This course helps students (1) understand and critically assess findings from a meta-analysis, and (2) analyze and critique results from randomized experiments and quasi-experimental studies. Students learn how to use meta-analysis ("study of studies") to combine evidence from different primary studies and ordinary least squares (OLS) regression to analyze the impact of different education policies and interventions on student learning outcomes. Class discussions explore questions about program effectiveness and causality, central to many current debates about education policy and practice. Do children learn more in small classes? Is skill grouping effective? Do states with higher per pupil expenditures have higher average SAT scores? Does FastForword improve children's phonemic awareness? Do Upward Bound students matriculate in college at higher rates than their classmates?

Students receive faculty guidance in dissertation research.

This course assists students in writing an outstanding dissertation proposal. The course is organized as a writing workshop, with ongoing collaborative study of the dissertation proposal genre and writing and discussion of drafts of portions of student proposals under development.

This seminar provides a critical understanding of diversity and inequality in education in relationship to larger social stratification. The aim of this course is to unravel the processes of social and economic reproduction and resistance in American schooling. Students explore the unique ways in which culture and power intersect within schools and schooling systems to reproduce and resist educational inequality. In addition, students examine how structures of domination and subordination are reproduced and resisted through the "cultural practices" and experiences of marginalized student populations. Special attention is given to the transformative practices that enable students to circumvent reproduction and struggle for a more democratic society. Particular attention will be given to "race," "class," and "gender" frames for understanding youth and their schooling experiences. At the center of the analysis of diversity and inequality are the voices of Asian, Black, Latino, and White youth navigating the schooling system. The course seeks to enhance and enlarge graduate students' ability to conduct research in distinct school settings by providing them with a broad overview of diversity and inequality as substantive areas of inquiry.

Education 284 is the middle course in a quantitative core sequence offered to students in the CSU/UCI Joint Ed. D. program. Topics covered include: measurement, correlations, reliability and validity, causation and correlation, population sampling, item properties, and item design.

This second year seminar focuses on the development and refinement of the student's qualifying paper that will serve as partial fulfillment of requirements related to advancement to candidacy within the CSU/UCI Ed.D. program. The qualifying paper takes the form of a review of the scholarly literature related to a significant educational issue/topic/problem of the student's choice. The qualifying paper provides the program faculty with a substantive example of student work directly related to the ability of the student to continue in the program and to eventually produce a quality dissertation. The content of this seminar is organized around the assessment criteria that faculty reviewers use to evaluate the qualifying papers

The first five weeks of this course will introduce the quantitative research core to new students in the CSU-UCI Joint Ed.D. Program. Topics covered include: descriptive statistics, distribution, elements of statistical inference, logic of hypothesis testing, interpreting t-test difference of means and chi-square.

This course introduces students to the epistemological underpinnings of educational research and to a range of research methodologies in education. Students examine quantitative and qualitative studies by reading and analyzing contemporary research. They critique selected research studies pertinent to educational practice and policy.

This course provides an introduction to conceptual foundations of learning and cognition. Topics include behaviorism, cognitive architecture, complex cognition, motivation and volition, the brain and cognition, expertise, psychometrics, and intelligence. Through examining these topics, students explore such foundations for doctoral study as the nature of inquiry in educational research, standards of evidence, scholarly writing, and participation in a field of scholarship.

The goal of this course is to familiarize students with graduate scholarship tools, particularly electronic tools and resources, that can enhance their success as doctoral candidates. This goal is be implemented through structured workshops, both collaborative and independent student work, and practicing and applying the study tools and resources introduced in the workshops. Doctoral study tools that are explored include computer applications, multimedia presentation technologies, digital libraries and electronic search techniques, graduate study resources on the World Wide Web, bibliographic software, and collaborative online communities and listserves.