Education Policy Commons^™

#Dusomething! A Qualitative Exploratory Study To Identify Challenges And Opportunities For Improvement In Du's Response To Sexual Harassment And Assault, Alejandro Cerón, Amanda Cali, Briana Cox, Camille Cruz, Camryn Evans, Cyndal Groskopf, Ashley Joplin, Clayton Kempf, Kēhaulani Lagunero, Jayvyn Jakai Lewis, Aili Limstrom, Gray Messersmith, Cal Quayle, Yadira Quintero, Michael Sze, Aaron Toussaint, Sami Zepponi

Anthropology: Undergraduate Student Scholarship

The purpose of this course-based research project was to identify where DU has made progress in its response to sexual harassment, identifying challenges and opportunities for improvement, with the hope that the results will support the DU community’s efforts to prevent, address, and eradicate sexual harassment.

Crossing Schools, Language, And Migration Borders: The Experiences Of Latinx And Caribbean Emergent Multilingual Mothers In K-12 Public Schools, Michelle Angelo-Rocha

USF Tampa Graduate Theses and Dissertations

Anti-immigrant sentiment and "English-only" ideologies have a significant impact on educational policies, practices, and processes. This includes parental engagement, the quality of education and life opportunities offered to immigrant children, and families’ well-being. The purpose of this study was to examine how Latinx and Caribbean mothers in Florida with various immigration statuses (i.e., undocumented, asylum seekers, refugees, international students, and mixed-status) and often with limited financial resources attempt to steward their children through the U.S. educational system. The research question was: How did emergent multilingual immigrant mothers experience the K-12 education system in Florida? The sub-question was: How did schools …

Crossing Schools, Language, And Migration Borders: The Experiences Of Latinx And Caribbean Emergent Multilingual Mothers In K-12 Public Schools, Michelle Angelo-Rocha

USF Tampa Graduate Theses and Dissertations

Anti-immigrant sentiment and "English-only" ideologies have a significant impact on educational policies, practices, and processes. This includes parental engagement, the quality of education and life opportunities offered to immigrant children, and families’ well-being. The purpose of this study was to examine how Latinx and Caribbean mothers in Florida with various immigration statuses (i.e., undocumented, asylum seekers, refugees, international students, and mixed-status) and often with limited financial resources attempt to steward their children through the U.S. educational system. The research question was: How did emergent multilingual immigrant mothers experience the K-12 education system in Florida? The sub-question was: How did schools …

"If I Go, I'Ll Probably End Up Dropping Out Too": College Enrollment Choices In A Free College Context, Gresham D. Collom, Ashton R. Cooper, Patrick Biddix, Alexis Hartley

Educational Leadership and Policy Studies Publications and Other Works

Objective: In this qualitative study, we explored why students in a free community college environment in Tennessee chose not to enroll in college or dropped out of college shortly after enrolling. Methods: We conducted 27 in-depth interviews with individuals who were eligible for the Tennessee Promise. Perna’s (2006) conceptual model for college access and choice guided our analysis. We analyzed data using a three-tier approach, which included open/emergent coding, followed by a priori/theoretical analysis. Results: We identified 15 emergent themes common among interview participants, which we then categorized into the four constructs of Perna’s model. Conclusions: …

Seeing Beneath The Surface: Using Critical Race Theory To Uncover Racial Inequities In The U.S. Public School System, Lauren Harkins

Montserrat Annual Writing Prize

Many policies and practices perpetuate racial inequities and stereotypes, harming and neglecting the young people in American schools. This paper uses Critical Race Theory as a lens or framework to understand the circumstances in which educational inequities are exacerbated and what systemic barriers and beliefs maintain them.

Covid-19 Education Response Mapping Study: Building Resilience In Lao Pdr: Readiness, Response, And Recovery, Yung Nietschke, Anna Dabrowski, Maya Conway, Chaula Yoga Pradhika

International Education Research

The coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) crisis has caused unprecedented levels of disruption to education systems worldwide. Across the Asia region, it is estimated that around 760 million children were impacted by school closures at the height of the pandemic. Government response strategies have varied across the region, with some countries imposing prolonged school lockdowns while others have had short, repeated closure periods. As countries begin to reopen schools and continue to prepare for subsequent waves of COVID[1]19 infection, there is a need to develop the greater capability of education systems to safeguard learning and address persistent barriers to learning equality …

Covid-19 Education Response Mapping Study: Building Resilience In The Philippines: Readiness, Response, And Recovery, Anna Dabrowski, Maya Conway, Yung Nietschke, Amy Berry, Chaula Yoga Pradhika

International Education Research

The coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) crisis has caused unprecedented levels of disruption to education systems worldwide. Across the Asia region, it is estimated that around 760 million children were impacted by school closures at the height of the pandemic. Government response strategies have varied across the region, with some countries imposing prolonged school lockdowns while others have had short, repeated closure periods. As countries begin to reopen schools and prepare for subsequent waves of COVID-19 infection, there is a need to develop a higher capability of education systems to safeguard learning and address persistent barriers to learning equality by harnessing …

Covid-19 Education Response Mapping Study: Building Resilience In The Kyrgyz Republic: Readiness, Response, And Recovery, Yung Nietschke, Anna Dabrowski, Maya Conway, Chaula Yoga Pradhika

International Education Research

The coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) crisis has caused unprecedented levels of disruption to education systems worldwide. Across the Asia region, it is estimated that around 760 million children were impacted by school closures at the height of the pandemic. Government response strategies have varied across the region, with some countries imposing prolonged school lockdowns while others have had short, repeated closure periods. As countries begin to reopen schools and continue to prepare for subsequent waves of COVID-19 infection, there is a need to develop the greater capability of education systems to safeguard learning and address persistent barriers to learning equality …

Covid-19 Education Response Mapping Study In Asia: Executive Summary, Yung Nietschke, Anna Dabrowski, Maya Conway, Chaula Yoga Pradhika

International Education Research

This document provides a summary of research exploring the systems, policies, and school-level practices that have supported learning continuity in Asia during and after the COVID-19 pandemic. Based on a review of policy documents on COVID-19 responses in Asia and a deep dive analysis of system and school-level responses in the Philippines and the Kyrgyz Republic, the findings from this study provide policymakers and education stakeholders with evidence of promising practices that could be leveraged to support learning recovery and education system resilience. In addition, a policy review was conducted on the Lao People’s Democratic Republic (Lao PDR), which focused …

Elementary Principals’ Perceptions Regarding Implementing A District-Mandated Educational Equity Policy, Glen Patrick Messier

Walden Dissertations and Doctoral Studies

The problem in the current basic qualitative study was that elementary principals were challenged to implement a district-mandated educational equity policy. The purpose of this qualitative study was to explore elementary principals’ experiences implementing a district-mandated educational equity policy. The conceptual framework for this study was transformational leadership theory. This leadership theory was often used by leaders who focused on a collective purpose and held themselves accountable for initiating and sustaining positive social change. Three research questions addressed principals’ experiences and perceptions in their attempt to implement a district-mandated educational equity policy, as well as principals’ suggestions for continuous improvement …

Diffusion Of Policy Innovations: State Adoption Of Value-Added Models In K-12 Education, Kirsten England

Doctoral Dissertations

Schools chase test scores as a means of validating educational practices. Having imposed high-stakes testing, public schools were still not generating the student test scores under policies such as No Child Left Behind, the Department of Education thought would ensue. To hold accountability on the part of the classroom teacher, Race to the Top, and with it, merit pay was imposed by most states within the United States.

Using policy innovation and diffusion frameworks, this research looks at how over time states have come to adopt value-added policies for teacher evaluations. The research takes into consideration the sociopolitical systems that …

High School Career Guidance: From The View Of A Street-Level Bureaucrat, George Clair Thomas

Open Access Theses & Dissertations

High school counselors struggle to complete the tasks assigned to them. Often serving more than 500 students, counselors must address requirements specified by the American School Counselor Associationâ??s national model. They must also perform duties required by state and local policy, as well as campus-designated priorities. Empirical studies of school counselors have focused on identifying the duties that counselors perform, the effectiveness of training that counselors have received, and issues that occur from the standpoint of local control of counselor duties. I found no study that identified how counselors prioritize what they do or the level of discretion that counselors …

The Experiences Of Pell Grant Students Who Lose Aid: A Mixed Methods Study, Jaime Carbajal, Jr.

UNLV Theses, Dissertations, Professional Papers, and Capstones

Understanding the link between financial aid and college attainment is particularly important for the Federal Pell Grant program, the nation’s largest financial aid program. Many studies have shown that the Pell Grant program increases retention, persistence, and graduation rates for undergraduate students (Castleman & Long, 2016; Evans & Nguyen, 2019). Nonetheless, 80% of Pell recipients do not go on to complete a college degree within four years (Goldrick-Rab et al., 2016). One possible reason for this outcome is the way the Pell Grant program is constructed and implemented. While the Pell grant starts out as a need-based aid, it becomes …

Moving From Harm Mitigation To Affirmative Discrimination Mitigation: The Untapped Potential Of Artificial Intelligence To Fight School Segregation And Other Forms Of Racial Discrimination, Andrew Gall

Catholic University Journal of Law and Technology

No abstract provided.

Experiences Of Teachers Using Student-Centered Approaches In China, Raven Roytblat

Walden Dissertations and Doctoral Studies

Schoolteachers in China are required by the government to transition from teacher-centered to student-centered instruction. Researchers have shown the challenges of and successes in implementing the instructional changes; however, a gap exists surrounding the challenges and successes of reforms from the perspective of teachers. The purpose of this generic qualitative study was to better understand the experiences of Chinese schoolteachers as the system of education in China transitions from teacher-centered to student-centered classroom instruction. The conceptual framework for this study included Schön’s concept of the reflective practitioner and Liu and Hallinger and Knapp et al.’s work on the role of …

Professional Dispositions And Perceptions Of Principals About Inclusion In Senior Secondary Schools, Desmond Prince, George Williams

Walden Dissertations and Doctoral Studies

AbstractProviding inclusive education for children with special educational needs and disabilities entails educating these students in general education classrooms. There are no consistent practices or regulations for administering programs for such students in general education classrooms in Sierra Leone. This problem is supported by the lack of literature about administrative inclusive education practices. This basic qualitative study was conducted to explore the professional dispositions, perceptions, and rules or regulations that school principals hold for administering programs for students with special educational needs and disabilities in general education classrooms. The conceptual framework of the study was based on moral leadership and …

The Axis Of Access: A Quantitative Ethnography Of Presidential Discourse On The Construct Of College Access In The United States, Pamela M. Donnelly

Theses and Dissertations

Federal discourse pertaining to college access requires clarified definition. Use of the college access construct has become commonplace, yet no unified refinement of meaning exists. This study, which covered U.S. presidential communications from January 2009 to October 2021, addressed the abstraction of language as leaders presented ideas, policies, and opinions. Observable trends impacting social mobility for students from underserved populations were of central interest. The research methodology, Quantitative Ethnography (QE), used the tool of Epistemic Network Analysis (ENA). Eight codes were identified through grounded analysis: Affordability, Pathway Program, Underserved Populations, Class Systems, Upward Mobility, Career Readiness, Trajectory, and Career Technical …

Education Faculty As Knowledge Brokers: Competing For Access To New York State Print Media And Policy Influence, Gary Anderson, Nakia Gray-Nicolas, Madison Payton

Publications and Research

In an environment in which new policy entrepreneurs and networks are influencing policy and public opinion, many university faculty are increasingly seeking ways to mobilize knowledge beyond academic conferences and journals. Using New York state as a case, we searched Access World News to compare the level of media access of academics with other knowledge brokering organizations (KBOs; e.g. think tanks, teachers’ unions, advocacy organizations, etc.). Our data shows relatively low levels of access for academics and provides profiles of those academics with high levels of access and what we might learn from them. We provide a discussion of the …

Constructing Curriculum: Centering Identities In Sex Education, Jozette Belmont

Dissertations, Theses, and Capstone Projects

Sex education (sex ed) is a state-by-state and school-by-school issue, and there are no federal laws which mandate medically accurate education. In New York, schools only offer one semester of health education which often happens in the last semester of twelfth grade. Further, LGBTQIA+ people’s sexual health and identities are rarely mentioned. Therefore, this project asks: What are the ways sex ed curricula and policies in New York address the needs of LGBTQIA+ youth? To answer this question, I use a critical policy analysis to compare curriculum from the New York City Department of Education (NYCDOE) and Peer Health Exchange …

Strategic Educational Leadership Within The Policy-Making Arena: The Promulgation, Passage, And Practice Of Tennessee's High Performing School Districts Flexibility Act Of 2013, Robert Lawrence Hullett Jr.

Theses and Dissertations--Education Sciences

In 2010, Tennessee’s 106th General Assembly passed the First to the Top Act (2010), a companion legislation for the federal Race to the Top Act (2009) program launched by the Obama Administration. A provision of this state law required that half of teacher and principal evaluations be based upon student achievement, which included a component of required continuous academic growth. For school districts whose students scored at the highest academic performance levels, the continuous growth component would negatively impact their teachers’ and principals’ annual evaluations. In 2012, the Williamson County Schools (WCS) superintendent requested mitigation for relieve from the Tennessee …

Weaving The Braid Of Culturally Responsive Leadership Within Policy And Governance To Improve Indigenous Student Success, Shelly L. Niemi

The Dissertation in Practice at Western University

This Organizational Improvement Plan (OIP) explores a Problem of Practice (PoP) that highlights the need for why the Board of Education and the Senior Administration team within the Raven Bay School Division (RBSD, pseudonym) would benefit from using a culturally responsive leadership approach when making decisions and how this may be achieved through policy and governance to guide their practice. The goal of this OIP is to examine why this leadership approach would be relevant for the Board of Education and the Senior Leadership team when they are making any policy and governance decisions, as it relates to Indigenous …

Trust Issues: A Case Study Of The Relationship Between Trust And Reform Implementation, Courtney R. Wilson

Educational Foundations & Leadership Theses & Dissertations

Reform creation and implementation tends to focus on the mechanics needed to ensure intended outcomes are achieved. School relationships are affected by the tension caused by reform implementation. Research suggests trust among teachers and between teachers and their administrator affects the way teachers make sense of, implement, and use new reform efforts. Given the demands reforms place on schools, trust has the potential to impact and encourage the implementation of reform and the maintenance of relationships. A qualitative case study method was used to decipher the impact trust plays in the implementation of reform. The concept of trust is used …

Asian American And Native American Pacific Islander Serving Institutions (Aanapisis): Serving And Advocating For The Educational Needs Of Southeast Asian American Students, Mike Hoa Nguyen

Journal of Southeast Asian American Education and Advancement

The purpose of this article is to highlight how AANAPISI programs can intentionally design their programming to support Southeast Asian American (SEAA) students, and their responsibility in effectively advocating for them at the policy level. In this effort, this article will first provide a background and an overview of the AANAPISI landscape over the past decade. Then it will focus on one exemplary AANAPISI, providing examples of programmatic mechanisms and efforts used to serve SEAA students. This article concludes by providing recommendations and discussing the implications regarding the role of AANAPISIs in effectively serving and advocating for their SEAA students …

Educator Voice And Influence In Mississippi Education Policy, Sarah Jamie Sproles

Honors Theses

This thesis attempts to discover if there are barriers educators and government actors feel are in place that prevent educator advocacy and influence in the state of Mississippi, and consequently what importance their voices hold in the policymaking and implementation processes. The research questions that are addressed in this thesis include: a) Is there an absence of educators affecting policies and if so, why? b) What are the perceptions of educators’ advocacy and engagement in laws passed regarding education? c) What, if any, barriers prevent educators’ voices from influencing laws? Qualitative data from educators and those in the government sector …

The Economic Impacts Of School Closure In Rural Maine, Heather Perry

Muskie School Dissertations

The purpose of this case study research was to examine the economic impact of school closures on three rural communities in Maine. I created a conceptual framework around six healthy community economic markers. Each of the six markers are studied in 2010 when schools were closed and then again in 2016. This data, in addition to perceptions data from stakeholders in each of the three communities was studied to determine if the closure of the school had any impact on these healthy economic markers. Findings suggest that there were no negative impact to the economic markers studied within the three …

Policy Problems: Preparing Students For The “Real World”, Shannon Mckechnie

Education Publications

Employability of students has risen as a key indicator of success of institutions, alongside an increased focus on policy for skills development in Canada. In Ontario, a hub for Canada’s economy, the issue of the “skills gap” has sustained interest as a significant but contested policy issue in public post-secondary education (Viczko, Lorusso, & McKechnie, 2019). Directed by policy and by public demand, significant resources at universities are invested into efforts to increase students’ skills capacities, career prospects, and overall employability. For student affairs staff (SAS), developing student career readiness and employability is central to many portfolios of our work …

The Global Child: A Roadmap For Becoming Culturally Responsive Educators, Ana I. Berdecia Med, Caitlin Kosec Mpp, Kamili O. Leath Ms, The John S. Watson Institute For Public Policy For Thomas Edison State College

Center for the Positive Development of Urban Children

The program strategies and the assessment tools encourage early childhood teachers to adopt 26 strategies across three competency areas: 1) classroom design; 2) teachers’ rhythm and temperament; and 3) instructional strategies during the 10-month program year. Mentors are assigned to each teaching team and through supportive site visits and assessment visits help the teams change their thinking and practices to be more culturally and linguistically responsive.

Education's Death Row : The Standardization Network And A Persistently Lowest Achieving School In The Era Of Common Core, Valarie J. Karas

Legacy Theses & Dissertations (2009 - 2024)

In 2010, New York State both adopted the Common Core Learning Standards and identified the State’s first 67 “persistently lowest achieving” schools, the most severe failure designation available under the State’s accountability system as based upon standardized test performance and/or graduation rates (Common Core Standards Initiative, 2015; NYSED, 2010a). The Common Core Learning Standards were advertised as a pathway to a high-quality education for all American students (Common Core Standards Initiative, 2015; Supovitz & McGuinn, 2019). However, a public uproar occurred in the late summer of 2013 following the release of standardized “Common Core” test scores which showed an increase …

The Effects Of Oklahoma's Universal Preschool Policy On Long-Term Educational Outcomes For Students, Betsy Morgan, Madison Stoecker

Senior Honors Papers / Undergraduate Theses

As states have increased their commitment to early childhood education over the past two decades, a debate on the efficacy of state-sponsored universal preschool has divided policymakers, administrators, and taxpayers. Some critics of these programs argue that universal preschool has a diminishing impact which does not justify the up-front cost, while supporters argue that there are long-term positive effects of high quality, universal early childhood education which outweigh the cost. In this paper, we examine the effect, if any, that the existence of a state-funded universally available preschool program has had on county-level average ACT scores in a before-and-after multivariable …

Political Culture And Policy: The Impact Of Culture And Values On School Choice Legislation, Heather Leigh Neal

Educational Foundations & Leadership Theses & Dissertations

Policy actors unite political culture, power, and values to make substantial decisions which are often subjective in nature. Politics and policy are about collective decisions, which rely on the arrangement of a group of people. As values can influence policy actors in their attempt to solve problems, it is important for policymakers to establish a balance among the most essential values. A qualitative case study approach was used to investigate how, and what ways, political culture influenced how state stakeholders interpreted or implemented policy. Power and values were explored as both can connect for the implementation of policy. If values, …