Education Policy Commons^™

Three Essays On Rural Education: Descriptive Studies Focused On Federal Rural Definitions And Policy Changes, Kyung Ha Oh

Theses and Dissertations--Public Policy and Administration

Rural education issues in K-12 public schools are understudied despite a large rural student population in the U.S. This dissertation studies how different federal definitions of rural change how rural school districts and their diverse communities are portrayed, in comparison to their non-rural counterparts. This study also explores the recent federal rural policy changes on rural district revenue and student academic outcomes.

This dissertation consists of three descriptive essays. The first chapter shows how we choose to define ‘rural’ changes what differences are accentuated between rural and non-rural districts. Definitions of ‘rural’ is closely related to who gains access to …

Three Essays On Governance, Inequality, And Social Equity, Sarah Ausmus Smith

Theses and Dissertations--Public Policy and Administration

Comprised of three essays, my dissertation is linked by a common focus: the relationship between state or local governance arrangements and inequality or facets of social equity. I draw upon a range of literatures to motivate my research questions and inform my methodologies—welfare and social policy, public economics, intergovernmental relations, public finance and management.

In the first essay, I ask: does localizing welfare governance impact geospatial access to the social safety net? This is an important question because proximity is highly salient to program utilization. I geocode the location of human services nonprofits from tax filings in eight states using …

Collaborative Competition In Homeless Services: Three Essays On Federal-Local Partnerships, Andrew Alfred Sullivan

Theses and Dissertations--Public Policy and Administration

The United States’ federal government funds homeless services provided at the local level through the McKinney-Vento Act, encouraging collaboration among providers. This dissertation studies three aspects of homelessness: merging of local planning bodies, identification of homeless students, and the relationship between experiencing homelessness in high school and long-term educational outcomes.

The first chapter studies the effect of merging Continuums of Care (CoCs), local planning bodies for homeless services. While merging brings organizations into the same network and could make use of economies of scale, it brings service provision to a less-local level, taking away responsiveness to the community and inter-jurisdictional …

Move Or Improve? Place, Policy, And Educator Labor Markets, Cory Curl

Theses and Dissertations--Public Policy and Administration

What is the role of place and policy in shaping educator labor markets during the decade following the Great Recession of 2008? This research leverages data on Kentucky students, educators, schools, and school districts from 2009 to 2018, with a focus on the rural, isolated Appalachian region. Many counties in the region have long struggled with poverty, low rates of labor force participation, lower educational attainment, and dependence on public transfers (Ziliak, 2019). Despite these challenges, the people of Appalachia demonstrate a strong attachment to the region. With this research, I enhance understanding of contexts and conditions, such as unique …

Three Essays On Public Organizations, Changgeun Yun

Theses and Dissertations--Public Policy and Administration

Organizations play key roles in modern societies. The importance of organizations for a society requires an understanding of organizations. In order to fully understand public organizations, it is necessary to recognize how organizational settings affect subjects of organizations and organizing. Although public and private organizations interrelate with each other, the two types are not identical. In this dissertation, I attempt to describe public organizations in their own setting by discussing three important topics in public organization theory: (1) innovation adoption in the public sector; (2) representative bureaucracy; and (3) decline and death of public organizations.

In Chapter II, I scrutinize …

Charter School Locations Across The U.S. And Their Influence On Public School District Revenues, Peter A. Jones

Theses and Dissertations--Public Policy and Administration

Since Minnesota passed the first charter school law in 1991, charter schools have become one of the most prominent school reforms in the U.S. While charter schools educate a small portion of public school enrollments, their existence has prompted various responses from traditional public school districts. For example, districts may change expenditure patterns or work to increase test scores in an effort to retain enrollments. In this sense, a charter school’s most significant impact on public school students may work indirectly through the traditional public school reactions they invoke.

This dissertation explores education finance implications for charter schools and their …