Students and faculty in the College of Education and Human Ecology showcased work across a variety of disciplines during the annual EHE Research Forum. The college recently presented the event at the Ohio Union.
The forum included presentations throughout the day and a keynote address by Penny Pasque, professor of educational studies. The event concluded with EHE’s annual Legacy Lecture, featuring professor emeriti Evelyn Freeman and Bruce Kimball.
Pasque offered expertise to students and faculty who are starting their careers. She emphasized the importance of furthering Ohio State’s land-grant mission by engaging the communities that the university serves.
Community engagement involves “making sure you’re looking for research questions from the community, but also community-involved work or community-directed work,” she said.
“Are you, through your work, paying community organizers to do interviews in the community and be a part of your research team? Or is it you and a research team going in and doing work and then leaving? Thinking about these things makes a difference.”
Oral presentations showcase students’ strength in research
Among the presenters were Traci Lepicki, associate director of operations and strategic initiatives at the college’s Center on Education and Training for Employment, and Elizabeth Kazemi, a graduate research associate working with the center. Lepicki and Kazemi spoke about their literature review of the center’s Developing a Curriculum (DACUM) International Training Institute.
DACUM assists organizations in developing performance assessments for job duties in various industries. In their research, Lepicki and Kazemi surveyed industry representatives on how to keep DACUM’s tools up to date.
“Working with subject matter experts helps to ensure that DACUM is job-relevant, rather than a model that relies on some conceptual understanding or maybe an out-of-date approach,” Lepicki said. “DACUM is pulling from the people who are doing the work today, so that they can provide [insight into], ‘This is how I learned it, but this is how I do it.’ We want to make sure training programs are built around the ‘this is how I do it’ approach.”
Kazemi said she approached the center about working with DACUM because the research aligns with her professional background in human resources. She said the research offers insight into how higher education and industry experts can collaborate on workforce development.
“I’ve gotten two master’s [degrees] here and now my PhD” in workforce development at Ohio State, she said. “I recognize that Ohio State is at the forefront of bridging that gap, and CETE [the center] is a cornerstone of that when it comes to workforce development and blending academia.”
Students highlight innovative research approaches during poster sessions
The Research Forum included sessions where graduate and undergraduate students displayed posters about their research and fielded questions from attendees.
Undergraduate students Arushi Paul and Ciera Fankhauser, along with graduate student Yvonne Gong, presented research with Xin Feng, their professor of human development and family science (HDFS), Department of Human Sciences. Their research focused on how mothers cope with anger and depression.
Their study found that while some study participants self-medicated with alcohol or relied on prescription drugs to manage stress, others sought therapy and other support systems, Paul said.
“If they didn’t have a therapist, they used their partners or friends as people they could turn to,” said Paul, a psychology major who is minoring in HDFS.
Langston Myers, Kat Diana and Garrett Price gave an overview of their research with Natasha Slesnick, professor of HDFS and associate dean of research for the college. Their focus was on how adolescent smoking is linked to mental health, physical activity, sleep and social networks.
“A lot of times, the exercise and the sleep and the depressive symptoms are all lumped together,” said Price, a graduate fellow in HDFS. “Is isolation enough to lead [teenagers] to smoking?”
Freeman and Kimball deliver Legacy Lectures
During the Legacy Lecture, faculty emeriti Evelyn Freeman and Bruce Kimball spoke about how Ohio State helped them pursue academic research that has made a positive impact on society.
Freeman taught courses in children’s literature and language arts, prepared elementary teachers and worked with graduate students. After fulfilling that role as a professor in the Department of Teaching and Learning, she became dean of Ohio State Mansfield, ultimately retiring from that role.
Kimball joined the college as director of what was then its School of Educational Policy and Leadership. He later became a professor in the Philosophy and History of Education program in what is now the Department of Educational Studies.
Freeman and Kimball encouraged students and faculty to follow their passions.
“You have to follow your intrinsic interest,” Kimball said. “If you feel something is interesting to you, it’s going to feel that way to other people. … You don’t need to worry about going into the hot field at the time or chasing the funding.”
“It’s really important for people who are going into higher education to find joy in what they’re doing,” Freeman said, “to care about what they’re doing and to believe in it.”