Educational Leadership Commons^™

Instructional Leadership Practices: Teachers Perceptions Of A Rural School Principal In Fiji, Govinda I. Lingam, Narsamma Lingam, Sunil K. Singh

Australian Journal of Teacher Education

The purpose of this study was to determine the extent to which teachers perceive their principal to be effectively exhibiting an instructional leadership role. Data for the study were collected from teachers (N=24) in a rural secondary school in Fiji using the Principal Instructional Management Rating Scale (PIMRS) developed and advocated by Hallinger (1990). In addition to Likert scale items, the questionnaire included open-ended questions to gain deeper insights into teachers’ ratings of each item. Analyses of the data revealed that ratings for the principal were the highest for communicating school goals to students and protecting instructional time while supervision …

Teachers’ Perceptions Of Their Work With Teacher Assistants: A Systematic Literature Review, Claire Jackson, Umesh Sharma, Delphine Odier-Guedj, Joanne Deppeler

Australian Journal of Teacher Education

With the number of teacher assistants (TAs) employed in schools steadily increasing, most teachers are likely to work with a TA at various times throughout their career. International research indicates there is scope for teachers to enhance their work with TAs. This systematic review examines teachers’ perceptions of their work with TAs. Twenty-six studies were reviewed to gain insight into teachers’ thoughts, beliefs and/or impressions of their work with TAs. Ten perceptions of teachers relating to the manner in which they work with TAs were identified and further categorised into four key themes of roles and responsibilities, planning and pedagogy, …

Training And Support Systems And Their Impact On First-Year Teachers In Kentucky, Ashley E. Dunn

Murray State Theses and Dissertations

This qualitative study surveyed elementary school teachers across the state of Kentucky in regards to these four main concepts: (a) identifying the challenges and needs of FYT, (b) identify and explore the trainings provided to FYT, (c) identify and explore the supports provided to FYT, and (d) identifying what is needed to effectively support FYT. The driving question of the study asked: what are the training and support experiences of first-year K-5 teachers and how can these experiences be improved for future educators? Based on this question, the following hypothesis was created: having been provided comprehensive induction programs, FYT will …

School Violence And Its Impact On Student Academic Achievement, Kewanis Kennedy

Murray State Theses and Dissertations

This study explores the occurrence of school violence and its impact on academic success and attendance. This study will encompass K-12 academic institutions in the state of Kentucky during the 2018-2019 academic school year, with an in-depth analysis of data submitted to the Kentucky Department of Education by the 171 participating school districts. The participating schools shared data in the form of disciplinary actions, attendance, graduation rates, academic achievement, and other relevant demographics. The collected data was analyzed to determine if there was a statistically significant difference among attendance rate, graduation rate, math ACT benchmark scores, and English ACT benchmark …

Georgia Agricultural Education Teachers’ Perceived Barriers Of Delivering Instruction Through Internet-Based Distance Learning, Cecily Gunter

Murray State Theses and Dissertations

In the late fall of 2019 and early spring 2020 educators across the world were abruptly faced with the issue of teaching curriculum through distance learning platforms. This challenge was even greater for agricultural education teachers to accomplish due to the goal of providing students opportunities for leadership development, personal growth, and career success through hands-on learning opportunities. The researcher conducted a study to examine the perceived barriers of internet –based distance learning by agricultural education teachers in Georgia and to explore the relationship between their perceived barriers and the perception of their level of computer and internet access, their …

Understanding Volunteer Motivations To Serve, Dominique P. Wood

Murray State Theses and Dissertations

An organization’s volunteer development program can serve as a useful tool in the P-20 framework to address transitional gaps preventing smooth and consistent movement of individuals from traditional education to career attainment. Utilizing Maslow’s Theory of Motivation and Maslow’s Hierarchy of Needs, this qualitative study revealed volunteer motivation effectively resolved needs that work toward Self-Actualization. Satisfied needs, addressed by the volunteer experience, places the organization as a relevant partner in the P-20 framework to resolve career attainment goals. The volunteer makes the gift of time, skills, experience, and knowledge based on personal preferences to the organization’s work. Partnerships are achieved …

A Program Evaluation Of One School’S Third Through Fifth Grade Instructional Practices, Yvette Edwards

Dissertations

The purpose of this study was to determine whether the instructional practices implemented by teachers using the State Standards were effective for instructing students in Grades 3-5 who were economically disadvantaged. The context of this inquiry was an urban elementary school in a large public school district in the United States of America. The need to implement an effective strategy to improve teacher instructional practices to improve student achievement using the State Standards was an issue in schools of the district under study with students who were economically disadvantaged. The need to meet the rigor necessary for students to obtain …

The Relationship Between Teacher Preparation And Attrition In The Teaching Field, Gerardo Trujillo

Dissertations

In this study, the researcher investigated the relationship between the preservice preparation and attrition in the field of teachers employed at Chicago Public Schools. The researcher administered a survey to teachers working in Chicago and its neighboring suburbs, and their responses revealed their perceptions about their preparation program and their real-world experiences in the classroom. The results indicated that new teachers need coursework in the areas of classroom management, social-emotional skill integration, and cultural competence. The expectation is that the findings will support the creation of a uniform policy for all universities to implement nationwide. Such a program could result …

Inclusive Campus Recreation: Creating A Space Where All Belong, Emelia Bebee

West Chester University Master’s Theses

This thesis examines discrepancies that marginalize students, faculty and staff from utilizing or working in campus recreation facilities. More specifically, Campus Recreation departments lack strategies that ensure inclusion for all abilities, identity backgrounds and genders. This critical action research thesis considers the experiences of stakeholders and will integrate research that has been supported by seasoned scholars. In this thesis, a three-day diversity and inclusion workshop is proposed supplemented by monthly programming for faculty and staff that focuses on inclusion techniques to incorporate into departmental planning. Solid leadership of this programmatic intervention would focus on collaboration and dedication to lifelong learning. …

The Ignatian Pedagogical Paradigm As A Critical Theoretical Framework To Enhance Teachers' Professional Identity In Diverse Context, Lourdu Sunder Reddy Mummadi

Doctoral Dissertations

Several previous studies have revealed the need and necessity to enhance teachers’ perception of professional identity (PI) as it impacts their feeling of satisfaction and effectiveness in the classroom and their persistence in the profession (Moore & Hofman, 1988; Sanders et al., 1997; Hanushek, 2011). According to some scholars, teachers’ professional identity includes teachers’ understanding of themselves and the factors impacting their teaching (Beijaard et al., 2000; Sachs, 2005; Day, 2018). The danger is that if a teacher lacks self-knowledge, they may be influenced by unexamined beliefs, stereotypes, cultural myths, and, most importantly, fears that affect the ways they relate …

A Relationship Built To Impact Instruction: Developing And Sustaining Productive Partnerships Between Mathematics Specialists And Principals, Nathan D. Potter, Hannah Adera Rooney, Melody Locher, Debra Kinsey

Journal of Mathematics and Science: Collaborative Explorations

How does the mathematics specialist provide a profound and lasting impact on instruction? We believe that a productive partnership between the principal and specialist, which we will call the principal-specialist relationship, is at the crux of the matter. When the principal-specialist relationship is built upon a foundation of a shared vision, clear roles, communication, and trust, both the teachers and students in the school benefit. We will explore the impact of the principal-specialist relationship on teacher success during the era of distance learning as necessitated by the COVID-19 pandemic. In order to explore how these ideas come alive in the …

Leading In Crooked Rooms: Race, Gender, Culture And Black Women's Leadership Skills And Practices, Portia Newman

Theses and Dissertations

The literature on Black women leaders, where it exists, focuses on the barriers to Black women becoming leaders or being fully empowered when in leadership positions. However, to understand the leadership identity of Black women, and perhaps help to explain the absence of Black women in formal leadership spaces, means to examine the influence of race, gender, and culture on leadership behavior, as well as the setting in which leadership exists. This qualitative grounded theory study explored the leadership skills and practices of 15 senior-level cross sector Black women leaders. The data was collected in two phases: 1) a leadership …

A Quantitative Study Of Factors Influencing Special Education Teachers’ Attrition: The Relationships Between Burnout, Personality, And Organizational Factors, Erin Lavery Wanat

All Electronic Theses and Dissertations

The purpose of this study was to examine if there is a relationship between independent variables—special education teachers’ emotional/interpersonal stressors, personality type, and worklife variables—and special education teachers’ burnout. Burnout is as complex as it is destructive for the special education teachers, who are likely to cite burnout as a major factor contributing to their pre-retirement departure from education. Burnout consists of three factors: emotional exhaustion, depersonalization/cynicism, and decreased estimation of personal contribution to the work. Six-hundred and ninety-two (n = 692) of Minnesota’s Tier Four licensed special education teachers participated in the study by completing a survey related to …

A Descriptive Study Of The Accommodations, Assistive Technologies, And Supports Chosen By Students With An Intellectual Disability Attending A Post-Secondary Institution, Lori Olson

All Electronic Theses and Dissertations

This study used a mixed methods approach to investigate the perceptions of students with intellectual disabilities (ID) attending a Transition Postsecondary Program for Students with Intellectual Disabilities (TPSID). This study explored what they perceived to be the most chosen and helpful accommodations, assistive technologies, and supports and why they chose them. The researcher sent out an electronic survey to students with ID attending a Transition Program for Students with Intellectual Disabilities (TPSID) to determine the most chosen and helpful accommodations, assistive technologies, and supports and why they found them helpful.The top ranked accommodations used and found most helpful in this …

Generational Giving In Public Higher Education, Christine Bernot

Murray State Theses and Dissertations

Abstract

Competition for donors and dollars between higher education and the non-profit sector has never been greater, with Americans giving nearly $450 billion in philanthropic support to charitable organizations in 2019 (IUPUI, 2020). Alumni of higher education institutions are a natural constituency group with a history of giving back to support student needs and programs.

New research in fundraising for higher education analyzing generational giving behaviors of alumni graduate donors could help universities better understand their giving results and support the innovation of new fundraising strategies and best practices. This quantitative research study used historical giving data to examine the …

Lessons From The Pivot: Higher Education's Response To The Pandemic, Janine S. Davis, Christy Irish, Ellen Watson, Rosemary Huff Arneson, Jennifer D. Walker, Tracey S. Hodges, Olivia Murphy, Lee Skallerup Bessette, Et Al.

Education Faculty Books

This text includes chapters from instructional designers, university faculty and staff, and undergraduate and graduate students, and the text has been divided into three sections to reflect these varied perspectives. Each section begins with research-based perspectives, but also contains more personal narratives at the end. While the context of most of the chapters is the United States, there are also chapters with a Canadian context. It is also important to note that, as of the first half of 2021, the pandemic rages on, and mentions of COVID-19 in the following chapters will be reflective of the state of affairs in …

Cultivating A 'Community Of Practice' In An Educational Leadership Preparation Program: Experiences And Roles Of Adjunct Faculty, Karen Swann, Karen L. Sanzo, Jay Paredes Scribner, Michael Cromartie

Educational Leadership & Workforce Development Faculty Publications

Educational leadership preparation programs increasingly rely on adjunct faculty to teach aspiring leaders. Although the percentage of adjunct faculty serving as instructors continues to grow relative to full-time, tenured faculty, the role of part-time instructors/K-12 practitioners remains confined to instruction. This study explored how one educational leadership preparation program attempted to include adjunct faculty in roles beyond teaching to include course and curriculum development, program redesign, and recruitment and marketing. Informed by the communities of practice literature, this study illustrates ways that programs can foster meaningful professional community among full- and part-time faculty in ways that contribute to program quality. …

Critical Consciousness-Raising: High School Teachers' Collective Strategies To Engage Students' Inspiragination, Kiera Havill

Pitzer Senior Theses

This study is a collection of strategies and practices utilized by ten high school teachers to inspire their students to engage with their critical consciousness as well as think critically about the world and their lived realities. Through this research, the study seeks to better understand how high school teachers create environments within their classrooms in which students question what exists, reflect on their own identities relative to the world, and engage in inspiragination. To examine this, 10 semi-structured, in-depth interviews with high school teachers were conducted via phone or Zoom. After cross-analyzing the interview transcripts, 10 themes arose relative …

Faculty And Dean Attitudes Toward Institutional Civic Responsibility, Mutual Trust, And Civic Mindedness At Two Year Colleges, David W. Kobilka

All Graduate Theses, Dissertations, and Other Capstone Projects

Two year colleges are often characterized as America’s “democracy colleges” implying a difficult to implement dual mission of democratizing education for all, and advancing the democratic purpose of civic engagement. Although such goals may be explicit in a college’s mission statement, how faculty or their deans receive that mission is not well-documented. Research suggests that for a college to advance a civic mission, those involved must themselves be civically minded. Moreover, for any mission to succeed, faculty and their deans must trust one-another. However, there is scant research specific to two-year colleges in these areas. This research attempted to address …

Importance-Performance Gap Analysis Of The University Brand Equity Dimensions, Tulay Girard, Musa Pinar

Atlantic Marketing Journal

This study examines the gaps between the importance students place on brand equity dimensions and their perceptions of how well their university performs on each dimension. It also assesses if the brand equity dimensions differ based on student demographics including gender, class level, and their living arrangement. Data were collected from a university in the Midwestern U.S. from undergraduate students. The findings reveal significant gaps between the importance and performance perceptions of students, and that females, students living on campus, and freshman require special

Principals’ And Teachers’ Perceptions Of Content-Specific Instructional Feedback, Shernore S. Prince

Walden Dissertations and Doctoral Studies

The research problem for this basic qualitative study was that principals were not consistently providing content-specific feedback to support teachers’ instructional practices. This problem was important because principals, as instructional leaders, are responsible for giving feedback to teachers to support teachers’ instructional practices. The purpose of this study was to investigate principals’ and teachers’ perceptions of content-specific feedback. Danielson’s framework for teaching was the conceptual framework that linked the concepts and variables in this study. The research questions addressed how principals perceived that they provided content-specific feedback to support teachers’ instructional practice, and how teachers perceived principals as providing content-specific …

Middle School Teachers' Perceptions Of Administrator Support, Teacher Retention, And Attrition, Tonya Kabia

Walden Dissertations and Doctoral Studies

Teacher attrition has been an issue in the local urban area resulting in students being taught by teachers and substitutes who may not be knowledgeable about the content. The attrition of experienced teachers is a concern for administrators, fellow teachers, parents, and students. The purpose of this study was to investigate teachers’ perceptions of administrator support, teacher retention, and teacher attrition. Bronfenbrenner’s ecological system theory served as the conceptual framework that guided this study. A basic qualitative research design was used to capture the insights of 10 middle school teachers in an urban district in the eastern United States through …

The Impacts Of Peer Observation Roles And Teaching Characteristics On Teacher Self-Efficacy: A Secondary Data Analysis Study Using The Talis Survey, Elisa Tedona

Theses and Dissertations

It is important for teachers to have a high sense of self-efficacy, as it is one of the prime motivational forces influencing student learning, teacher quality, and in turn, overall success (Curry, 2015; Hattie, 2009; Klassen & Chiu, 2010). Teachers with high self-efficacy work harder, are more involved in learning, and have higher assurance (Bandura, 1994). For these reasons, it is imperative to study the influencers of teacher self-efficacy. Peer observations and observational feedback, a highly used practice in all schools, is one of those influencers. This cycle of observations and feedback provided to teachers is influential to teacher self-efficacy …

The Past And Future Of Teacher Efficacy, Thomas R. Guskey

Educational, School, and Counseling Psychology Faculty Publications

Knowing how the concept of teacher efficacy has evolved in education research shows us good ways to raise teachers' confidence now.

Learning From Failures: Lessons From Unsuccessful Grading Reform Initiatives, Thomas R. Guskey

Educational, School, and Counseling Psychology Faculty Publications

This article describes accounts of grading reform initiatives that while well-intentioned, met with staunch opposition and eventually were abandoned. The implementation strategies employed by the leaders of these reform initiative are explored, along with reasons these strategies failed to result in meaningful and enduring change. Alternative grading reform strategies with supporting evidence are offered, justification for their use explained, and new directions for grading reform initiatives recommended.

Remote Math Or Remotely Math? : A Qualitative Study Of The Challenges Of A Covid-19 Induced Transition To Ict-Based Teaching For High School Mathematics Teachers, David Hurst

Legacy Theses & Dissertations (2009 - 2024)

In the blink of an eye schools across the country closed their doors in March 2020 and teachers were forced to transition from face-to-face instruction within a brick-and-mortar setting to ICT-based remote teaching. Many high school mathematics teachers were accustomed to their students having devices as their schools had established 1:1 computing programs. Even so, not all teachers had fully embraced ICT enhanced instruction in their classrooms. Research has shown that the degree of ICT utilization in a classroom has a strong positive correlation with the comfort level of the teacher. The COVID-19 closures required teachers to incorporate ICT in …

The Impact Of Implementation Drivers On Teacher Efficacy Beliefs Within A Multi-Tier System Of Support Framework, Heather Jennings

Doctor of Education Dissertations

Schools are implementing a Multi-Tier System of Support (MTSS) to address being met with increased pressures to ensure every student has an equal opportunity to reach proficiency standards and close the achievement gap. An MTSS is characterized as a systematic approach to identifying and problem-solving barriers to learning. In implementing an MTSS, teachers have experienced added responsibilities and have had to increase or refine their skill set in data analysis, data-based decision-making, implementing interventions, and managing academic and behavioral interventions. Through a case study, qualitative and quantitative in nature, the study identifies implementation drivers in the areas of leadership, competency, …

A Quantitative Study Of The Impact Of Leadership On School Culture In A Small Rural School District As Measured By Stakeholder Satisfaction, Hope L. Littlejohn

Doctor of Education Dissertations

This study examined the relationship of school leadership on school culture. Given the demands on educational leaders, the goal is to improve student achievement and school culture. The literature review examines the previous study of the history of school leadership, history of school culture, effective school leadership, elements of effective school culture, and public perception as it relates to school culture. The literature review discusses leadership styles and how each one contributes to positive school culture as perceived by various stakeholders to build the case for the current study. The study uses the School Culture Triage Survey by Wagner (2002). …

The Power Of The Modern Underground Railroad For Black Women: The Sistas’ Guide For Survival To Navigate Troubled Waters In Educational Leadership, Felicia H. Simmons

Doctor of Education Dissertations

This dissertation was designed to explore the advancement, obstacles, and barriers Black female educational leaders in Region X confront. The qualitative research examined 13 Black female educational leaders and teachers regarding the advancement and sustainability of Black female leaders despite obstacles and barriers. Participants were Region X administrators and educators. Data were collected through semi-structured interviews and a focus group. The data were coded for common themes, assessed, and member checked. The findings revealed there is a need for informal and formal mentorship and networks to assist with navigating the obstacles and barriers in their leadership positions in Region X …

Secondary Principal Perceptions Of Preparatory Experiences, Renita Griffinjordan

Doctor of Education Dissertations

The purpose of this qualitative study was to gain insight from current principals regarding principal preparatory experiences and to reveal which assistant principal experiences contributed to principal readiness. Through this study, 17 current secondary principals in an urban school district completed a 21-item survey using a 5-point Likert scale; 10 principals also participated in a follow-up interview. The survey instrument was constructed based on practices within seven primary standards of the North Carolina Standards for School Executives. The content validation index was utilized to measure the validity of the survey tool. The theoretical framework chosen to explore these relationships was …