Meet some current QME graduate students

Beng Chang

Focus on statistics education
chang308@umn.edu

Beng has enjoyed teaching college mathematics and statistics courses for many years. His current interest is in learning about students' growth in understanding mathematics and statistics, and technical aspects of measuring educational improvement. He is a TA for EPSY 3264—Basic and Applied Statistics, and a RA for the Adapting and Implementing Innovative Materials in Statistics project.

Jared Dixon

Focus on statistics education
dixon118@umn.edu

Jared received his bachelor’s degrees in mathematics (B.A.) and psychology (B.S.) from Indiana University and completed his minor coursework in music studies and information technology. After moving from Bloomington, Ind., he worked as a financial services software analyst with a large consulting firm, and although this was a great experience, he realized that his true passion and interests are in education. He is particularly interested in how students learn statistical concepts and the advancement of the field of statistics education from both an instructional and research perspective. He is currently working as a teaching assistant for one of the introductory educational psychology statistics courses (EPSY 3264). He enjoys working with the introductory statistics courses because he is able to practice innovative instructional techniques, as well as experience first-hand how students learn statistical concepts and express their ideas about statistics. Please feel free to contact him via e-mail.

Lija Greenseid

Focus on evaluation
gree0573@umn.edu

Lija has a diverse educational background with a liberal arts bachelors' degree from UW-Madison and an M.A. in educational policy and administration at the University. Prior to working on her Ph.D., she worked with non-profit organizations in the US, UK, and Israel and traveled extensively. Her research interests are in evaluation use and influence and, more broadly, in evaluation theory and history. Currently she is working as a RA with Drs. Frances Lawrenz and Jean King on the Beyond Evaluation Use research project.

Kentaro Kato

Focus on statistics
kato0027@umn.edu

Kato got his B.A. and M.A. in education from University of Tokyo, and M.S. in statistics from the University of Minnesota. He has much experience in statistical analysis of educational and psychological data. His current research interests include psychometric modeling for cognitive diagnostic assessment (item response theory, latent class models, and their mixture/extensions; Bayesian networks), application of Bayesian statistics to psychometrics, and statistical computation. Currently, he is a RA at the National Center on Educational Outcomes (NCEO).

Kei (Kyoungwon) Lee

Focus on statistics
leex1514@umn.edu

Kei’s interests are meta-analysis, statistics education, and statistical modeling. Currently, she is a lab instructor in the Carlson School of Business for OMS 2550—Business Statistics: Data Sources, Presentation, and Analysis.

Pey-yan Liou

Focus on measurement
Lioux005@umn.edu

Pey-yan received her B.A in history and minors in education and mass commutation from National Taiwan University. After two years as a research assistant in the educational field and one year as a high school teacher, she committed herself to be an educational researcher. Her research interests are evaluating factors that affect student academic performance, and seeking methods to improve student achievement. She currently is a TA for EPSY 5261—Introductory Statistical Methods, and a GA for the Honors and Awards Committee (HAC) at the U. She is also working on the Evaluation of Noyce Projects.

Amanuel Medhanie

Focus on statistics
medha001@umn.edu

Amanuel currently has two research assistantships. One is for the Minnesota Child Response Center which is doing research on the impact of trauma on children and another for the Minnesota Mathematics Achievement Project which is interested in the impact of different teaching approaches to mathematics on college math performance.

Chayut Piromsombat (Maoh)

Focus on measurement/statistics
pirom002@umn.edu

Maoh’s research interests are MIRT, test equating, SEM, missing imputation, and categorical data analysis. Also, he would like to apply measurement methodologies and statistical techniques to improve large scale testing. He does not have a position at the U of M, but he is conducting two research projects with his professor in Thailand.

Jihoon Ryoo

Focus on statistics
ryoox001@umn.edu

Jihoon got his M.A. and M.S. in mathematics separately. His primary interests are in longitudinal data analysis and factor analysis, as well as other approaches to analyzing multivariate statistics. This year, he is a RA for Dr. Long, and a TA for EPSY 8261—Statistical Methods I: Probability and Inference.

Rebecca E. Swinburne Romine

Focus on measurement
swin0024@umn.edu

Rebecca has a B.A. in psychology. She is interested in research and instrument design, especially in research on adolescents. She is a research assistant on two projects. The main one is a multi-year study of adolescent sex offenders. It is conducted out of the Program in Human Sexuality in the school of Public Health. Her position involves interviewing participants, collecting and managing data, and running data analyses. She and her colleagues are currently applying for an additional grant. Her other position is with a joint project of the School of Social Work and the School of Veterinary Medicine. The project is developing tools for assessing the communication skills of veterinary students. She has primarily been providing measurement related input on the development of a rating scale for veterinary/client interactions.

Catherine N. Wanjugi

Focus on measurement
wanju001@umn.edu

Catherine is currently working as a research assistant with her two advisors on projects such as assisting with the evaluation process of an NSF funded project and also the ACT/SAT program here at the university of Minnesota.

J.D. Walker

Focus on evaluation
jdwalker@umn.edu

Walker earned a Ph.D. in philosophy from the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill in 1996 and began work at the University of Minnesota's Digital Media Center (DMC) in 1998. He coordinates the DMC's research and evaluation team, the mission of which is to investigate the ways in which digital learning technologies are affecting the teaching and learning environment at the University of Minnesota. Current projects include university-wide student and faculty technology surveys, a collaborative evaluation of an online master's degree curriculum in the School of Nursing, and an investigation of the effectiveness of online interactive tools for learning about copyright and fair use.

April 2007