Student work featured at South Florida Education Research Conference


Students present at the South Florida Education Research Conference.

Debaro Huyler, Wei Ding and Adly Norelus, doctoral students in the College of Education, delivered a presentation at the South Florida Education Research Conference on how companies must adapt to millennials entering the workforce.

Students and scholars shared the stage recently at the 14th Annual South Florida Educational Research Conference (SFERC) exchanging ideas and sharing the latest research on topics ranging from education, to human resources and to the development of urban communities.

Held Saturday, June 6, at Barry University, the conference featured student and professor lectures and presentations from its 11 member universities and colleges: FIU, Barry University, DeVry University, Florida Atlantic University, Florida Memorial University, Johnson and Wales University, Keiser University, Miami-Dade College, Nova Southeastern University, St. Thomas University and the University of Miami.

SFERC was founded in 2002 as the FIU College of Education Research Conference and welcomed the other colleges and university as partners in 2013.

Feng Li presents at the South Florida Education Research Conference

Feng Li, a doctoral student in the Curriculum and Instruction program at FIU presents his research on how biology classes can be more interactive.

“Presenting at the conference helps me because I have more chances to exchange ideas with my colleagues,” said Feng Li, a doctoral student in the Curriculum and Instruction program in College of Education. “Conferences like these help you collaborate with others and to build a network with other scholars,” he added.

Li delivered a presentation on how college-level biology classes could be modified to include team-based, hands-on assignments that could replace the traditional lectures in biology courses so students get a better understanding of key material.

Although Debaro Huyler and Adly Norelus, doctoral candidates in the Adult Education and Human Resource Development program at the College of Education, study in a different field, there was a lot they learned from Li.

“It’s a great opportunity because I’m interested in doing further research,” Huyler said. “It’s good to see other ideas on how to present and you do get to meet other researchers. Now I’m starting to have conversations on how I might be able to collaborate with another researcher I just met.”

Huyler, Norelus and their colleague, Wei Ding, were among the first presenters, sharing insight into their research on how companies must adapt to accommodate the way millennials work.

Even though they might not appear to be at their desks, working every minute from nine to five, they get things done, Norelus said.

“Millennials see themselves as having no time off,” Huyler said. “If they’re the person in charge of a particular department, they’ll reply to messages even though they’re on vacation. They’re always available.”

Students also received accolades for their work.

Ruth Ban, Lilla DiBello and Veronica Gesser, collaborators from Barry University and UNIVALI in southern Brazil, won the Kaiser University Graduate School Poster Presentation Award for their work on “How Graduate Professors and Students Understand the Relationship Between Higher Order Thinking and Pedagogical Practice.”

Poster presentation honorable mention at the South Florida Education Research Conference

Mercedes Gimenez, Assistant Professor Barbara King and Denise Raposo (left to right) received an honorable mention for their poster presentation on using problem solving to support student buy-in in mathematics.

FIU students Mercedes Gimenez and Denise Raposo, and College of Education Assistant Professor Barbara King received an honorable mention for their poster presentation on “Writing in Mathematics, Using Problem Solving to Promote Student Buy-In.”

A study on the factors that affected professional development scores of academic advisors at a large South Florida university won FIU students Mia Heikkila and Craig McGill the Lorraine R. Gay Award for Excellence in Research and Scholarship.

Although their research couldn’t say definitively whether crucial training intended to help advisors relate more with students would have led to better professional development evaluations, it supported prior research that indicated such training was underutilized.

Students receive Lorraine R. Gay Award for Excellence in Research and Scholarship

Thomas Reio, associate dean of Graduate Studies (center), presents Adult Education and Human Resources Development doctoral students Mia Heikkila and Craig McGill with the Lorraine R. Gay Award for Excellence in Research and Scholarship.

“An advisor needs to be approachable and to see in students what the student isn’t expressing,” McGill said. “A student may not say I’m distressed but an advisor needs to be able to see a student and realize something’s not right to make the right referrals.”

Because McGill and Heikkila, both doctoral students in the Adult Education and Human Resource Development program, were such harsh critics of their own work, they never expected their names would be called during the award ceremony.

“I was just excited that our paper was accepted,” Heikkila, said. “When we won the award, I was speechless. It gives me a new perspective and inspires me to present in more places.”