Research Blog #6 Five Scholarly Sources and Research Question

"How do Professors prepare individuals to successfully retain knowledge?  Has Higher Education focused on improving college teaching? Are these practices performed by the professors merely becoming a product of privatization? Can graduating students be the answer to a successful change?"

Berrett, Dan. "Teaching." Harvard Seeks to Jolt University. The Chronicle of Higher Education, 5 Feb. 2012. Web. 28 Feb. 2012. <http://chronicle.com/article/Harvard-Seeks-to-Jolt/130683/>.


Rachel Hensley, et al. "Rate My Expectations: How Online Evaluations Of Professors Impact Students’ Perceived Control." Computers In Human Behavior 27.5 (2011): 1862-1867. Academic Search Premier. Web. 28 Feb. 2012.


Behar-Horenstein, Linda S., Kellie W. Roberts, and Alice C. Dix. "Mentoring Undergraduate Researchers: An Exploratory Study Of Students' And Professors' Perceptions." Mentoring & Tutoring: Partnership In Learning 18.3 (2010): 269-291. Academic Search Premier. Web. 28 Feb. 2012.


Sevian, Hannah, and Lisa Gonsalves. "Analysing How Scientists Explain Their Research: A Rubric For Measuring The Effectiveness Of Scientific Explanations." International Journal Of Science Education 30.11 (2008): 1441-1467. Academic Search Premier. Web. 28 Feb. 2012.


Stes, Ann, and Peter Van Petegem. "Instructional Development For Early Career Academics: An Overview Of Impact." Educational Research 53.4 (2011): 459-474. Academic Search Premier. Web. 28 Feb. 2012.

Rutgers RIOT

Rutger's RIOT tutorial offered an easy interaction between the user and the library resources.  Easily demonstrating the steps one at a time made it easy to recall.  Elaborating on the importance of choosing a specific topic versus a broad one was helpful when considering future papers.  However, one must make sure their topic of choice is not so narrow that information  is difficult to come across.  To gain a better understanding of ones topic, websites and search engines such as Google and Wikipedia are helpful.  Though, both do not provide proper primary sources acceptable for credit.  It is important to find a strong primary source that will help support the argument.  Secondary sources coinciding with the original primary source only strengthens the discussion.  When conducting research in the library, RIOT offers important points to consider when searching for primary sources.  One must consider using key words to find specific sources.  The RIOT tutorial provided me with insight on how to properly conduct a search via the library's data bases.  With this information I feel confident in gaining information for future papers.

Ways Privatization Connects with my Analytic Essay

The research process associated with our analytic essay has offered interesting insight in regards to the affects of privatization.  Privatization creates a business like ambiance in today's universities.  Many students are beginning to acknowledge these restraints as college tuition begins to sky rocket.  The quality of institutions suffer as the search for money and funding becomes controlled by the power of privatization.  The decisions made by such officials supportive of privatization forget the voice of the student body.  The student's money becomes circuited towards a single lens, focused by those strictly associated with privatization.  With the lack of student voice, one has to wonder what the money goes towards?  Students paying thousands of dollars of their money deserve the proper tools to succeed.  Say a university becomes influenced by privatization, a noticeable change in the professor's teaching direction will be seen as the vision of university officials becomes the overall image.  Student's then become a single minded product of privatization.  Professor's no longer provided the necessary tools to succeed, to evolve into an individual, they provide the foundation for an individual influenced by privatization.  In many ways, privatization of higher education begins to eliminate the voice of the student body, redirect the use of institution money, and produces insufficient, unmotivated scholars.