Feature image: Pixdaus.
Category Archives: Research
Student of Today, Skills of Tomorrow
Struggles and Methods of Teaching Web Building to the Contemporary College Undergraduate
As the senior educators in this country, university professors have an obligation to respond to data such as the findings in this report from the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development and the Educational Testing Service on the current state of millennials’ understanding, skill level, and ability to apply these important technologies to real-world problem solving.
“Despite having a higher rate of educational attainment than any previous generation, U.S. students 16-34 years of age ranked lower than most of their international peers in literacy, mathematics and technology problem solving. Those born in the U.S. after 1980 tied for last among the 22 participating countries in numeracy and technology skills, and 16th in literacy. Top scoring Americans in this cohort ranked lower than their peers in most other countries, and bottom-scoring Americans ranked among the lowest in the whole study.” 1
I am currently working on an article that describes my methods and struggles of teaching basic, intermediate, and advanced topics in Web design and development to college students. The intent with this article is to contribute to the ongoing discussion on how to improve U.S. students’ skills and understanding of these fundamental technologies in today’s global world.
Feature image: Old Main at Penn State. Photo by: Greg O’Toole.
MEAN stack, Drupal 8, Reactjs, PHP
Feature image: College of IST at Penn State.
Teaching & Research @ Penn State University
As a faculty member in the College of Information Sciences and Technology at Penn State University, I teach many courses related to building with web technology. I focus on leading languages, software and methods that scale up to the demands of the assembled web that users expect across any number of mobile devices and platforms. In the contemporary world, every environment is a web environment and users expect a beautiful and personal experience.
I also use these technologies in National Science Foundation funded research projects across different Penn Sate institutes and colleges working to discover and implement new ways to augment scientific collaboration, development, and teaching across the planet.
Feature image: Old Main, UP by Greg O’Toole.
Media & Meaning in Berlin
In 2013 I defended my doctoral dissertation with Magna Cum Laude honors in Berlin, Germany in Media and Communication Philosophy. I started my Ph.D. at the University of Denver in Philosophy and Cultural Theory and finished at Europäische Universität für Interdisziplinäre Studien, European Graduate School EGS, Saas-Fee, Ringacker, Switzerland.
- Dissertation: Media, Meaning, and the Legitimation Problem: From the Eradication of the Metanarrative to the Present.
- Dissertation Oral Defense: May 2013, Berlin, Germany.
- Committee Advisory Chair: Dr. Professor Hubertus von Amelunxen, Präsident, President, Hochschule für Bildende Künste Braunschweig / Braunschweig University of Art.
- Committee Members: Dr. Larry Rickels and Dr. Jennifer Davy.
- Dissertation published Atropos Press, Dresden, Germany, New York, 2014.