Education Commons^™

Small Schools And The Issue Of Race, Linda C. Powell

Occasional Paper Series

Bank Street College of Education, in conjunction with the Consortium on Chicago School Research did a study of small schools in Chicago. This paper examines one element of the findings in depth - the interaction of race and school size. Powell argues that small schools are by their very nature an anti-racist intervention.

Historical Perspectives On Large Schools In America, Robert L. Hampel

Occasional Paper Series

Hampel evaluates the large school versus small school debate from a historical perspective. Until the 1970's, the small school was seen as the problem, not the answer. This essay will look at five beliefs, each firmly held for a long time by most educators.

Small Schools And The Issue Of Scale, Patricia A. Wasley, Michelle Fine

Occasional Paper Series

Wasley and Fine write this essay to respond to the oft-heard claim that small schools are not a systemic reform strategy. They argue, instead, that there is now a broad professional and community consensus for small schools; major policy moves within urban, suburban, and rural communities are being advanced to create and maintain small schools, and substantial social science evidence documents the efficiency and equity potential of small schools .

Restorative Schooling: The Healing Power Of Counternarrative, Veronica Benavides

Occasional Paper Series

Deficit-based thinking and subtractive schooling on negatively impact children from minoritized communities. This paper considers the unique role of families as leaders in the restorative schooling process, and offers educators research-based guidance on creating culturally responsive learning environments.

Introduction: Reading And Writing The T/Terror Narratives Of Black And Brown Girls And Women: Storying Lived Experiences To Inform And Advance Early Childhood Through Higher Education, Jeannine Staples, Uma M. Jayakumar

Occasional Paper Series

Staples and Jayakumar introduce this issue of the Occasional Paper Series that speaks to the #SayHerName social justice initiative. The movement aims to expose the experiences of Black and Brown girls and women who are subject to police violence in society and various violences in schools. In response to this movement, this issue includes stories of Black and Brown women from early childhood education through higher education.

An Analysis Of The Affirmative Action Program For Ethnic Minority Students At Hexi University In Zhangye, Gansu, China, Caitlin Shea

Capstone Collection

This study investigates and critically analyzes the People’s Republic of China’s (PRC) preferential policy for ethnic minority students (少数民族的优惠政策) through the use of a case study conducted at Hexi University in Zhangye, Gansu. This study examines how the national preferential policy for ethnic minority students is implemented at a university level and how it is perceived by teachers and students in order to better understand and assess the impact and purpose of the policy. The study is driven by three questions; how is the PRC’s preferential policy for ethnic minority students implemented at a university level? Is the preferential policy …

Tlc : Creating A Culturally Responsive School Through Effective Teaching, Leadership, And Climate., Jessika Berry English, Joseph Ellison Iii

College of Education & Human Development Capstone Projects

Educators in today’s global community are held accountable for teaching to develop the whole child. This requires providing instruction and support to equip students both academically, socially and emotionally to prepare for real world experiences. Competencies such as self-awareness, decision-making and relationship building have proven to be essential to create student outcomes associated with prosocial behavior, mental health and smooth transition to college or career. Acquisition of these skills occur as a result of social emotional learning. In order for social emotional skills to develop and promote these outcomes key features of programs, quality of implementation and support of school …

At The Intersection Of Politics And Higher Education: Policy, Power, And Governing Boards In Oklahoma, Kirk Rodden

Electronic Theses and Dissertations

This quantitative study examined the perceptions of members of Oklahoma public higher education governing boards and legislators concerning higher education governance. The purpose of this study was to gain a greater understanding among the participants as to the role governing boards should play in the system. The population for the study comprised 142 members of the Oklahoma Legislature and 107 members of 15 Oklahoma public higher education governing boards. The principal investigator used a web-based survey development company to design, collect, and store survey responses.

Results from the study were examined using independent samples t tests and one-way ANOVAs. From …

Charting Constellations Of Power: Texas Public Education Policy, Hollie Wright

MSU Graduate Theses

For decades, public education in Texas has been entrenched in neoliberalism-inspired policies that research shows largely fail to produce promised results and have a tendency to perpetuate the very problems advocates claim the policies will solve. This raises questions about the decision-makers and what is happening in the public education policy process. In line with Laura Nader’s directive for more anthropologists to make those in power the subject of their research, I used both ethnographic and social network analysis methods to ‘study up’ in Texas public education. This study describes some relationships of members of the Texas State Board of …

Arkansas Teacher Salaries, Sarah C. Mckenzie, Gary W. Ritter

Policy Briefs

This brief examines teacher salaries in Arkansas. Using data publicly available from the Arkansas Department of Education, we examine how teacher salaries compare to the nation and surrounding states. Further analyses examine differences in teacher salary within and between the regions of Arkansas. We identify the district factors most related to and make recommendations for utilizing this information.

Comprehensive Analysis Of Arkansas Teacher Salaries: State, Region, And District, Katherine M. Kopotic, Sarah C. Mckenzie, Gary W. Ritter

Arkansas Education Reports

School funding has been an area of contention in the courts of nearly every state. Many of these court cases have challenged the constitutionality of state funding formulas, arguing the funding system was inadequate or inequitable because poor urban or rural districts often faced a disadvantage in garnering tax dollars for education. Specific to Arkansas, in the 1983 decision Dupree v. Alma School District, the Arkansas Supreme Court declared the state’s funding system was not meeting its constitutional requirements.

Steady Work, Tom Roderick

Occasional Paper Series

Roderick's remarks made on the occasion of receiving an honorary doctorate from Bank Street College of Education in 1999. He speaks about his steady work in conflict resolution programs, because there is always a need for conflict resolution in a world where conflict is natural but violence is taught.

In Their Words: Student Choice In Training Markets: Victorian Examples, Justin Brown

Dr Justin Brown

This research offers new insights into the options available to individuals as they navigate an increasingly complex vocational education and training (VET) system. It explores the extent to which the consumer model of training, aimed at increasing student choice, is changing the dynamics between prospective students and registered training organisations (RTOs). The focus here is on examples from Victoria, the first state to initiate market reforms, by means of the Victorian Training Guarantee. Importantly, this study directly represents the voice of students, asking how their choices were made as they navigated these new policy settings, and whether their choice, if …

Partnerships Promoting A Culture Of Inclusion In Maine's Early Childhood Workforce, Linda Labas

Poster Presentations

This poster session highlighted the Maine UCEDD’s role as a statewide resource and collaborative partner in advancing inclusive practice in Maine’s early care and education system. It covered the delivery of a continuum of supports for inclusion; examined collaborations that create systemic impact; and reviewed the services needed to increase knowledge, skills and application of practices to improve the quality of early care and education settings in Maine.

School Choice Vouchers And Special Education In Indiana Catholic Diocesan Schools, William H. Blackwell, June M. Robinson

Journal of Catholic Education

Catholic schools are now located at a crossroads of school choice voucher programs and special education services. With enrollment in Catholic schools declining over the past several decades, voucher programs that allow parents to use public funds for tuition at private schools – including tuition for students with disabilities – could possibly help to steady or even reverse this decline. This study examined the impact of Indiana’s statewide voucher program on Catholic schools, student enrollment, and special education services in three large diocesan school systems. The findings address issues related to enrollment growth, changing student population characteristics, special education services, …

Subsidizing Public College Tuition, Mariah Wallace

The Eastern Illinois University Political Science Review

This article provides, via a qualitative analysis, an alternative view on how to pay for college education in America by exploring the possibility of subsidizing public college education. The author indicates that subsiding public college tuition is possible, making it easier for citizens to receive a college degree, but the entire education system must be restricted in order to adapt to the new system.

“Undocumented” Ways Of Navigating Complex Sociopolitical Realities In Higher Education: A Critical Race Counterstory, Alonso R. Reyna Rivarola

Journal of Critical Scholarship on Higher Education and Student Affairs

In the United States, undocumented students must navigate complex sociopolitical realities to access and succeed in higher education. These complex sociopolitical realities are shaped by federal policies on education and immigration, state-specific legislation on education and public policy, as well as general attitudes regarding race, immigration, and nationalism in the U.S. In this manuscript, I weave in counter-storytelling to document some of the ways one undocumented student accessed and navigated U.S. higher education. I begin by reviewing the national and state policy contexts that affect undocumented students in the U.S. I focus a state policy analysis in Utah, as one …

The Arizona Kith And Kin Project, Sarah Ocampo-Schlesinger, Vicki Mccarty

Occasional Paper Series

In 1999, soon after the federal welfare reform was enacted, many people in Pheonix, Arizona were transitioning off of welfare and into the workforce. When considering job development in any any community, the focus shifts to child care needs. A study of child care needs in the area revealed that most parents were relying on family, friends, and neighbors for care. The Association for Supportive Child Care (ASCC) became committed to reaching out to the underserved population of kith and kin caregivers in their communities to provide training and support.

Ways Of Caring: How Relative Caregivers Support Children And Parents, Juliet Bromer

Occasional Paper Series

Reports on a subset of findings from a study that explored the support roles of African American child care providers in poor Chicago neighborhoods. Based on ten in-depth interviews with relative caregivers, Bromer discusses five themes: caregiver's adult-focused and child-focused motivations for caring, daily work with children, childrearing advice to parents, and caregiver-parent conflict. Caregivers’ motivations to provide child care and the meanings they ascribe to this daily work suggest new ways of defining a child-focused approach to caregiving.

Family, Friend, And Neighbor Care: Crib Notes On A Complex Issue, Toni Porter, Shannon Kearns

Occasional Paper Series

Before the 1996 federal welfare reform, home-based childcare was either overlooked or looked down upon. Since then, there has been a flurry of research investigating kith and kin childcare - which makes up approximately 73% of child care in the U.S. This essay provides insight into who provides home-based care and the quality of that care.

Introduction: Perspectives On Family, Friend And Neighbor Child Care, Rena Rice

Occasional Paper Series

Introduces a series of essays that explore family, friend, and neighbor child care. This form of child care has often been portrayed as "substandard, unregulated care" without any adequate research to support this claim. In 2005, the National Alliance for Family, Friend and Neighbor Child Care was formed. This series aims to encourage greater recognition of the role that kith and kin caregivers play in the child care continuum - offering a review of recent research, programs, and policy.

A Narrative Policy Analysis Of The Responses To Tennessee Promise And Plans For Transfer Receptivity By Six Tennessee Public Universities' Presidents And Provosts, Lori Elliott Buchanan

Dissertations

The Tennessee Promise scholarship and mentoring program broadened access and affordability to postsecondary education in Tennessee. This policy innovation increased the number of students seeking to engage in postsecondary education. It also shifted some of the state’s students to the more affordable community colleges and colleges of applied technology for their first two years of college. Equally important, Tennessee Promise incentivized the presidents and provosts of the six public universities under review to expand existing transfer receptivity efforts as their universities prepared to receive and support Tennessee Promise community college student transfers.

The purpose of this narrative policy analysis based …

Litigation In Search Of Educational Opportunity: An Analysis Of Abbeville County School District Et Al. V. The State Of South Carolina Et Al., Jennifer Michelle Hein

Dissertations

Like many southern states, South Carolina has a history permeated by issues related to race, equity, and educational opportunity. As early as the 1949 South Carolina court case, Briggs v. Elliott, South Carolina has had to address issues of equity and educational opportunity among its disenfranchised and marginalized citizenry. More than 60 years later, in Abbeville County School District et al. v. the State of South Carolina et al., sectors of rural South Carolina, predominantly black and poverty laden, would unite and engage in a legal battle with the State over equity in public education and by judicial mandate, be …

Dispatches From Flyover Country: Four Appraisals Of Impacts Of Trump’S Immigration Policy On Families, Schools, And Communities, Edmund T. Hamann, Cara Morgenson

Department of Teaching, Learning, and Teacher Education: Faculty Publications

A university professor and high school ESL teacher, both based in Lincoln Nebraska, each write two short essays that detail implications of the Trump administration immigration policies for students, teachers, schools, and communities. The first two dispatches come from the transition period (after Trump won but while Obama still presided) while the latter two come from the 50-day mark of the Trump presidency. Juxtaposing voices contrasts overarching impact with the local; juxtaposing chronologies allows comparison of political promises and threats to early actions and reactions.

Workforce Well-Being: Personal And Workplace Contributions To Early Educators' Depression Across Settings, Amy M. Roberts, Kathleen C. Gallagher, Alexandra Daro, Iheoma Iruka, Susan Sarver

Buffet Early Childhood Institute Reports and Publications

Building on research demonstrating the importance of teachers' well-being, this study examined personal and contextual factors related to early childhood educators' (n =1640) depressive symptoms across licensed child care homes, centers, and schools. Aspects of teachers' beliefs, economic status, and work-related stress were explored, and components of each emerged as significant in an OLS regression. After controlling for demographics and setting, teachers with more adult-centered beliefs, lower wages, multiple jobs, no health insurance, more workplace demands, and fewer work-related resources, had more depressive symptoms. Adult-centered beliefs were more closely associated with depression for teachers working in home-based settings compared …

“Just Get It Done”: How The New York City High School Admissions Process Is Re-Defining The Work & Identities Of Professionals In Screened High School-Programs, Heather Rippeteau

Dissertations, Theses, and Capstone Projects

The implementation of the high school admissions process in the New York City Public schools, has re-defined the work and identities of professionals working the screened high school-programs. This study uses descriptive statistics culled from the Directory of New York City High Schools for 2007 and 2017, and interviews with school personnel from three screened school-programs, to review the impact of the implementation of this process during its first full decade in existence. These data establish the fact that screened school-programs are experiencing the phenomenon of marketization by way of their admissions process. Further, the implementation of this process generates …

Examining School Leadership In New York City Community Schools, Stacey Campo

Dissertations, Theses, and Capstone Projects

The community school model is rooted in John Dewey’s (1902) conceptualization of the public school as a hub for the community. The model has recently been identified as part of New York City’s school turnaround strategy and continues to gain prominence nationally, because of this, it is essential to identify the key components of an excelling leadership partnership. This dissertation describes findings and recommendations from interviews with principals and community school directors in ten New York City community schools. These interviews were triangulated with analysis of the New York City school environment survey utilizing both faculty and parent responses. This …

Language Culture Wars: Effects Of Language Policy On Language Minorities And English Learners, Ambar A. Perez

Electronic Theses, Projects, and Dissertations

This thesis investigates the intertextuality of language policy, K-12 TESL pedagogies, and EL identity construction in the perpetuation of unjust TESL practices in these contexts. By examining the power structures of English language ideology through critical discourse analysis of recent California language policy, this thesis demonstrates English language teaching’s intrinsically political nature in K-12 education through negotiations and exchanges of power. Currently, sociolinguistic approaches to TESL and second language acquisition acknowledge the value of language socialization teaching methods. This requires the acceptance of cognition, not as an individual pursuit of knowledge containment and memorization, but cognition as a collaborative and …

Karmel Oration: Leading Schools And School Systems In Times Of Change: A Paradox And A Quest, Toby Greany

2009 - 2019 ACER Research Conferences

The ‘paradox’ in this title refers to a set of contradictions that sit at the heart of education policy in many school systems. Policymakers in these systems want things that, if not inherently at odds, are nevertheless in tension— such as a tightly defined set of national standards and a broad and balanced curriculum; academic stretch for the most able and a closing of the gap between high and low performers; choice and diversity and equity; and so on. The ‘quest’ is for leaders and leadership to resolve these tensions in practice. School autonomy policies have placed huge power in …

2017 Diversity Climate Survey, Illinois Mathematics And Science Academy

Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion: Resources

In February 2017, a survey regarding diversity and school climate was administered by the Diversity Committee based off of the National Climate Survey developed by the Gay, Lesbian and Straight Education Network (GLSEN). There were a total of 577 students that took the survey. Those students who had incomplete surveys (n = 20) or who marked all possible choices for sexual orientation (n = 3) were excluded from the data analysis, and the remaining 554 respondents were considered “authentic.”Of the 554 authentic respondents, 203 were sophomores, 169 were juniors, 176 were seniors, and six did not indicate their grade level. …