Educational Assessment, Evaluation, and Research Commons^™

Teacher Effectiveness Among Female Teachers In Primary And Secondary Schools In Southwestern Nigeria, Ireti Folasade Alao

Journal of Educational Leadership in Action

This study determined the level of female teachers’ effectiveness in primary and secondary schools and specific factors related to the effectiveness of female teachers in southwestern Nigeria. The teacher effectiveness rating scale was used in gathering data on a sample of 2,400 female teachers in selected Nigerian primary and secondary schools. The analysis of data shows that a high percentage (78.3%) of the teachers were effective. More specifically, 81.4% of the primary school female teachers were effective, while 75.1% of the secondary school female teachers were effective. The difference in effectiveness was found to be statistically significant (t =4.93, p …

An Exploratory Analysis Of Principals' Self Perceptions Of Curricular And Instructional Leadership: Evidence From Ohio, Jeffrey Bucher, W. Kyle Ingle

Journal of Educational Leadership in Action

In this study, the researchers sought to determine the relationship between principals’ characteristics, their schools’ characteristics, and the dependent variable—principals’ perceptions of their own curricular and instructional leadership (CIL). The researchers found significant and positive relationships between principal characteristics and CIL, including gender (female) and years of principal experience (p<.01). Principals with prior teaching experience in suburban schools were significantly related to increases in CIL compared to their counterparts with prior teaching experience in charter schools (p<.05). With regard to school-level characteristics, a unit increase in the percentage of African-American students was significantly and positively related to an increase in CIL. However, a unit increase in the percentage of Hispanic students was significantly related to a decrease in CIL.

Closing The Gap? Persistent Underperformance Of Black Minorities In Former Whites-Only Sa Schools, L. M. Dreyer, Sam Singh

Journal of Educational Leadership in Action

This paper is based on a study that explored the life experiences of Xhosa-speaking learners as a minority in a former whites-only school in the Western Cape province of South Africa. The focus was specifically on the factors that contribute to the continued poor academic performance of this minority group within the school. Identifying and understanding these factors as challenges to academic success can help teachers and schools provide appropriate support structures to maximize the potential of these learners. Research has shown that programs of support will only be effective if they appreciate and cater to the needs of the …

An Exploration Of Educational Leadership In Part C Of Idea: Voices From The Field, Diana J. Larocco

Journal of Educational Leadership in Action

Given the complexities of providing intervention services and supports to families of infants and toddlers with disabilities birth through 2 years of age, building educational leadership capacity from within the Early Intervention Program for Infants and Toddlers with Disabilities of the Individuals with Disabilities Education Act Part C is important. Nevertheless, this area of educational leadership is woefully understudied. This article provides a summary of key themes that emerged from a qualitative survey of 44 identified educational leaders from seven states and various levels of the Part C program. Participants’ understanding of effective leadership clustered into three areas: technical-functional knowledge …

Support For School Leadership: Who Is Feeding The Principal?, Barbara Stacy Rieckhoff

Journal of Educational Leadership in Action

Neila Connors’ well-known book, If You Don’t Feed the Teachers, They Eat The Students (2000), serves as a favorite read for new and aspiring principals. It contains much sage advice for mentoring teachers and supporting their transition in the profession while offering wisdom to protect them from the ills and evils of the outside world. While the entertaining style gets the point across, the message underscores the fact that supporting teachers is a key role of a school administrator. Since the book was published, tremendous strides have been made to provide teachers, both new and veteran, resources to mentor and …

Modification And Adaptation Of The Program Evaluation Standards In Saudi Arabia, Mohammed Alyami

Dissertations

The Joint Committee on Standards for Educational Evaluation’s Program Evaluation Standards is probably the most recognized and applied set of evaluation standards globally. The most recent edition of The Program Evaluation Standards includes five categories and 30 standards. The five categories are Utility, Feasibility, Propriety, Accuracy, and Evaluation Accountability. In recent years, evaluation has grown into a global practice with more than sixty national evaluation associations around the world. Examples include Japan, Malaysia, Sri Lanka, Mongolia, Russia, Brazil, Colombia, Peru, South Africa, Zimbabwe, Niger, and New Zealand. Because countries differ from one another in context and culture, they may need …

Has Time Expired For Zero Tolerance Policies?, Charles J. Russo

Educational Leadership Faculty Publications

Zero-tolerance policies call for the consistent application of consequences for student offenses involving violence, bullying, tobacco, alcohol, drugs, and weapons in school or at school-sponsored events. As educators struggled to eliminate student violence during the last 25 years, states adopted zero-tolerance statutes to address the rise of juvenile delinquency and the possession of weapons and drugs in schools.

Insofar as debates over zero-tolerance policies rage as violence, bullying, drugs, tobacco, and weapons in schools continue to be a major concern for educators, the remainder of this column is divided into three substantive sections. The first section briefly reviews arguments in …

I See, I Think I Wonder: An Evaluation Of Journaling As A Critical Reflective Practice Tool For Aiding Teachers In Challenging Or Confronting Contexts, Geoffrey M. Lowe, Peter Prout, Karen Murcia

Australian Journal of Teacher Education

In October 2011, five selected Western Australian teachers took part in a teacher mentoring project in Tanzania. The teachers spent a month embedded in local primary and secondary schools, working collaboratively with their Tanzanian counterparts. As a strategy for making sense of their experiences, each teacher was asked to maintain a reflective journal, using the Harvard Visible Thinking Routine of ‘see, think, wonder’ as a critical structure for guiding their journal writing. The purpose of this article is to discuss the effectiveness of journaling for teachers in challenging teaching situations, and the usefulness of the Harvard approach in structuring the …

Former Students' Perceptions Of How Theatre Impacted Life Skills And Psychological Needs, Tia Cowart

Doctoral Dissertations and Projects

The purpose of this qualitative case study was to investigate former high school theatre students' perceptions of how theatre education addressed their psychological needs and impacted life skills. Participants were graduates of a large metropolitan high school, located near Atlanta, GA. A focus group, individual semi-structured interviews and collection of artifacts were the data collection procedures utilized to discover students' perceptions. Pseudonyms were used to protect the identities of the participants. The data analysis process included initial coding, axial coding and memo writing. Based on the information from the interviews, this case study showed the benefits of offering youth opportunities …

A Second Look At Enrollment Changes After The Kalamazoo Promise, Brad J. Hershbein

Upjohn Institute Working Papers

While previous research has documented how the Kalamazoo Promise, the most prominent and generous place-based college scholarship program, increased enrollment in Kalamazoo Public Schools, this paper qualifies and quantifies the characteristics of students who were induced to enter—or stay—in the district. In particular, it analyzes the origins and destinations, socioeconomic composition, and school-level sorting behavior associated with student flows around the time of the Promise announcement. These dimensions are more subtle than changes in the volume of students or measures of their individual success, but they are equally important to understand for communities exploring the feasibility of place-based scholarships as …

Social And Emotional Learning Competencies And Cross-Thematic Curriculum Related Skills Of Greek Students: A Multifactorial And Triangulation Analysis., Olympia Tsolou, Vasileios Margaritis

Journal of Educational Research and Practice

The cross-thematic curriculum (CTC) for school education has recently been implemented so that the quality of the Greek educational system is improved. This study aimed at assessing social and emotional learning competencies and CTC-related skills of 541 Greek students aged 11–13. Data triangulation was also used for validating these findings, having 145 school teachers reporting their perceptions on students' skills. Both students and teachers reported moderate scores of all students' skills. Multivariate analysis revealed that gender remained a significant predictor for high scores of all students' skills, and that the higher the grade level of the students, the lower the …

Using An Information Literacy Rubric To Evaluate Student Annotated Bibliographies, Erin E. Rinto

Scholarship Colloquium

Results of a study of student annotated bibliographies from English 102 students.

Has Higher Education Lost Control Over Quality?, Ellen Hazelkorn

Other resources

No abstract provided.

Georgia Council Of Graduate Schools - Articles Of Incorporation, Charles Patterson

Armstrong Office of the Registrar: Georgia Council of Graduate Schools Publications (Archived)

No abstract provided.

Literacy And The Most Marginalised Children, Megan Robinson

International Developments

Researchers, practitioners and policy makers interested in the field of inclusive education gathered at a roundtable meeting to discuss synergies across the Australian and international development education policy arenas regarding literacy interventions for the most marginalised children.

Regional Focus : Africa, Rachel Outhred

International Developments

Significant work on evaluation and assessment aimed at addressing equity and educational quality in Africa is being undertaken by researchers at ACER.

Unicef And Unesco, Richa Jain

International Developments

ACER has been working with the United Nations through UNICEF and UNESCO to support high-quality education across the world.

Making A Difference In Developing Countries

International Developments

The work of ACER in education is making the difference in educational outcomes for students across the world, particularly in developing countries, explains the author.

International Developments (No.3) 2013

International Developments

Table of contents for this issue: (a) Making a difference in developing countries; (b) UNICEF and UNESCO; (c) Regional focus : Africa; (d) Literacy and the most marginalised children.

Bringing Online Peer Review Into Blended Teaching, Susan White

Blended Learning in the Liberal Arts Conference

Motivated by my experience as a student in a MOOC, I have incorporated online peer review of writing assignments into my advanced undergraduate biochemistry courses. Each student submits her review of a course reading or report online, then evaluates work submitted by two or three of her classmates based on a rubric I provide. As peer reviewers, students anonymously assign low-stakes grades and receive credit for their reviews, but they also get an opportunity to write for each other and read their classmate's responses to course topics. Moodle’s Workshop activity was used to manage the submission and review process. I …

Using Blended Learning To Take Advantage Of Learning Science Research, Jennifer Spohrer

Blended Learning in the Liberal Arts Conference

Why does blended learning work? Some observers have suggested that students simply spend more time with the material in a blended course, but evidence from studies of blended courses is mixed. Learning science research suggests that how learners study also matters, and a blended learning approaches incorporate many tactics shown to be effective, such as formative assessment, repetition at intervals, and metacognitive prompting.

Fostering Student Engagement In An Upper-Level, Online Seminar On The History Of Sexuality: Lessons Learned About Pedagogy And Course Design To Deepen Students’ Learning, Kristine Rabberman

Blended Learning in the Liberal Arts Conference

GSWS 422 “History of Sexuality” has been offered for four years in the online summer program at the University of Pennsylvania. The instructor leads advanced undergraduate and graduate students through a highly interactive seminar class in which they learn how to analyze critically works in the history of sexuality, exploring sexual identities, roles and norms from Ancient Greece and Rome, to the United States in the 21^st century. Students are required to demonstrate their critical engagement and understanding of central debates and themes, methodological challenges, and issues of change versus continuity. One of the instructor’s goals in teaching the …

Keynote: Nglc Blended Learning Study Report And Where Do We Go From Here?, Kimberly Cassidy, Jennifer Spohrer

Blended Learning in the Liberal Arts Conference

Drs. Cassidy and Spohrer will give an update on the Next Generation Learning Challenges Wave I grant-funded study of blended learning, including an overview of preliminary findings from courses taught at our partner colleges over the 2012-2013 academic year. We will also present and discuss possible next steps for 2013-2014.

Curriculum Design In The Urban Arts Classroom; Can The Common Core Standards Be The Great Equalizer For Arts Education? : A Research Paper And Studio Art Unit Study, Kathleen Kennedy

Graduate Student Independent Studies

The purpose of this research is to present a case for developing Common Core Standards for the arts as an avenue to increase universal access to quality arts education regardless of a student's geographic or socioeconomic background.

Chartered Sites Of Exception : Problematizing The Construction Of Bare Life For Exceptional Populations In The United States Educational System, Jonathan Michael Mcintosh

Graduate Student Independent Studies

The purpose of this paper is to analyze the influence of deregulation policies in charter schools through a site of exception analysis and the resulting effect on exceptional populations in these schools.

2013 Legislative Review, Reed Greenwood, Gary W. Ritter

Policy Briefs

The 89th General Assembly in Arkansas convened on Monday January 14th and would file 2,640 pieces of legislation over the next 100 days. Of this legislation, there were 145 House Bills, 4 House Resolutions, and 97 Senate Bills referred to either the House or Senate Education Committees. That is a grand total of 246 pieces of “education” legislation representing roughly 9 percent of legislation filed in the session. The purpose of this policy brief is to review some of the “high -profile” education bills during the session. The highlighted bills here are split into three categories: 1) school choice, 2) …

Disaster From Above: New York City Teachers' Perceptions Of School Reform, Elizabeth Baker

African & African American Studies Senior Theses

No abstract provided.

The Next Information Literacy Challenge: Partnering To Promote Deeper Engagement With Information And Better Writing, Wendy Holliday, Kacy Lundstrom, Anne R. Diekama, Sheri Haderlie

Instructional Technology and Learning Sciences Faculty Publications

No abstract provided.

Agricultural Communication Lesson Plans For The Agricultural Leadership Class At Elk Grove High School, Chelsea Molina

Agricultural Education and Communication

The purpose of this project was to develop agricultural communication lesson plans for Elk Grove High School’s Agricultural Leadership class. The lesson plans were created after the research of the existing California Agricultural Education and Agricultural Leadership Curriculum standards. The lesson plans were then based off of the FFA Agricultural Communications Career Development Event (CDE) guidelines in order to grasp many of the important details of the CDE. The CDE is offered at the national level but not yet at the state level in California. Providing lesson plans that coincide with the requirements of the CDE will help California FFA …

Community Partners’ Assessment Of Service Learning In An Interpersonal And Small Group Communication Course, Sarah Steimel

Department of Communication Studies: Faculty Publications

This assessment explored community partners’ perceptions of service learning in a required communication course. Semi-structured interviews revealed that community partners believed that students were providing needed and valuable service, students were learning about the community and students were learning through their application of course skills in an applied context. However, community partners also felt that students were unaware of or did not care what they should be learning, that faculty contact was rare or nonexistent and that community feedback opportunities were rare and undervalued by faculty. Results suggest specific improvements necessary in service learning assignment design.