Overview

Research Library

Research in Service to Society

The central mission of research conducted by faculty and students in Lehigh’s College of Education is to improve the lives of individuals across the lifespan by enhancing educational, psychological and social functioning.

We accomplish this mission by conducting research that is relevant and accessible to our stakeholders including school and mental health professionals, policy makers and families. We believe that research is critically important in informing and improving educational and mental health policy and practice. Thus, the community is our “laboratory” in that we conduct research in collaboration with our stakeholders to address critical issues that affect the daily lives of students, families, and adults. And our research involves data collection at the “point of performance”, i.e., in the real world settings and timeframes where behaviors of interest occur. 

Although our college is relatively small in terms of faculty numbers, we are extraordinarily productive in the quantity, quality and breadth of our research and scholarship. This productivity is reflected by traditional academic metrics of publication rates, citations by other scholars and receipt of grant research funding. More importantly, our faculty, students and alumni produce work of lasting impact on educational and mental health practice in schools and communities as well as on policy development and implementation.

Our work covers a wide spectrum of issues that are important to the community such as examining the effects of interventions on the educational and psychological functioning of youth and adults with disabilities (e.g., autism, attention-deficit/hyperactivity disorder, learning disorders); measuring children’s school readiness and academic skills over time; examining the origins of gender roles and their impact on the psychological status of individuals and communities; or assessing factors that improve the daily practice of school building principals. 

Of particular note is our Center for Promoting Research to Practice that has produced dozens of studies that have improved school- and community-based services for individuals with educational and mental health disabilities. 

Dr. Patti Manz, Professor, School Psychology Program
Associate Chair of Education and Human Services Department

Dr. Patti Manz's research is directed toward improving early childhood education for ethnic minority and low income children. In particular, she is invested in empowering and supporting families’ involvement in their children’s learning at home and early childhood settings. Utilizing research methods that engage families and early childhood professionals as collaborators, her current projects include an evaluation of a home visiting program to promote oral language and early literacy among young urban children, examination of variables that affect families’ involvement in home-based learning activities, and establishing cross-cultural validity of family involvement measures. 
 

Research News