Educational Leadership Commons^™

Addressing The School-To-Prison Pipeline Through Critical Self Reflection: A Self-Study Of Courageous And Transformative Leadership, Ernest D. Williams

Dissertations

Research reveals that zero-tolerance policies lead to school suspensions of a disproportionate number of African American students in urban areas (Center for Civil [CCRR], 2015). Suspensions increase student failure rates and dropout likelihood and reduce the ability to graduate on time (Skiba, Arrendondo, & Williams, 2014). Studies have also shown that African American students are suspended three times more than their White American peers and two times more than their Latino American peers (CCRR, 2015). This has impelled federal and local government agencies, community organizations, and educators to question the effectiveness of punitive discipline policies that have marginalized black and …

Critical Bicultural Masculinities: Reframing Community College Success Among Latino Immigrant Male Students, Rene Lozano Esquivel

LMU Theses and Dissertations

By employing critical narratives, this qualitative study examined the lives of Latino male immigrants and their educational experiences in the California community college system. Seven Latino male immigrants matriculated at a community college participated in the study. The study utilized Critical Bicultural Theory and Latino Masculinity Theory frameworks to analyze the male students’ narratives. Findings speak of their unique racialized and gendered experiences as they navigate their community college educational experiences. This study contributes to the field by identifying what Latino immigrants need to co-construct their own educational success in a way that employs their strong familial and cultural knowledge. …

We Wear The Mask: Stories Of The Black Girl Middle School Experience In Predominantly White, Elite, Independent Schools, Tina B. Evans

LMU Theses and Dissertations

This dissertation examined the experiences of Black middle school girls who attend predominantly white, elite, independent schools in the Greater Los Angeles area. Using Critical Race Theory, Black Identity Theory, and Black Feminism Theory as a conceptual framework, this qualitative research explored the role of race, class, gender, and parental support as contributing factors to the development of participants’ racial consciousness. Utilizing timeline interviews and critical narratives to explore the lived histories of each student and parent participant, data analysis included content coding based on themes that emerged throughout the narrative examination. An analysis of the narratives of student participants …

Beyond Colonizing Epistemicides: Toward A Decolonizing Framework For Indigenous Education, Samuel B. Torres

LMU Theses and Dissertations

American schooling and Indigenous peoples share a coarse relationship mired by devastating periods of forced removal, indoctrination, and brutal assimilation methods. Over the course of more than a century of failed education policy—though often veiled in good intentions—Indigenous peoples have yet to witness a comprehensive Indigenous education program that fundamentally honors the federal trust responsibility of the United States government. On the contrary, with a contemporary approach of apathy, invisibility, and institutionalization, it is not difficult to see the legacy of settler colonialism continuing to wield its oppressive influence on Indigenous communities. Wolfe’s (2006) claim that “invasion is a structure, …

Impact, Implementation, And Insights Of Peace Education: A Case Study Of The M.A. In Peace Studies And Conflict Transformation Program At The University Of Rwanda, Sarah M. Doerrer

LMU Theses and Dissertations

Higher education is arguably critical for healing and stabilization in postconflict contexts, by developing leaders who value peace and have the skill sets to achieve it in various sectors. A rapidly growing body of literature concludes that peace education in particular has great potential to transform postconflict communities, both in higher education and at other levels of schooling. Yet there exists little rigorous analysis of the decisions faced by educational leaders responsible for implementing such programs, particularly those in postconflict settings where the needs are uniquely challenging.

This qualitative investigation documented the M.A. in Peace Studies and Conflict Transformation program, …

Culturally Responsive School Leadership In Catholic Education: Practices To Improve Tuition Assistance And Community Outreach For Latino Families, Michel-Anthony Castillo

LMU Theses and Dissertations

Recent demographic trends indicate that the number of young Latino Catholics in the United States is increasing. In response, educators and researchers have examined the Catholic school experience of Latino families as a means to provide meaningful support for this growing constituency amid broader enrollment declines and related challenges of fiscal viability. Within this context, this study examined the leadership practices of Catholic secondary school leaders in relation to the development of tuition assistance policies and community outreach efforts intended to serve Latino families. Utilizing a theoretical frame consisting of Catholic Social Teaching (CST) and Culturally Responsive School Leadership (CRSL), …

Investigating Intercultural Communication Competence In Narrative Texts Of English Learners, Alexander Lee-Heng Tai

All Theses And Dissertations

The purpose of this research was to investigate the current levels of intercultural communication competence in fourth and fifth grade English Learners through narrative text composition within the researcher's English Learner classroom environment. This mixed-methods research was conducted as a response to the need for curriculum changes in preparing EL pre-service educators within the higher education system to become more proficient in the implementation of intercultural communication pedagogy. This action research was supported by a literature review including topics of intercultural communication pedagogy, linguistic relativity hypothesis, linguaculture, and English language development. The research questions that guided this study were: (1) …

Policies And Procedures Perceived By School Leaders To Reduce Truancy In A Public Charter School, Alix Desulme

All Theses And Dissertations

This qualitative study examined the causes of student truancy and the policies and procedures established by one public charter school to reduce truancy. Eight participants were asked to discuss the policies and procedures of their school, CSS, and how they as school leaders contributed to the success of the school regarding low truancy rates. Student truancy has become a major concern in the United States with some states and some counties experiencing higher truancy rates than others. This study aimed to understand leaders’ perceptions of the effectiveness of truancy policies at their school. To understand what factors affected truancy at …

Why Women Give To Women: A Portrait Of Gender-Based Philanthropy, Amy C. G. Beck

Theses and Dissertations

Abstract

WHY WOMEN GIVE TO WOMEN: A PORTRAIT OF GENDER-BASED PHILANTHROPY AT A PUBLIC COLLEGE IN VIRGINIA

By Amy Gray Beck, Ph.D.

A dissertation submitted in partial fulfillment of the requirements for the degree of Doctor of Philosophy at Virginia Commonwealth University.

Virginia Commonwealth University, 2019

Chair: Katherine Cumings Mansfield, Ph.D., Associate Professor, Educational Leadership and Cultural Foundations, School of Education, UNC Greensboro

The cost of public higher education is steadily increasing, with state and federal government cutting its support year after year. Students are having to pay more out of pocket for classes and tuition, and institutions rely on …

Elementary School Leaders' Practices To Provide Equitable Discipline: Disproportionality On The Rise, Beverly L. Ford

College of Graduate Studies: Theses & Dissertations

This mixed-methods study was conducted to explore practices Elementary School Leaders report using to address discipline. The study target population was school administrators in the Northeast Regional Educational Service Agency (RESA). The participants were principals and assistant principals located within 13 school districts and are comprised of 64 elementary schools. In order to gain a deeper understanding of practices reportedly used, the research asked the following questions:

1. What practices do Elementary School Leaders report are most effective in providing equitable application of discipline across the student population?
2. What practices do Elementary School Leaders report are used most frequently to provide …

Come Together: Inclusive Leadership And Public Relations Education, Heather Paige Preston

Antioch University Dissertations & Theses

Multiple voices from educational and professional arenas have called for change in the way in which public relations undergraduates are prepared to navigate complex communication challenges in the 21st century. Some scholars have advanced leadership as a way to address this change, identifying the undergraduate public relations curriculum as the ideal place to introduce future practitioners to leadership as a way to better prepare them to initiate and participate in positive social change in complex contexts. However, scholars have neither made in-depth connections with leadership theory and practice, nor provided a framework for designing a curriculum for incorporating leadership into …

Is It Who Am I Or Who Do You Think I Am? Identity Development Of Adolescents With Substance Use Disorders, Danielle N. Treiber

Antioch University Dissertations & Theses

The purpose of this study was to unearth how adolescents with substance use disorders achieve the task of identity formation and the construction of self-concept in the midst of the drug culture and society that exists. It sought to uncover the social constructs designed to ignore and/or remove human complexities and allow an intersectional approach to be brought to a study on this population. Historically, there has been a failure to investigate the underlying social attitudes and behaviors that impact the very delicate and vulnerable process of finding self. Psychosocial and relational adjustment are strongly influenced by the extent to …

When Bad Genes Ruin A Perfectly Good Outlook: Psychological Implications Of Hereditary Breast And Ovarian Cancer Via Narrative Inquiry Methodology, Cammi Clark

Antioch University Dissertations & Theses

Scientists debunked the belief that breast cancer is always viral with the mid-90s discovery of the first hereditary genetic mutation linked to a significantly higher-than average chance of breast and ovarian cancer. This genetic condition, called Hereditary Breast and Ovarian Cancer (HBOC), passes the mutation from generation to generation in a family. Thousands of variations of such mutations exist, and carriers account for 10 to 15% of all breast cancer, and up to 20% of ovarian (Childers et al., 2017). In addition, genetic testing uncovered a rapidly rising number of healthy people (never had breast/ovarian cancer) who are also carriers, …

The Next Ten Years: Looking Back, Looking Forward, Chris R. Glass, Krishna Bista

Educational Leadership & Workforce Development Faculty Publications

As we near our tenth year as a publication, the journal’s global community continues to grow in ways we could not have imagined when we first started. We now receive over 300 submissions per year. We are proud to be among the top-20 journals in higher education according to GoogleScholar with almost 10,000 active subscribers around the world. As we prepare for the next ten years, we want to share a few updates on where we have been and where we are going. We have five major focus areas as we move forward as a publication: expand our global network …

Our Separate Struggles Are Really One: Building Political Race Coalitions For Educational Justice, Phillip Smith, Sonya Douglass Horsford, Enrique A. Alemán Jr.

GSE Faculty Publications

In this article, we explore political race theory as a framework for building coalitions between Black and Brown communities as part of a shared struggle for educational justice and community power amid neoliberal reform. Inspired by the Black and Brown alliances for economic justice of the 1960s and 1970s and informed by previous scholarship on the conceptualization of political race and the lived experience of being raced in America and its relationship to power, we draw from the experiential knowledge of African American and Mexican American superintendents to better understand how they interpreted and navigated the politics of race as …

The Relationship Between Instructional Leadership Practices And Leadership Self-Efficacy Of School Leaders, Carter B. Akins

College of Graduate Studies: Theses & Dissertations

With educational reform focused on school accountability, principals must attend to tasks that lead to school improvement. Identifying such tasks as instructional leadership practices and gaining a more comprehensive understanding of instructional leadership practices through leadership self-efficacy may contribute to school improvement. Thus, the purpose of this quantitative study was to investigate instructional leadership practices and the degree to which these practices predict the leadership self-efficacy of school leaders. Participants in the survey were 100 principals and assistant principals of public schools in the southeastern United States, spanning 18 school districts, and 180 schools. Findings indicated instructional leadership practices of …

Emotional Intelligence Instruction For Millennials In Undergraduate Education, Jason M. Pollett

College of Graduate Studies: Theses & Dissertations

The purpose of this study was to examine the improvement, if any, of emotional intelligence scores of students who participated in and completed the specified professional development seminar. In addition, this study aimed to examine the relationship between emotional intelligence subscales of students enrolled in a professional development seminar that focuses on enhancing the emotional intelligence. The research design for this study was an ex post facto, quasi-experimental correlational quantitative research design. Data from the 371 students who enrolled in the Professional Development Seminar course during academic years 2015-2017 served as the sample for this study.

This study focused on …

Predictors Of Community College Students’ Academic Success In The Corequisite Model, Damon Andrews

College of Graduate Studies: Theses & Dissertations

The purpose of this quantitative study was to determine predictors of community college student academic success in the corequisite model. Academic success was defined dichotomously on a pass or fail basis. The population in this study included 1,933 students that enrolled in at least one corequisite English and/or mathematics course at the college between the fall semester of 2015 and summer semester of 2018. The predictors examined were a student’s sex, race, age at time of enrollment, Pell grant recipient status, first-generation college student status, high school GPA, placement test scores, academic major, time spent receiving academic tutoring in college’s …

The Multicultural Center's Role In Black Male Success At A Predominantly White Institution, Stephan Tramaine Moore

College of Graduate Studies: Theses & Dissertations

Many scholarly works have focused on the problems that Black males face in higher education at predominantly White institutions (PWI). However, few have explored specific factors that lead to the success of Black males. This study focuses on the Multicultural Center’s role in Black male success a PWI. There are a myriad of issues that Black men face when pursuing higher education ranging from a lack of financial resources to “invisibility” in the collegial environment. These challenges are further exacerbated for Black men who are enrolled at a PWI. The Multicultural Center (MC) is among the essential modalities that can …

Exploring Alumni Valuation Of An Undergraduate Leadership Program, John D. Egan

College of Graduate Studies: Theses & Dissertations

This study explored alumni’ valuation of an undergraduate leadership program by gaining an understanding of what leadership learning and leadership behaviors transferred into their work environments. The alumni graduated from the same university in the southeastern United States, and while enrolled completed a four-year, co-curricular leadership program. In this mixed methods study, eight participant alumni engaged in semi-structured interviews as well as completed the Leadership Practices Inventory. Alumni perceived that leadership experiences, learning community, classroom learning, peer coaching, and intentional reflection were the most valuable attributes of the program. The leadership learning that effectively transferred to work environments included collaboration, …