Theses and Dissertations from UMD
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Item Problems and Possibilities: The identities and challenges of early career science teachers(2024) Mesiner, Jennifer Elizabeth; Levin, Daniel M; Elby, Andrew; Education Policy, and Leadership; Digital Repository at the University of Maryland; University of Maryland (College Park, Md.)Learning to teach is multifaceted and dynamic resulting in a turbulent, fast-changing era of professional life for early career science teachers (ECSTs). Teaching practice is uncertain and tensions are endemic to the profession (Ball, 1993). This dissertation connects to and extends current research of the challenges ECSTs face and how those challenges affect ECSTs’ work, identity, and experience. In the first chapter, I introduce my research focus and offer a personal narrative to provide context of my positionality and experiences between myself and my research. In Chapter 2, I offer a systematic review of the literature to provide a contemporary update to Davis and colleagues’ (2006) review Challenges New Science Teachers Face to answer the question: What challenges do ECSTs face while navigating their first years of teaching? Chapter 3 describes the research design, data sources, and general analysis for the longitudinal case study of an ECST, Alexa. The remaining body chapters build upon Chapter 2 and each other in answer to my remaining research questions: What challenges does Alexa face as an ECST? How does Alexa’s teacher role identity develop over time? In what ways do challenges shape Alexa’s teacher role identity? Chapter 4 builds upon the themes drawn from Chapter 2’s systematic review to explore the challenges Alexa experiences. Chapter 5 describes how Alexa’s identity develops across her early years as an ECST using a Dynamic Systems of Role Identity framework (Kaplan & Garner, 2018). Chapter 6 explores how those challenges impacted Alexa’s science teacher identity using a productive friction framework (Hagel & Brown, 2005a). In Chapter 7, I close by summarizing the research, describing its implications, and offering future directions for research and practice.Item Navigating college search and choice: How immigrant capital paves a path to postsecondary education for first-generation Students of Color(2023) Malcolm, Moya Nikisha; Griffin, Kimberly A; Counseling and Personnel Services; Digital Repository at the University of Maryland; University of Maryland (College Park, Md.)Immigrant youth represent one of the fastest growing and most diverse groups in the U.S. K-16 system. Though immigrant youth generally report high educational aspirations, they face multiple interrelated obstacles to postsecondary enrollment. Despite barriers, data indicate that immigrants are going to college and in some cases are enrolling at a rate higher than their non-immigrant counterparts. Previous research highlights multiple forms of capital, including community cultural wealth (Yosso, 2005), that immigrants who share a racial or ethnic background leverage to access higher education. However, few studies have examined the extent to which immigrants, across race and ethnicity, engage similar resources to navigate the college choice process. This study sheds light on the pre-college experiences of a racially diverse sample of 1.5-generation immigrants who, at the time of this study, were first-year students at a 4-year institution.The following research questions guided this study: (a) How do low-income immigrant students of color engage in the college search and choice process? (b) How do various forms of capital and community resources shape students’ college choice process. Through semistructured interviews, 10 Asian, Black, and Latinx immigrants shared detailed accounts of their family background, migration, and transition to U.S. schools; development of college aspirations; and college search, application, and decision-making experiences. Participants also discussed the tools and resources they used, individuals who assisted them, and how they made sense of their experiences, significant moments, and turning points in their journey. Findings reveal multiple forms of capital that developed within participants’ immigrant families: capital that fostered an early predisposition toward college and enabled participants to navigate a complex college application process, during the COVID-19 pandemic, to ultimately gain admission to multiple postsecondary institutions. Findings from this study suggest immigrant capital as a unifying concept capturing skills, assets, and perspectives immigrants use to achieve their educational goals. Findings also have implications for future research, policy, and practice.Item TOWARD A DATA LITERACY ASSESSMENT THAT IS FAIR FOR LANGUAGE MINORITY STUDENTS(2023) Yeom, Semi; O'Flahavan, John; Education Policy, and Leadership; Digital Repository at the University of Maryland; University of Maryland (College Park, Md.)Data literacy is crucial for adolescents to access and navigate data in today’s technology-driven world. Researchers emphasize the need for K-12 students to attain data literacy. However, few available instructions have incorporated validated assessments. Therefore, I developed and implemented the Data literacy Assessment for Middle graders (DLA-M) that can diagnose students’ current stages fairly and support future practices regardless of their language backgrounds. I initiated the study with two research questions: a) How valid is a newly developed assessment to measure middle-grade students’ data literacy? b) How fairly does the new assessment measure data literacy regardless of students’ language backgrounds?A new assessment purported to measure two competencies of data literacy of 6th to 9th graders: a) Interpret data representations and b) Evaluate data and data-based claims. I used the Evidence-Centered Design (ECD) as a methodological framework to increase the validity of the assessment. I followed the five layers of the ECD framework to develop and implement the DLAM. Then I analyzed the data from implementing the assessment and gathered five types of validity evidence for validation. Based on the collected validity evidence, I concluded that the assessment was designed to represent the content domain that is purported to measure. The assessment had internal consistency in measuring data literacy except for nine eliminated items, and the data literacy scores from the overall assessment were reliable as well. Regarding item quality, item discrimination parameters met the quality criteria, but difficulty estimates of some items did not meet the intended design. Empirical cluster analyses revealed two performance levels from the participants. Differential item functioning analyses showed that item discrimination and difficulty were not differentiated between language minority students (LMSs) and their counterparts with the same data literacy level. These results did not reveal the possibility of unfair interpretations and uses of this assessment for LMSs. Lastly, I found significant interaction effects between the DLAM scores and the two variables about students’ English reading proficiency and use of technology. This study delineated how to develop and validate a data literacy assessment that could support students from different linguistic backgrounds. The research also facilitated the application of a data literacy assessment to school settings by scrutinizing and defining target competencies that could benefit adolescents’ data literacy. The findings can inform future research to implement data literacy assessments in broader contexts. This study can serve as a springboard to provide inclusive data literacy assessments for diverse student populations.Item "Why Be Average When You Could Be Extraordinary?": A Case Study of an Exemplary African American Math Teacher(2022) Buli, Tarik; Goffney, Imani; Brantlinger, Andrew; Education Policy, and Leadership; Digital Repository at the University of Maryland; University of Maryland (College Park, Md.)It is well documented that as an educational system we subject students from particular racial and socioeconomic backgrounds to unequal schooling experiences. Some researchers attribute the unequal schooling experiences and outcomes of minoritized students of color to their limited access to educational resources, like skilled teachers and quality curriculum. Other researchers identify that even in highly resourced American schools, African American students are specifically subjected to oppressive learning conditions. Given this context of schooling for African American students, this study explores how an African American 8th-grade mathematics teacher, Ms. Collier, may be a protective factor in her students’ education. Specifically, I use qualitative case study methods to examine how Ms. Collier’s instructional practice relates to historical conceptualizations of African American teachers of African American students, and how her mathematics instruction socially positions her students as learners of mathematics. For this case study, I conducted classroom observations in two differently tracked mathematics classes, as well as semi-structured interviews with Ms. Collier and her students in both classes. Ipay particular attention to how she enacts a historically situated practice of care for her students, through how she facilitates whole class discussions and maintains high expectations for her students. I then consider how her instructional practice positions the students as learners of mathematics and compare how the students are positioned in her honors and on-level classes. The findings of this study suggest that Ms. Collier’s instructional practices are rooted in a historical legacy of African American teachers resisting antiblack, deficit characterizations of Black students. Instead, Ms. Collier cares for her students by supporting them in their pursuit of mathematics learning in multifaceted and nuanced ways. Her care manifests in her teaching practice by cultivating a classroom culture that centers student belonging. She does this by allowing students to experience a range of emotions, like nervousness and joy, all the while still perceiving and treating them as mathematically competent. She also makes considerable demands of her students, including that they publicly participate in problem solving during whole class discussions, even when they do not know the answer. The classroom interactions reveal that all of Ms. Collier’s students, across both tracked classes, are positioned as mathematically competent. However, there are some distinctions in how the students are positioned across the two classes. Whereas the students in the on-level class are positioned as capable of making sense of and persisting in mathematical problem solving, in the honors class the students are positioned as capable of making mathematical connections and solving problems independently. Despite these differences, all of Ms. Collier’s students, across both tracked classes, are positioned as human.Item AN INVESTIGATION INTO THE RELATIONSHIP BETWEEN CO-TEACHING AND STUDENT ENGAGEMENT(2022) Clancy, Erin; Wexler, Jade A; Special Education; Digital Repository at the University of Maryland; University of Maryland (College Park, Md.)Federal law mandates that students with disabilities (SWDs) receive specially designed instruction (SDI), which includes the adaptation of the content, methodology, or delivery of instruction to meet SWDs’ unique needs, to ensure access to the general education curriculum (Rodgers et al., 2021; Ten Napel, 2017) within the least restrictive environment (Individuals with Disabilities Education Act, 2004). One common service delivery model for the many SWDs in the general setting education is co-teaching, wherein a content-area teacher (CAT) and a special education teacher (SET) share instructional responsibilities. The CAT and SET can use a variety of models (e.g., team teaching) to implement co-teaching. Although research showing the effectiveness of co-teaching for improving student achievement is limited (Clancy & Wexler, see Chapter 2; Murawski & Swanson, 2001), co-teaching has the potential to increase student engagement due to the defining features of certain co-teaching models that may benefit SWDs. Increasing student engagement is important as engagement is positively correlated with student outcomes, such as retaining information, graduating from high school, and pursuing postsecondary education (Finn, 1993).To better understand the extent to which different co-teaching models are implemented and which teacher (i.e., CAT or SET) leads instruction during the implementation of certain co-teaching models, it is necessary to extend previous research (e.g., Wexler et al., 2018). Additionally, given the importance of engagement and the potential relationship between co-teaching and engagement, it is necessary to explore whether specific co-teaching models are associated with higher levels of student engagement. Thus, there are two goals of the current dissertation. The first goal is to investigate the frequency of use of each co-teaching model and the extent to which each co-teacher leads instruction during the implementation of certain models. The second goal is to explore the relationship between each observed co-teaching model and student engagement. The current manuscript includes a statement of the problem, theoretical framework, literature synthesis, research questions, methodological approach, results, and discussion for the study. I provide this information sequentially over five chapters. Chapter 1 introduces the problem the current dissertation seeks to address. This chapter provides an overview of current service delivery models for SWDs in the general education setting, including co-teaching, and includes extended descriptions of each of the six co-teaching models. Chapter 1 also provides an overview of the research on student engagement. The chapter closes by providing a statement of the problem and the theoretical framework. Chapter 2 of the dissertation presents a literature synthesis of experimental studies investigating the effect of co-teaching on student achievement. The purpose of the synthesis is to extend a previous synthesis (Murawski & Swanson, 2001) and provide updated knowledge on the impact co-teaching has on student outcomes. While co-teaching has been a commonly used service delivery model, information about its effectiveness is limited. This synthesis contributes a new understanding of co-teaching as more than 20 years have passed since Murawski and Swanson’s initial synthesis. In Chapter 3, I describe the methodological approach of the empirical study. I used archival observation data to determine which co-teaching models were used most often and which teacher led instructional delivery for specific models (i.e., one-teach-one observe, one teach-one assist, one teach-one monitor). I then investigated the relationships between student engagement and the observed co-teaching models. Chapter 4 provides the results of the empirical study. Results from the observation data showed that team teaching and one teach-one assist were the most relied upon co-teaching models. Additionally, the CAT typically led instruction during implementation of one teach-one assist and other independently driven models. Furthermore, there was a moderate significant relationship between engagement and the co-teaching models. Then, Chapter 5 contextualizes the findings within similar research and the theoretical framework. The findings of the first research question on observed co-teaching models align with similar recent research. The investigation into the relationship between co-teaching models and student engagement aligned with the theoretical framework. Specifically, student engagement was observed more frequently in models where both teachers drove instruction (i.e., alternative, station, and team teaching). In closing, I provide implications for practice as well as recommendations for additional research and present the conclusion.Item ADDRESSING THE DISPROPORTIONALITY OF BLACK/AFRICAN AMERICAN STUDENTS IN ADVANCED PLACEMENT (AP) CLASSES(2022) DiFato, John Paul; Imig, David; Education Policy, and Leadership; Digital Repository at the University of Maryland; University of Maryland (College Park, Md.)Data at the national, state, and local levels all indicate disproportionately low enrollment of Black/African American students in Advanced Placement (AP) classes at the high school level. Black/African American students are missing out on educational opportunities and access to an equitable education by not participating in AP classes in high school. One method for high schools to address this issue is to explore the processes in place for recommending/selecting students for AP classes. The purpose of this study was to develop and pilot a talent-spotting tool using student data for teachers and school counselors to use in the AP course recommendation process. Specifically, this protocol was developed to identify more students, especially Black/African American students, whose data indicated that they might be ready for AP coursework. The researcher developed the talent-spotting tool, and the algorithm used to process the data, and tested its effectiveness in identifying students who should be recommended for AP classes. The researcher employed the following methodology for the study: (a) developed a data-based talent-spotting tool protocol draft; (b) obtained input from potential users regarding current course recommendation practices (including the use of AP Potential) and their perceptions of the talent-spotting tool and its potential usefulness via an anonymous, web-based survey; and (c) piloted the talent-spotting tool and compared the results with course recommendations based on SY1819 AP Potential data and with the SY1819 actual course recommendations. Based on survey responses from potential users, the majority indicated they want a process that is simple to use and can be a portion of the course recommendation process, but not the entire process. Participants appreciated the objectivity that the talent-spotting tool brought to the course recommendation process, but many were not ready to completely give up on the subjective human factors that are involved with course recommendations. Furthermore, the talent-spotting tool accurately identified students who were recommended for AP courses. But, more importantly, the talent-spotting tool identified more students who were not recommended for AP courses but who have the aptitude to succeed in those courses. In fact, the talent-spotting tool identified a higher proportion of Black/African American students than white students. The adoption of this talent-spotting tool as part of the course recommendation process has the potential to directly impact the disproportionate representation of Black/African American students in AP courses.Item COMPUTATIONAL THINKING IN THE ELEMENTARY CLASSROOM: HOW TEACHERS APPROPRIATE CT FOR SCIENCE INSTRUCTION(2021) Cabrera, Lautaro; Clegg, Tamara; Jass Ketelhut, Diane; Education Policy, and Leadership; Digital Repository at the University of Maryland; University of Maryland (College Park, Md.)Researchers and policymakers call for the integration of Computational Thinking (CT) into K-12 education to prepare students to participate in a society and workforce increasingly influenced by computational devices, algorithms, and methods. One avenue to meet this goal is to prepare teachers to integrate CT into elementary science education, where students can use CT by leveraging computing concepts to support scientific investigations. This study leverages data from a professional development (PD) series where teachers learned about CT, co-designed CT-integrated science lessons, implemented one final lesson plan in their classrooms, and reflected on their experience. This study aims to understand how teachers learned about CT and integrated it into their classroom, a process conceptualized as appropriation of CT (Grossman et al., 1999). This dissertation has two parts. The first investigates how teachers appropriated CT through inductive and deductive qualitative analyses of various data sources from the PD. The findings suggest that most teachers appropriated the labels of CT or only Surface features of CT as a pedagogical tool but did so in different ways. These differences are presented as five different profiles of appropriation that differ in how teachers described the activities that engage students in CT, ascribed goals to CT integration, and use technology tools for CT engagement. The second part leverages interviews with a subset of teachers aimed at capturing the relationship between appropriation of CT during the PD and the subsequent year. The cases of these five teachers suggest that appropriation styles were mostly consistent in the year after the PD. However, the cases detail how constraints in autonomy to make instructional decisions about science curriculum and evolving needs from students can greatly impact CT integration. Taken together, the findings of the dissertation suggest that social context plays an overarching role in impacting appropriation, with conceptual understanding and personal characteristics coming into play when the context for CT integration is set. The dissertation includes discussions around implications for PD designers, such as a call for reframing teacher knowledge and beliefs as part of a larger context impacting CT integration into schools.Item “IT’S BEEN A LONG JOURNEY”: EXPLORING THE IDENTITIES AND PEDAGOGY OF SECONDARY CRITICAL LITERACY EDUCATORS(2021) Murphy, Olivia Ann; Turner, Jennifer D; Curriculum and Instruction; Digital Repository at the University of Maryland; University of Maryland (College Park, Md.)Critical literacy—which I define briefly here as a lens that assumes no text is neutral and therefore an important goal of reading and writing is to evaluate and critique the power and perspectives that all texts contain—has been continuously well-theorized over the past half-century but is less frequently taught or studied in practice, especially in the United States. To help bridge this gap and to contribute to the conversation that identifies critical literacy as an invaluable approach to literacy education, this dissertation study is a qualitative multiple case study that investigated the teacher identities and pedagogies of five high school English Language Arts (ELA) teachers who self-identified as critical literacy educators. Using critical literacy theory to frame my understanding of teachers’ pedagogy and taking a sociocultural approach to understanding teacher identity, I sought to answer the following three questions: (1) How do critical literacy educators’ lived experiences inform their critical literacy teacher identities? (2) How do critical literacy educators’ identities inform their critical literacy pedagogy? and (3) What supports and/or challenges do critical literacy educators face when implementing critical literacy pedagogy, and how do they navigate challenges? To answer these questions I administered a survey to, collected teaching artifacts from, and conducted a series of in-depth interviews with each of my five participants. Analyses of these data indicated that participants’ critical literacy identities are largely the product of a variety of methods of self-selected professional development, and are deeply connected to social justice beliefs. To enact these identities and beliefs into practice, participants employed a number of student-centered classroom strategies to build students’ capacities to consider multiple perspectives and counternarrative stories, critique power in texts, and move towards taking social justice action. Finally, when enacting their critical literacy pedagogies, participants felt most supported by curricular freedom and self-selected professional development, and encountered the most challenges when it came to normative education elements that reflected dominant ideals such as suggested canonical texts and standardized testing requirements. The findings from this study have implications for critical literacy research, literacy teacher education, and K-12 schools, and include the importance of teaching critical literacy in theory and in practice across pre- and in-service teacher training, re-thinking the relationship between current standards and curriculum and critical literacy, and considering the value of curricular freedom in achieving critical literacy goals in K-12 classrooms.Item Investigating Resilience in the Context of Exclusionary Discipline(2021) Yang, Mei; McGloin, Jean; Criminology and Criminal Justice; Digital Repository at the University of Maryland; University of Maryland (College Park, Md.)Exclusionary school discipline is widely adopted by American schools. Existing literature documents that school suspension and expulsion are associated with subsequent negative outcomes including antisocial behaviors, substance use, and poor grades. Still, many students who get suspended or expelled do not exhibit these outcomes. Because it is hard to change the discipline structure entirely, it is important to understand why students respond to exclusionary discipline differently. The objective of the current dissertation is to move beyond negative outcomes of school discipline to explore predictors of resilience, that is, good outcomes, among youth who get excluded from school. Drawing on labeling theories, exclusionary discipline may promote negative outcomes by alienating people from conventional institutions. Therefore, the key to why many students demonstrate resilience after experiencing exclusionary discipline may lie in connections to conventional institutions. The current dissertation focuses on connections to two domains of conventional institutions among youth: parents and schools. Using data from the National Study of Adolescent to Adult Health, this dissertation explores whether parental attachment, parental support, school attachment, and school commitment predict resilience, measured as no involvement in delinquency or substance use and obtaining passing grades across all academic core courses. Furthermore, Black students may react to exclusionary discipline differently compared to White because of their overrepresentation in the use of exclusionary discipline and unique broader social environment they live in. As such, this dissertation also explores whether the relationship between the potential predictors and resilience differ by race. Results suggest that being suspended/expelled is associated with a higher likelihood of engaging in delinquency and substance use as well as a lower likelihood of obtaining passing grades across all core courses at a later time. However, the four types of connections to conventional institutions predict good outcomes in general instead of resilience distinctively for those who are suspended/expelled. It also appears that the four factors predict good outcomes better for the students who are not suspended/expelled at Wave I compared to those who are. Finally, race does not moderate the relationships between the four factors and resilience. However, school commitment appears to be a substantively stronger predictor of good outcomes for Black students regardless of discipline status. This dissertation has several important implications. First, it is important to understand the divergent paths that students take after receiving exclusionary discipline, and it is critical to explore the negative cases in criminological research in general in order to complete our understanding about risks and adversities. Second, because connections to conventional institutions appear to be less impactful on the students who have weaker connections to such institutions, it is important to strengthen their connections to these institutions so that parents and school can be more effective in exerting informal social control. Third, nurturing school commitment may be particularly beneficial for racial minorities; schools should pay attention to racial minority students’ race-related experiences. Last but not least, the negative outcomes associated with school suspension and expulsion suggest the importance of reforming the current discipline structure and seeking alternatives to exclusionary discipline. Future research may benefit from exploring heterogeneities in the application of exclusionary discipline and continuing seeking for alternatives to school exclusion. It would also be beneficial for future research to explore other potential factors of resilience in this context such as prosocial peers.Item AN EXPLORATORY STUDY OF THE PHENOMENA: GLOBALIZATION AND SCHOOL VIOLENCE, AND THE RELATIONSHIP BETWEEN THEM AS PERCEIVED BY VARIOUS STAKEHOLDERS FROM A SUBURBAN COMMUNITY IN TRINIDAD AND TOBAGO(2020) James, Veronica; Ginsburg, Mark; Klees, Steven; Education Policy, and Leadership; Digital Repository at the University of Maryland; University of Maryland (College Park, Md.)The present study is an exploratory one which investigates the perceptions of the members of a suburban community, Sanaata, in Trinidad and Tobago, regarding the phenomena, school violence, globalization, and the relationship between them. It seeks to answer the questions: 1. How does the community of Sanaata in Trinidad and Tobago perceive the phenomenon of school violence in the country? 2. How does the community of Sanaata perceive the phenomenon of globalization? 3. How does the community of Sanaata view the relationship between the two phenomena, globalization, and school violence? 4. What other factors (besides globalization) do various stakeholders in Sanaata perceive as contributing to school violence? Apart from the theoretical concepts of the local and global, colonialism and postcolonialism, and dominance and subordination, the study is also based on discourses and theories of macro-social development, ecological perspectives, and developmental behavior. I used qualitative methodology inquiry for the study, employing methods of open-ended interviews, questionnaires, (limited) participant observation and document analysis to collect data for the study. Students, teachers, parents, and community members living or working in the vicinity of School S and School U communicated their perspectives via interviews or self-administered questionnaires. The findings of the study reveal that the respondents of Sanaata perceive that globalization can influence children to engage in school violence. In addition to globalization, it was found that other factors can also act as triggers for school violence. These include home socialization of children, teasing and rough playing in school, verbal abuse, abuse in the home, drugs and crime in the community, lack of good role models and lack of social services in the neighborhoods.