Digital Commons Network^™

Increasing Collaboration To Improve Student Outcomes: Improvement Science, Cassandra Diane Thonstad

Dissertations and Theses

The aspiration of achieving equitable outcomes for all students is a focus of schools, districts, and communities but has largely remained unattainable with the top-down implementation of change ideas and directives that come and go as quickly as they are implemented. Too often the direct users, students and classroom staff, are left out of the conversations around what works best to improve student success, contributing to the achievement gaps experienced by our students of color, students receiving special education or English language services, or in the case of a hook discipline, young men. By utilizing Improvement Science through collaboration across …

Analyzing Classroom Discourse To Investigate Structuring Equitable Mathematical Talk In Small Groups And Whole-Class Discussions, Brittney Marie Ellis

Dissertations and Theses

Shifting classroom discourse to be more student-centered has become an integral part of reform-oriented instructional practices. At the same time, shifting discourse can open up opportunities for inequity to occur in the immediate learning environment as both the quantity and quality of mathematical talk changes. In this project, I examined complexities involved in such settings by using discourse analysis methods to explore the positioning of students relative to mathematics content and each other's mathematical ideas. First, I analyzed the ways teachers' discourse during group work enactments related to established equitable teaching practices. Findings from this study suggest communicating group tasks …

Improvement Science: Improving Employee Engagement, Ryan S. Carpenter

Dissertations and Theses

Improving employee engagement has proven elusive in too many schools and districts in our nation, persistently contributing to high staff turnover in buildings and limited employee ownership in the mission, vision, and values of a school's strategic plan. The most common approach to the improvement of educational systems has been the adoption of top-down reforms and short-lived improvement programs. In recent years, an Improvement Science approach, which originated in the medical and business worlds, has made its way onto the education scene. The impact of Improvement Science in education is a developing area in educational research. This dissertation includes four …

The Elementary And Secondary Education Act (Esea) And Its Reauthorization As The Improving America's Schools Act (Iasa) With Its Impact On Funding, Education Policy, And Supporting The Change For Improvement Of Student Achievement, Kaylee Latocha

University Honors Theses

A comparison of the Elementary and Secondary Education Act (ESEA) of 1965 and the Improving America’s Schools Act (IASA) of 1994 within the time period they were written in, and contextualizing them historically to discuss their failures and successes. This thesis will examine how they were shaped on a national level by politicians and political activists to create a more equitable system so that funding was beneficial to all students. Education policy formed itself to funding and student achievement as achievement was what determined funding.

Socio-Emotional Learning As A Core Standard In Early Education: Producing Competent Adults, Talia Maras

University Honors Theses

A child’s foundational emotional proficiency is highly predictive of their academic success. It is therefore imperative that center-based, federally funded, public childhood education systems provide their students with a curriculum that facilitates the development of a strong socio-emotional baseline on which to build their cognitive, academic abilities. Drawing on government reports by the US Department of Education and empirical publications from an academic perspective, this paper reviews the nature of current efforts to reform the childhood education system, as seen through the implementation of the common core standards of learning. I review the quality of education that is provided by …

Medical Faculty Engagement In Curricular Revisions: An Inquiry Into Individual And Organizational Factors That Support Participation, Tomoko Tanikawa

Dissertations and Theses

In efforts to facilitate the education of highly qualified and best-prepared medical professionals, many medical schools are either planning for or engaging in curriculum revisions including a complete overhaul of the curricular structure, academic and medical content, and pedagogical delivery modalities. To be effective, such changes require faculty buy-in, participation, engagement, and innovation. Unfortunately, despite medical schools' efforts to support faculty involvement in curricular revision, a range of reactions exist, including resistance. Thus, understanding the interactions between individual faculty attitudes and behaviors toward organizational initiatives and structural support is critical in advancing the educational mission of medical schools. Based on …

Paradigm Shifts In Large-Scale Educational Change: Uncovering The Oregon Education Investment Board's Theory Of Change-In-Action, Johanna Kathryn Blackford

Dissertations and Theses

Education system leaders and policymakers around the globe expend vast amounts of resources on educational reform efforts and despite positive intentions, most attempts to affect educational change fail to realize large-scale, sustainable, positive outcomes--yet some have. While it is widely acknowledged that no two systems' educational change journeys are the same, what is becoming clear is that there is significant similarity among the thinking or paradigms underpinning theories of change-in-action guiding positive large-scale system-wide reform. This research highlights four change paradigms and suggests that a collective learning paradigm guided by systems thinking represents the paradigm shift associated with successful large-scale …

Architectural And Philosophical 'Makerspace' Redesign Impact On Teacher Beliefs And Practices: A Case Study, Rurik-Rory James Nackerud

Dissertations and Theses

Current jobs in a global economy require more complex cognitive skills, such as critical thinking, cooperation, creativity, and collaboration, in addition to content knowledge. To address these areas, researchers have suggested the use of a 'makerspace' in schools. As with many other establishments, my school remodeled the primary school to create a makerspace for developing these skills. What impact might a makerspace -- a physical as well as a curricular change -- have on teachers' individual and collaborative learning? The purpose of this case study was to describe how the makerspace concept and changes to classroom or instructional space influence …

Development Of Physics Curriculum For Pre-Health Students, Elliot Eckman Mylott

Dissertations and Theses

Many pre-health students are required to take introductory physics as undergraduates, though they often struggle to see the relationship between medicine and what they learn in these courses. In order to help students make that connection, reformed curriculum was adopted that teaches physics through the context of biomedicine. This dissertation will discuss the development, implementation, and assessment of the reformed curriculum for the introductory and intermediate level physics courses that targets the needs of pre-health students.

The curriculum created during this project include laboratory activities, multimedia content, and other instructional materials all of which present physics in biomedical contexts. The …

The Effects Of An Overnight Environmental Science Education Program On Students' Attendance Rate Change For Middle School Years, Jennifer Elizabeth Basham

Dissertations and Theses

Programs that engage middle students in participatory, real-world, and hands-on field based instruction can be a powerful asset to the educational experiences for students; motivating and inspiring some to appreciate and value school in a different way. Overnight environmental science programs have a unique opportunity to support students by creating experiences where students can participate in learning in vastly different ways from what they may engage with in the traditional 4-walled classroom, while concurrently developing a relationship with the natural world. Decreasing educational budgets and increased need to substantiate educational programs in terms of their impact on students has added …

Guiding The Work Of Professional Learning Communities: Perspectives For School Leaders, Daniel Paul Draper

Dissertations and Theses

Professional Learning Communities (PLCs) are groups of educators committed to working collaboratively in ongoing processes of collective inquiry and action research to achieve better results for the students they serve. PLCs operate under the assumption that the key to improved learning for students is continuous job-embedded learning for educators (DuFour, DuFour, Eaker, & Many, 2006). Researchers and practitioners agree that PLCs are critical to the overall success of schools. The problem is that implementing PLCs with fidelity to an inquiry process is a real challenge. Most school districts do not have a systematic or comprehensive approach to guide their PLC …

Smart Change, Linda L. Baer, Anne Hill Duin, Judith A. Ramaley

Public Administration Faculty Publications and Presentations

This article explains how "smart change" (contrasted with routine, strategic, and transformative change) is about using learning as a core asset and a guidance system for institutional change, and provides three institutional vignettes.

Characteristics Of Marginally Achieving Secondary Students And The Nature Of Their School Experience, Aeylin Summers

Dissertations and Theses

In American high schools, students are sorted into three "tracks" to cluster resources for students of similar abilities and interests. Much is known about the high track student, and especially in the past decade, the low track or "at-risk" student. However, the middle track--or marginally achieving student--has been largely overlooked in the literature. Acknowledged as "lost in the middle" (Judson, 1992), as well as deserving of higher quality of service in their school systems (Powell, Farrar, & Cohen, 1985), marginal achievers-defined here as having a GPA of 1.5-2.5, still maintain a profile of invisibility. Current reform efforts to increase student …