Education Commons^™

Middle School Student Records As Dropout Indicators, William Sherman Gregg

Electronic Theses and Dissertations

Dropping out of school is associated with a wide array of negative outcomes and the extraordinarily high United States dropout rate has brought the issue to the forefront of American education.

This study investigated normally collected middle school data from a suburban Colorado school district to determine the predictive value toward students dropping out or graduating from high school. Accessed was a longitudinal data set of first year in middle school records, 7^th grade, from 1999-2003 for students that graduated or dropped out from a Colorado suburban high school from 2003-2007. Discriminate function analysis was utilized on 2,195 student …

Non Traditional Superintendent: A Case Study Of The Transition From Military To Public School Superintendent, Luiza Miera Hernandez

Electronic Theses and Dissertations

In June of 2006, Urban School District appointed the individual who is the focus of this study, a retired Air Force Two Star Major General, as its new superintendent. Although the appointment represents the first nontraditional superintendent to lead Urban School District, it was one of several such appointments to large, urban school districts throughout the nation. This study investigates his transition from military leader to urban school superintendent, using a case study approach.

The study presents findings in response to the research question: How did the Participant transition from military leadership to urban school superintendent? The findings of the …

Teachers' Perspectives About Implementing A Content-Specific Technology Innovation, Thomas Stovall Hibbs

Electronic Theses and Dissertations

This research was designed to examine the implementation of a technology innovation in a content area from teachers’ point of view. Three classroom teachers who were involved in organized implementations of a technology innovation at the school level were asked to describe their implementations. They then were asked to review those implementations through four specific lenses that research indicates are important: school change, factors affecting implementation of technology innovations, technology in their content area, and examining their use of developers’ innovative improvements. Finally the classroom teachers were asked, as a summary technique, to talk about factors important to include in …

Mario Math With Millennials: The Impact Of Playing The Nintendo Ds On Student Achievement, Adam Gelman

Electronic Theses and Dissertations

One of the biggest innovations of the last century has been the invention of the video game. Video games are an extremely popular form of entertainment today. While some question the use of video games in education, others argue that video games are one innovation that if introduced into the classroom, might change how teachers effectively engage learners. This quantitative study examined the impact of Brain Age 2 for the Nintendo DS on seventh grade achievement in math and on student attitude towards school. A sample of eighty seventh graders from the same school played the Nintendo DS daily for …

Process For Selecting An Outside Provider For The Closing The Achievement Gap Project, Dianna Rae Hulbert

Electronic Theses and Dissertations

In the spring of 2008, Dwight Jones, Commissioner of the Colorado Department of Education, invited six Colorado school districts to partner with the department and an outside provider to close their achievement gaps in reading and math between minority and poverty students and White students and non-poverty students. Districts were invited to partner based on an achievement gap that exceeded the state‟s average gap in reading and math, and its perceived leadership capacity to initiate change.

This study examined the process the six districts used to select a provider to assist in closing its achievement gap. The multi-case study analyzed …

A Phenomenological Study Of How Anti-Racist Leadership Training Principles Impact The Actions Of Middle School Principals, John Gregory Kennedy

Electronic Theses and Dissertations

The national crisis of the academic achievement gap is one of the most impactful phenomena for the nations' public schools. This study used a phenomenological qualitative research design to capture the essence and perceptions of building principals' experiences related to principles of anti-racist leadership training. The researcher interviewed ten principals who had provided numerous questions in an interview format, to gain insight into the attitudes, beliefs, and leadership practices as they relate to the eradication of the achievement gap at their respective sites. The researcher conducted ten, in-depth, interviews with specific questions related to the achievement gap. All of the …

Narrowing Of Curriculum: Teaching In An Age Of Accountability, Donna Kay Newberg-Long

Electronic Theses and Dissertations

Since No Child Left Behind (NCLB) legislation made clear the need for increased accountability of U.S. public schools in 2002, there has been a trend toward narrowing curriculum in social studies and other core subjects to focus predominantly on what is tested through state exams. Concerns exist regarding the unintended consequences of curriculum narrowing on low, middle and high socioeconomic status (SES) students in public schools.

The Center on Education Policy (CEP) and National Center for Education Statistics (NCES) have been tracking the effects of NCLB since it took effect in 2002 and found that 71 percent of districts nationwide …

Women Leaders Resolving Conflict In Higher Education: A Feminist Epistemological Perspective, Maureen C. Silva

Electronic Theses and Dissertations

In an American postsecondary context, conflict is inherent (Gianneschi & Yanagiura, 2006; Valian, 1999). Successful navigation of conflict in the academy is vital for those who aspire to leadership positions (Nadler & Nadler, 1987; Walters, Stuhlmacher, & Meyer, 1998). Presently, however, women face significant barriers to achieving success in higher education administration, including gender expectations for conflict resolution behavior (Bartunek, 1992; Bowles, Babcock, & McGinn, 2005; Gayle, Preiss, & Allen, 2002).

While a considerable body of literature exists for understanding gender negotiation, it remains rooted in a masculine paradigm (Kolb & Putnam, 2006; Shuter & Turner, 1997), and, as such, …

What Matters Most? Measuring Service Quality To Improve Schools, Shannon L. Hagerman

Electronic Theses and Dissertations

Over the recent years an observable trend has emerged in the field of education. Parents are empowered and encouraged to make school choice decisions for their children and have become consumers of the educational delivery system. They are inundated information regarding the “product” of the school - student achievement scores and overall performance rankings. Do parents value other things beyond academic performance rankings and student achievement ratings? How do parents perceive the importance of the quality of the delivery of educational services? In a competitive educational marketplace, attracting and retaining families is essential to a school’s ability to survive and …

A Phenomenological Study Of Balanced Leadership, Ann K. Christy

Electronic Theses and Dissertations

The purpose of this study was to describe, interpret and analyze the experiences of six elementary principals in the Stewart district who have effectively balanced the instructional and managerial roles of the principalship. The research question for this study is: How do effective principals balance managerial tasks and instructional leadership responsibilities?

By analyzing these experiences, principals would be able to provide valuable insights into principal's needs and feelings about instructional leadership. This study centers around six elementary principals that provided information regarding the skills needed to become an instructional leader and their interpretation of experiences that contributed to their development …

Examination Of Universal Screening In Response To Intervention At The Secondary Level, Debra Allison Layland

Electronic Theses and Dissertations

The purpose of this study was to examine three means of universal screening to identify students in need of reading interventions at the secondary school level. Specifically the results of the Colorado State Assessment Program (CSAP), the Test of Silent Contextual Reading Fluency (TOSCRF) (Hammill, Wiederholt, & Allen, 2006) and the Test of Silent Word Reading Fluency (TOSWRF) (Mather, Hammill, Allen, & Roberts, 2004) were used to group students in a Response to Intervention Framework of Tier 1 (needing no intervention), Tier 2 (needing intervention) and Tier 3 (needing intensive intervention). Categorization results were compared to determine the accuracy of …

English Teachers And English Language Learners In Middle School Classrooms: Perspectives And Practices, Elmer Celso Manzanares

Electronic Theses and Dissertations

Public school classrooms in the United States are composed of an increasingly diverse population of learners. The number of students with limited proficiency in English has grown exponentially across the United States, yet their level of academic achievement lags significantly behind that of their language-majority peers.

The purpose of this study was to examine the attitudes, opinions and practices of middle school language arts/reading teachers regarding the inclusion of ELL students and the support they receive in their classrooms. The researcher administered a survey to 171 language arts/reading middle school teachers and interviewed six teachers from fourteen schools in a …