Phd/EdD, Leadership: Organizational Leadership Course Descriptions

LDR‐7000: Leadership Theories and Professional Practice (3 hours) Contemporary and classical leadership theories and their application to a variety of professional settings; examine and assess an organization’s leadership platform and practices.  

OLDR-7500: Scholarly Writing (3 hours) This doctoral course introduces organizational leadership students to the expectations of scholarly writing, which adheres to specific standards. The course focuses on understanding and using scholarly voice; developing scholarly writing style [evidenced, objective, and critical], and effectively using APA

OLDR-7010: Follower-Leader Relationship (3 hours) Students explore the often-understudied aspect of leadership—the role of the follower and the dynamics that drive the follower-leader relationship. Students examine the various theories and models of followership, the follower-leader mindsets, and shared leadership practices that promote organizational wellness. 

OLDR-7030: Applied Ethics and Organizational Leadership (3 hours) Students are offered an opportunity to explore and examine critical ethical issues in organizational leadership, such as power, politics, influence, and ethical responsibility. Students will examine their personal and professional ethical positions and the impact of their moral compass on decision-making.

RES‐7605: Quantitative Analysis (3 hours) An introduction to the quantitative analysis of data, including data coding and entry of data. SPSS will be used to explore descriptive and inferential statistics, using both non‐parametric and initial parametric techniques.

LDR‐7020: Leading the Knowledge Enterprise (3 hours) Leading the Knowledge Enterprise is a course that introduces students to the exciting and sometimes hard-to-define field of knowledge management. The role of the leader is emphasized, especially as it relates to identifying and leveraging the intellectual capital of an organization; promoting and facilitating knowledge sharing and innovation; intellectual assets, knowledge management strategy, knowledge management cycle, and knowledge taxonomies.

OLDR-7050: Advanced Seminar in Leadership and Strategy (3 hours) The course is designed to advance students’ understanding, perspectives, frameworks and mindsets for integrating leadership and strategy within their organizations. Students explore and examine various organizational issues impacting strategy, strategic decision making and innovative opportunities for leading and planning change initiatives. 

LDR‐7030: Promoting and Leading Change (3 hours) Effective change leadership requires an understanding of the basic principles and practices underlying innovation, change processes and sustainability in organizations. The focus of LDR‐7030 is initiating, implementing and ensuring continuation of change as a key leadership challenge. Various change theories and principles are examined with an emphasis on the leader’s role in capacity building, creativity, organizational strengths and style. Participants are encouraged to develop a more situated and experienced informed approach to change in the organizational front lines. 

OLDR-7020: Change Innovation and Transformative Leadership (3 hours) Students examine the various roles and processes in organizational change, innovation and transformation efforts in the context of globally responsible leadership. Organizational culture, climate, communication practices, and mental models that acknowledge the need for socially and globally responsible leadership are explored. The necessity for moral integrity in the face of increasing ethical pluralism is also examined. 

EDL-7211: Policy Analysis (3 hours) This course is intended to provide an overview of policy issues, policy development, policy analysis and policy implementation processes through an examination of the theoretical and practical applications related to policy considerations in organizations and institutions.

FPR‐7300: Philosophy of Scientific Knowledge (3 hours) This course provides an orientation to the nature, uses, and limitations of science with the aim of achieving an understanding of the variety of approaches to research design and developing conceptual frameworks. With regard to the metatheory of knowledge, particular attention will be paid to the following topics: the relationship between theory and observations, the role of the researcher’s values in knowledge generation, how the research conceptualizes the relationship between researcher and subjects, the standards that are used to appraise theories, the theory of reality (ontology) and of how to know that reality (epistemology) that underlies critical theories, and how different methods of data gathering and data analysis influence the generation of scientific knowledge.

OLDR-7040: Inclusive Leadership (3 hours) Differences in gender, race, and ethnicity have a significant impact on leadership style and practice in both overt and covert ways in all aspects of life, including within the workplace. This course provides students with an analytic framework for understanding the role that inclusions play in defining and determining access to leadership and power in organizations.

RES‐7700: Qualitative Research (3 hours) An examination of qualitative research approaches with a focus on research design, the role of the researcher, data collection and analysis, and writing from a qualitative perspective. 

EDL-7121: Research-Based Decision Making (non-K-12) (3 hours) This course prepares students to be consumers of research in order to make leadership decisions based on qualitative and quantitative research studies. Investigation of primary source research studies includes the analysis of the research problem, research question, literature review, methodology and results to understand the structure of research studies that can be applied to authentic problems in various fields of study.

RES‐7800: Mixed Methods Research (3 hours) This course explores the theory and practice of mixed methods research in program evaluation and applied research. Prerequisite: B or higher in RES‐7700 or RES‐7605.  

[Note: PhD students take RES7620 OR RES7710]

RES‐7620: Advanced Topics in Statistics (3 hours) An introduction to advanced statistical concepts, including multivariate analysis, linear models, hierarchical linear models, factor analysis, and data management, will be covered in this course. Students will use published software packages and will learn to write basic syntax for custom analysis. Prerequisite: B or higher in RES‐7605.  

RES‐7710: Advanced Qualitative Analysis (3 hours) This course provides advanced introductions to a representative range of qualitative methods. It is designed to familiarize doctoral and advanced master’s students with the commonly used qualitative research methods. The course will prepare them to further understand philosophies and concepts of qualitative methods, to utilize these methods in their own research, or to evaluate the qualitative work that others have done. This course also teaches how to use qualitative software as an analytic tool to analyze qualitative data. Prerequisite: B or higher in RES‐7700.

LDR‐7010: Developing the Organization’s Human Capital (3 hours) In this course, students examine and explore human resources policies and practices; administrative supervision strategies and effective communication techniques; job performance, employee development and deployment, diverse work force, employment law, training and development, harassment and health issues, and disabilities and discrimination. LDR‐7020: Leading the Knowledge Enterprise (3 hours) Leading the Knowledge Enterprise is a course that introduces students to the exciting and sometimes hard-to-define field of knowledge management. The role of the leader is emphasized, especially as it relates to identifying and leveraging the intellectual capital of an organization; promoting and facilitating knowledge sharing and innovation; intellectual assets, knowledge management strategy, knowledge management cycle and knowledge taxonomies. 

EDL-7141: Organizational Change (non-K-12) (3 hours) This course is designed to address the importance of organizational change. The need for change, planning for change, implementing change, and evaluating change will be discussed from a variety of theoretical and practical perspectives.

RES-7910: Research Design I (3 hours) First course in the Research Design series. Principles of research theory, paradigmatic fit, problem formulation, and literature review development.

RES-7920: Research Design II (3 hours) Second course in the Research Design series. Principles of research design, epistemological claim, and methodology/methods, including data collection and analysis.

COMP-7010: Doctoral Comprehensive Exam (1 hour) Evaluates a) student program content knowledge, b) student ability to apply content knowledge, and c) student readiness for the dissertation process.

Note: Students must successfully pass the comprehensive exam to advance to the dissertation process. Prerequisite: B or higher in RES–7920. Offered Pass/Fail.

DISS-7011: Dissertation Proposal I (3 hours) Required research hours taken during the preparation of the dissertation proposal. Prerequisite: P in COMP–7000 or COMP–7010. Offered Pass/Fail.

DISS-7012: Dissertation Proposal II (3 hours) Required research hours taken during the preparation of the dissertation proposal. Prerequisite: P in DISS-7011. Offered Pass/Fail.

DISS-8010: Dissertation Completion (0 hours) Doctoral candidates use this course to maintain continuous enrollment and make progress on their dissertation once they have passed their proposal defense until they have successfully defended their dissertation. This course is not credit-bearing. Prerequisite: P in DISS–7012 or DISS–7030, and evidence of a successful proposal defense. Offered Pass/Fail.

 DISS-8011: Dissertation Completion (0 hours) Doctoral candidates use this course to maintain continuous enrollment and make progress on their dissertation once they have passed their proposal defense until they have successfully defended their dissertation. This course is not credit-bearing. Prerequisite: P in DISS–7012 or DISS–7030, and evidence of a successful proposal defense. Offered Pass/Fail.

•  Students continue in the DISS-701X sequence until successful proposal defense.
• After a student successfully defends their proposal, they apply for candidacy and maintain continuous enrollment in DISS–8010 Dissertation Completion and DISS–8011 Dissertation Completion until program completion.

Go back to PhD/EdD, Leadership: Organizational Leadership program.