Education Commons^™

Adaptive Leadership: A Phenomenological Study On The Strategies Used By Special Education Directors To Build Adaptive Capacity, Amber Gallagher

Dissertations

Purpose: The purpose of this exploratory phenomenological study was to identify and describe the strategies used by special education directors to build an adaptive capacity based on the five key characteristics of adaptive leadership identified by Heifetz et al. (2009).

Methodology: This phenomenological study explored the lived experiences of special education directors serving in unified public school districts in Los Angeles, Orange, and San Bernardino counties in California. Purposeful, convenience sampling was used to identify the 10 participants who met the study’s criteria. The semistructured, open-ended interview protocol was developed by a thematic research team of nine peer researchers and …

A Phenomenological Study Of Successful Superintendent Retention In A North-Central New Mexico School District, Adán G. Delgado

Teacher Education, Educational Leadership & Policy ETDs

Superintendent of Schools is uniquely critical in a school district due to its tremendous effect on the operational and cultural bearing of the organization (Myers, 2011). Superintendent turnover can hinder district reform and improvement (Grissom & Andersen, 2012; Marzano, 2006). The United States and New Mexico struggle with superintendent retention and northern New Mexico is especially plagued with short superintendent tenure (Grissom & Andersen, 2012; NMPED Stat Books, 2021; Sawchuck, 2022). In this study, I investigated the initial selection and subsequent interactions and relationships between school board members and superintendents. Using a phenomenological approach, I interviewed two superintendents and four …

How Exemplary Female Executive Leaders In Higher Education Use Five Principles Of Grit—Courage, Conscientiousness, Long-Term Goals, Resilience, And Excellence Versus Perfection—To Accomplish Extraordinary Results In Their Organizations, Julie Pettitt

Dissertations

Purpose: The purpose of this phenomenological study was to identify and describe how exemplary female leaders who hold executive roles in higher education use five principles associated with grit (courage, conscientiousness, long-term goals, resilience, and excellence versus perfection) to accomplish extraordinary results in their organizations. It challenges the notion that academic credentials and intelligence alone drive leadership success, emphasizing the role of grit in extraordinary leadership. This study delves into the barriers women encounter in reaching executive roles, their strategies for overcoming challenges, and how they leverage gritty qualities to facilitate and sustain transformative change. Methodology: A phenomenological design was …

Equipped For Change: A Grounded Theory Study Of White Antiracist School Leaders’ Attitudes And Perceptions Of Racial Consciousness In Educational Leadership, Thomas Joseph Peterson

Education (PhD) Dissertations

There is substantial evidence that issues of race and racism and are common in U.S. public schools, especially those greatly impacted by poverty and racial segregation. Unfortunately, it is highly likely many of these occurrences either go unrecognized, unacknowledged, or are perpetrated unknowingly by White educators and administrators—many of whom are well-intentioned, but lack the critical lens necessary in challenging and dismantling them. For White people, the enculturating normativity of White racial dominance, maintained by the social conditioning of Whiteness, facilitates an environment of racial ignorance and insignificance, leaving most painfully oblivious to the damaging complexities of racism in contemporary …

A Delphi Study To Determine The Organizational Supports Necessary For Middle School Counselors To Be Successful And Positively Influence Student Outcomes, Debbie Monroe

Dissertations

Purpose: The purpose of this Delphi study is to identify, from the perspective of expert counselors, the roles that middle school counselors perform during their workday, to rate the importance of the roles identified, and to identify organizational supports necessary for middle school counselors to successfully perform each of the six most important roles identified. Additionally, this study seeks to gain feedback from expert middle school counselors on how to best align the necessary organizational supports with the identified most important roles.

Methodology: The Delphi method was utilized for this study through an electronic survey that asks participants a combination …

A Study Linking Title 1 Strategic Resource Allocation To Student Academic Success In South Carolina Public Schools, Brenton Jerrod Coe

Electronic Theses and Dissertations

Strategic instructional resourcing has become an important topic in public education, the most lucrative and expensive business in the United States. It is estimated which the United States spends about $612.7 billion annually on public education. This study will analyze and synthesize data from Title I schools in South Carolina, specifically in the area of resource allocation and its relationship to student academic success. Historically, public education has provided all citizens with an equal and equitable opportunity to receive an adequate education. Over time, access to strong public education can impact the lives of students with regard to social mobility. …

The Impact Of Embedded Coaching On Educational Leader Professional Practice, Heather J. Sanchez

Education Dissertations

School and district leadership is complex work. Educational leaders today are charged with a myriad of responsibilities, ranging from everyday operational duties to strategic development of school improvement plans. Leaders are expected to be experts at everything ranging from transportation to transforming teaching and learning. Gone are the days when a leader was expected to manage the school or district. Today leaders are expected to meet the robust needs of staff, students, and families inclusive of social-emotional needs, academic needs, and physical needs. Today’s leaders are expected to be transformative, to have skills sets that enable them to effectively partner …

Investigating The Relationship Between Empowerment And Secondary Science Teachers’ Technology Integration Knowledge, Jane Elizabeth Walsh

Theses and Dissertations--Educational Leadership Studies

Empowered teachers believe they can improve their work conditions and positively impact student outcomes. Likewise, teachers with technology integration knowledge can effectively use technology to enhance lessons and improve student learning. This quantitative correlational study investigated teachers’ empowerment, teachers’ technology integration knowledge, and associations between empowerment and technology integration knowledge. Two hundred fourteen randomly selected high school science teachers from across the United States responded to a survey intended to measure empowerment and technology integration knowledge. The teachers' average responses indicate that teachers generally agree with statements surrounding empowerment (M = 3.93, SD = 0.54) and technology integration knowledge …

Herstory 101: Examining The Representation Gap Of Bipoc Women Educational Leaders, Kinasha Brown

Graduate Research Theses & Dissertations

Background/Purpose: The purpose of this study was to examine how lived experiences influenced perceptions of leadership self-efficacy amongst Black, Indigenous, or Person of Color (BIPOC) women educational leaders in order to minimize future representation gaps in educational leadership. Methods: Qualitative interviews were conducted with 14 BIPOC cis-gender female leaders who worked in a large school district in the southwestern region of the United States. Results: Examining the social constructs of race, gender, leadership makes clear how BIPOC women are socially constructed as inferior and how that played out in this educational leadership settings. The interconnectedness of both approaches contributes to …

The Relationships Among Organizational Support, Teacher Well-Being, And Teacher Resilience In Secondary School Teachers, Lisa Journell

Browse all Theses and Dissertations

This study examined the relationships among perceived organizational support, teacher well-being, and teacher resilience in secondary school teachers in Ohio public schools. An explanatory sequential mixed methods research design was employed. In phase one, survey data were collected from Ohio public school teachers (n = 254, grades 6-12), and structural equation modeling was used to analyze the structure of the relationships between the variables of interest. In phase two, using a phenomenological approach, follow-up interviews were conducted with a subset of participants (n = 10) to examine the lived experience of teachers with high and low levels of teacher resilience. …

Principal Leadership Practices At Kentucky High Schools Administering The Pisa For Schools: Leading For Global Competitiveness, Marjorie L. Johnson

Theses and Dissertations--Education Sciences

Since launching Sputnik in 1957, the United States education system has been trying to climb to the top of the international education rankings. The Organisation for Economic and Co-operative Development (OECD) began analyzing how well school systems prepared students to compete in the global economy in 2000. The OECD uses the Programme for International Student Assessment (PISA). U.S. students rank at or near the OECD averages in reading and science but consistently perform below the OECD average in mathematics. In addition to the PISA, the OECD released the PISA for Schools, which provides PISA data at the school level.

In …