Social and Behavioral Sciences Commons^™

No Excuses Yet No Solutions: The Inherent Anti-Blackness Of The No-Excuses Charter School Model, Tshala A. Pajibo

Dissertations, Theses, and Capstone Projects

The No Excuses model of education has routinely been labeled abusive and harmful to students. The No Excuses model has garnered significant pushback from students, families, and stakeholders because of procedures and policies that have caused physical, mental, and bodily harm to young students. While many education stakeholders have examined how No Excuses charters and their policies have harmed Black children, not many have examined why. This paper argues that the No Excuses charter model is completely at odds with Black cultural and educational values. This paper suggests deeper studies of the educational mindsets and opinions of No Excuses …

Embracing Conflict And Contradiction As A Path To Awareness, Joann Rintel Abreu

Dissertations, Theses, and Capstone Projects

The focus of this autoethnographic dissertation is the exploration of habitus and how it consciously and unconsciously influences our perceptions, emotions, values, and actions. I describe this dissertation as an autoethnography to highlight my subjective approach to research and to dispel any claims of objectivity. Through my experiences as a daughter, mother, administrator, and teacher-educator, I explore three internal conflicts, highlighted by intense emotional reactions, and deconstruct how my past and present contexts inform my values, beliefs, and actions. In each chapter, I describe several events that led to a greater understanding of my emotional responses and how I adapted …

Agentive Personhood: Finding Yourself Through Serving Others, Sasha M. Miller

Dissertations, Theses, and Capstone Projects

At the core of this study, at the core the transformative experiences that will be described, is agency and what can occur when it is at the forefront of development and learning. I discuss educational spaces that give young learners the opportunity to recognize their ability to shift their perception of themselves and the world and lead to social change. I address this topic through the lens of my own experiences and the experiences of my peers. This study is a reflection on my experiences of participating in a social justice program. I hold a mirror to myself and contemplate …

Towards A Pedagogy Of Life Purposes, Manny Lopez

Dissertations, Theses, and Capstone Projects

College students who understand how the courses that they are enrolled in connect with their broader life goals are more likely to apply an approach of task perseverance with academic endeavors. Yet, nearly three million adolescent community college students in the United States may not have developed clear purposes in life. Relatedly, overtime the lack of lucid life purposes contributes to maladaptive behavior.

This dissertation is a compilation of three interrelated studies that took place in two public community colleges in the City University of New York. Guided by authentic inquiry and framed by sociocultural theory, central to each study …

“Dropouts” Drop In: Re-Visualizing The “Dropout” Stereotype, Rondi Silva

Dissertations, Theses, and Capstone Projects

“Dropouts” Drop In aims to challenge conventional views of both “dropping out” and “dropouts.” When young people “drop out” of high school, they open themselves up to a world of negative assumptions and blame, which are directed at them from the outside and are also deeply internalized. Young people are constantly messaged that “dropping out,” or being a “dropout” is at best a bad choice and at worst something akin to being a criminal. Lost in this messaging is that in reality “dropping out” of high school is often a positive move out of untenable social and educational situations and …