Two of our students competed last week in the College of Education Research Forum! Kimberly Ball is a doctoral student and Blake Haney is an undergraduate student in our ITS program. Read more about their presentations below! Kim: Doctoral student Kim Ball won the first place in the College of Education's 11th Annual Research Forum! At the College of Education's 11th Annual Research Forum on April 6, doctoral student Kim Ball's research poster won the first place. With a background in electric engineering, Kim is interested in investigating the reasons behind engineering students' nonpersistence in their undergraduate study, which is an issue across the country. Although many students leave engineering programs during their second and third years in the program, little research has been conducted on this phenomenon. As such, Kim's quantitative study explored the impact of a variety of indicators on students' nonpersistence in the second and third-year engineering study. Kim's research also won the 2nd place in the Ph.D. social sciences category at the University's Graduate Research Forum. Co-advised by Drs. Mable Okojie and Kun Huang, Kim conducted this study as a preliminary effort in her dissertation. Blake: Mr. Blake Haney, a senior in the ITS program teamed up with Dr. Wei-Chieh Wayne Yu to present at the 11th Annual College of Education Research Forum. The title of their research is "Factors Influencing the Pursuit of IT Certifications." The purpose of their study was to investigate the problem of determining the factors that influence the students in information technology to pursue IT certification along with their academic degree and thereby increase their chances of gaining employment and earning higher entry-level salaries. Many thanks to the College of Education and the Dean's office to make this project possible. We are so proud of these students for their hard work! Great job!