable, and use course concepts and skills to modify policies of their own choosing.

The Seminar is one of a series of doctoral level seminars offered by the Language, Literacy and Culture Doctoral area on contemporary issues in language, literacy and culture in education. The purpose of this course is to support doctoral students interested in exploring theoretical and practical aspects of second language literacy, teachers' professional development, and school change from a sociocultural perspective.