EHE Experience Graduate Education Week

Graduate study in EHE is not just about learning — it’s about becoming. We nurture the next generation of leaders who will move education, policy and practice forward. Who we are in EHE is who we empower our students to become —  scholars, innovators and leaders who will shape education for generations to come. In EHE, we don’t just prepare graduate students for careers — we also prepare them to lead with vision, courage and purpose. We engage students in questioning, imagining and building, so they leave not only with knowledge, but also with the confidence to transform the communities they serve.

The work of PK-12 educational leaders is critically important to student learning and the culture of a school. At The Ohio State University, our top 10 ranked Educational Administration program empowers aspiring school leaders with the vision, tools and practical applications needed to transform learning environments and uplift students and teachers alike.
 
To meet your professional goals, we have thriving doctoral, master’s and licensure-only programs designed to meet your needs. If this sounds intriguing, come join us and become the kind of leader tomorrow’s schools need today.

My clinical work and research in couple and family therapy engage grad students around family-based and community interventions in pediatric and adult weight management and bariatric surgery. I explore and/or address the social determinants of health around who patients live with (including interpersonal dynamics that affect behavior change), where they live (including access to healthy foods and opportunities for physical activity) and effects on health outcomes (behavior change, weight loss, readmissions/complications).
 
I work with students, preparing them to identify and intervene on relationship dynamics that can affect the adoption and maintenance of healthy behaviors. I and the rest of the faculty in the couple and family therapy master’s and doctoral programs work with students to develop their own approach to intervention and therapy that is evidence-based and sensitive to the populations they will work with.

I have been a staff member at Ohio State since 2017. Over time, I have had the incredible opportunity to explore and learn about the many benefits of an Ohio State education. So, when I was ready to start my doctoral journey, it was a no-brainer to do it here on campus.

I want to use my expertise to lead and help colleges and universities weather the turbulent time many are facing now. I have 15 years of practical experience in workforce development settings as a practitioner, and I know that this combined with a PhD from Ohio State, will position me as someone who can be an agent for positive change and re-alignment in the higher education industry and the workforce more broadly.

The college faculty have been incredibly supportive during my time at Ohio State. They have introduced me to opportunities and events that I otherwise would not have known. They are open to meeting regularly and discussing my plans for the rest of my academic journey. I am happy to say that my experience has been everything I could have hoped for and more.

I want to work in special education and behavioral health, but I don’t just want to work. I want to bridge the gap between education, clinical practice, and policy. This program is allowing me to dedicate time and resources to my studies and gain the knowledge I need to truly make an impact.

Our PhD training program in special education combines rigorous coursework in experimental methodology with hands-on research opportunities in central Ohio schools. We follow an apprenticeship model in which students begin by contributing to their advisor’s research projects and gradually transition to developing and conducting their own independent research. Upon graduation, our students are well-prepared in both research and college teaching, equipping them to train future special educators and improve outcomes for students with disabilities.
 
Our MA programs feature practical coursework that leads to teacher certification or eligibility to sit for the Board Certified Behavior Analyst (BCBA) exam. Graduates work in public schools, private schools and clinics, providing intervention services to children, youth and adults with disabilities. Special education teachers and BCBAs are currently in high demand. As a result, 100% of our graduates secure employment where they apply their newly acquired skills.

I study early literacy development and how such development can be supported in classrooms. I am committed to supporting the next generation of education researchers. My Early Learning and Literacy Lab (EL3) includes students at all levels — undergraduate, graduate and postdoctoral. The PhD students whom I advise are immersed in the research experience from their first day in the lab. Each collaborates on an active school- or lab-based research project and experiences the full spectrum of research activities. These range from participant recruitment through to data collection and analysis. All PhD students engage in co- and first-authoring presentations and manuscripts.

Much of my understanding of leadership is inspired by my research, my commitment to communities and my own life experiences. I explore how people can use language to see each other more clearly, particularly in educational, teaching and learning settings. My interests lie in what people do with language and how they use it to navigate and make sense of the world around them. In my world, language is primarily a verb — languaging.
 
As future leaders, educators and scholars, how we use language can cause people to despair or give them hope. Our languaging reflects how we see each other, and how we see ourselves in relation to others. While the weight of educational leadership is substantial and seeing through language can be unsettling, it also holds great opportunities. It urges us to reconsider the ‘human work’ that ‘we,’ as a local and global human family, must continue.
 
Through our languaging, future educational leaders can see more clearly and articulate a more thoughtful, nuanced, resilient vision of ‘we’ — a vision full of innovation and possibility that can carve out spaces of hope, care, empathy, personal responsibility, dignity and ingenuity.

Did you know that Ohio State has 18 colleges, but over a quarter of all FuIbright students are enrolled in the College of Education and Human Ecology, and they’re mostly from Indonesia? Or that the OSU – Indonesian Memorandum of Understanding is 17 times bigger than any other OSU international agreement by partner number?

I primarily advise Southeast Asian graduate students who are on leave from their faculty positions at home to complete their MAs and PhDs in our college. Students return to take on leadership in their universities, including the roles of department chairs, deans and even a university president! This demonstrates the global reputation and impact of the college and Ohio State.

I am a Fulbright Scholar from the Philippines and I am so fortunate to be here at Ohio State. My dissertation revolves around my work back home. I’m an instructor and a professional development trainer. I was fortunate to be part of the Dennis Learning Center, which offers courses such as learning and motivational skills. I also had the opportunity to train at the Drake Institute for Teaching and Learning and help other graduate teaching associates. These opportunities have helped me expand my horizons in terms of teaching and student affairs theories. When I go home, I will be able to bring back all these insights and experiences.

The Counselor Education program is nationally recognized for our outstanding graduate students who use their passion and commitment to improve the lives of the people they serve. Our rigorous cohort-based, in-person program and intensive school and community-based internships prepare students to use evidence-based practice. We ensure that our graduates are prepared to provide the highest quality counseling services.
 
Our master’s students become Professional School Counselors or Licensed Professional Clinical Counselors who for decades have had 100% passing of their licensure exams and 100% job placement.

Our doctoral students work closely with faculty mentors to produce cutting-edge, award-winning research that creates meaningful change for people and communities, landing jobs as faculty and leaders within the profession.

My research engages graduate students in becoming leaders of tomorrow through a focus on innovative and timely research needs, solid statistical skills, and a focus on publications and research presentations in our academic community.

I always knew that I wanted to help people in some sort of capacity. I dove in with a lot of the clinical experience. I see individuals, couples and family at the Couple and Family Therapy Clinic. I work as a behavioral health therapist at Nationwide Children’s Hospital Integrated Primary Care Department. I also work under Natasha Slesnick at Star House Columbus, where I work as a research assessor for the suicide prevention for substance-using youth experiencing homelessness. I’ve been seeing clients in a lot of different contexts, so it’s really helped me gain an understanding of what I want to do long-term.

Our four Ohio State nutrition and dietetics graduate programs equip students to realize their career goals — whether they involve research, healthcare, wellness, industry or academia.
 
Graduate students in my human nutrition lab gain real-world experience engaging with research participants as we collect dietary data and biospecimens, test cognitive function, analyze nutritional biomarkers and provide nutrition interventions to improve health outcomes for cancer survivors.
 
I engage students in my research to better understand how the food that we eat affects neuroinflammatory conditions. We particularly focus on nutrition interventions to reduce neuroinflammatory side effects of cancer treatment, such as cancer-related cognitive impairment, cancer fatigue and mental health.

In my work, graduate and undergraduate students engage in applied research that directly improves student well-being. Through programs like Exercise is Medicine™ for Student Resilience and the MOVE initiative, they gain hands-on experience in human performance labs, deliver peer-led wellness coaching and use innovative tools such as wearable technology to connect physical activity with mental health outcomes.
 
These opportunities prepare students to become evidence-based practitioners while fostering leadership, resilience and collaboration. At Ohio State, we are proud to provide a supportive, interdisciplinary environment that equips students to thrive as the next generation of health and exercise science professionals.

I am pursuing a Master’s in Kinesiology with a concentration in health and exercise science. I get to work under Carmen Swain, she’s really involved in Exercise is Medicine and a lot of other great movement and exercise research and courses here. She’s been a great mentor and taught me a lot about teaching and research.

Once I finish my master’s here, my plan is to hopefully go into medical school. I want to work in sports medicine, which is why I decided to do a degree in exercise science and kinesiology. I think that background will be very beneficial, especially getting to see the research side of it and how that can be implemented in medicine specifically.

The graduate students I work with get opportunities to tackle fascinating questions at the intersection of families and the economy — and more specifically, questions surrounding fertility decisions and family formation. I work with difficult to access, restricted data sources, such as the restricted versions of the National Center for Health Statistics Natality files, restricted American Community Survey data and Norwegian Register data. These data sources allow the students with whom I work to address research questions that cannot be answered using publicly available sources and to publish in high-quality journals.

As I reflect on my experiences as a very successful (Black female) graduate student at another university, I must state that attending Ohio State’s College of Education and Human Ecology (EHE) would have been even more career changing.  I truly appreciate how our college supports students in the classroom and beyond —  your future as a professional. I am happy to speak with and mentor students one-on-one, in independent study classes, in all of my classes, and throughout EHE to discuss how to be a published scholar before graduating.  When I graduated, I had over a dozen publications, and I want this for my students and all students in the College of EHE.

Our top-ranked Higher Education and Student Affairs program prepares leaders to benefit college students in classrooms and beyond. This is evident within our Student Personnel Assistantship program which links students to funded assistantships at Ohio State for hands on experiences.
 
To uplift collegiality, expansion and innovation, I developed the College Impact Laboratory, where I have grant-funded projects that focus on worldview identities, community colleges and innovation capacities for STEM students. I welcome student partners for internships, practicums, independent studies and, if available, research assistantships.
 
For instance, I engage grad students in projects such as Interfaith, Spiritual, Religious, and Secular Campus Climate Index (INSPIRES). Funded by multiple sources over time, INSPIRES is an assessment tool used to measure, evaluate and represent a university campus’ efforts toward commitment to establishing a welcoming climate for students of multiple worldviews. To date, I have received over $21 million in grant funding for my research.

Research can be a scary word for students new to graduate school or students coming back to school after years as an administrator. I teach graduate students “how” to do research and ensure they’re asking great questions.
 
For example, I co-author with students, invite students to work with me on grants (such as the Department of Defense grant I’m working on now) and co-present with students at conferences. At times, students don’t need me to co-present, and in these cases, I support them with advice or any cheerleading needed.
 
The goal is to design research so that it makes a difference for people — in their policies, programs and/or organizational practices. Research should be exciting and make a difference.

I had a great time at the annual EHE Research Forum presenting my research on sport management students’ academic self-efficacy and learning about the research interests of my peers. I'm looking forward to the next one!

Presenting at the EHE Research Forum sparked engaging discussions and insights into the poetic text, enriching my understanding of methods, theoretical frameworks and artistic paradigms. Interacting with fellow scholars set a solid foundation for the project's next phase.