College of Education
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The collections in this community comprise faculty research works, as well as graduate theses and dissertations..
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Item INVESTIGATING DISTRIBUTED LEADERSHIP PRACTICES OF ELEMENTARY PRINCIPALS IN A LARGE SCHOOL DISTRICT(2019) Williams, LaTonya C.; Eubanks, Segun; Education Policy, and Leadership; Digital Repository at the University of Maryland; University of Maryland (College Park, Md.)Over the past few decades, the job of school leadership has become increasingly more demanding, creating a need to further understand how principals utilize leadership practices that support them on the job. The purpose of this study was to identify the extent to which principals report distributing leadership responsibilities and tasks in their schools, the ways in which they distribute these responsibilities and tasks, and the extent to which teacher leaders are afforded opportunities to assume leadership responsibilities and tasks in their schools. The study also explored the barriers and supporting factors that contribute to implementing distributed leadership practices at the school level. This mixed-methods study utilized a web-based survey and semi-structured interviews to explore the following research questions: (1) To what extent do elementary principals report distributing leadership responsibilities and tasks to others in their schools? (2) What structures, processes, and tools do principals report using to distribute leadership in their schools? (3) To what extent do teacher leaders report assuming leadership responsibilities and tasks in their schools? (4) What do elementary principals perceive as the major barriers and supporting factors of implementing distributed leadership in their schools? During the 20182019 school year, 111 elementary school principals and 115 teacher leaders or Instructional Lead Teachers (ILTs) participated in the study. The principals and teachers were at comprehensive model schools serving grades PreK5 and PreK6. Findings from the study revealed principals distribute leadership to a variety of leaders in their buildings, specifically assistant principals and ILTs. Principals and teacher leaders both describe implementing organizational structures, processes, and tools to support distributed leadership in schools. Principals identified in both the survey and interview portion of the study reported that a lack of time to develop the capacity of teacher leaders, and to allow teacher leaders to practice leadership skills, was a major barrier to distributing leadership in schools. Data from principals showed that district level support was beneficial in helping principals engage in distributed leadership practices by providing professional development and other systemic initiatives that were implemented in their schools.Item AN INVESTIGATION INTO THE SUBJECTIVE EXCLUSIONARY DISCIPLINE PRACTICES IN A LARGE SCHOOL DISTRICT(2019) Walls, Anita C; Snell, Jean; McLaughlin, Margaret; Education Policy, and Leadership; Digital Repository at the University of Maryland; University of Maryland (College Park, Md.)The problem investigated for this dissertation was the overuse of exclusionary discipline practices across a large, suburban school district adjacent to a major metropolitan area. The purpose of this descriptive, mixed methods study was to examine within five elementary schools if and how student discipline referrals varied across the subgroups of grade, race/ethnicity, and gender, and the reasons teachers gave for subjective discipline referrals. In addition, this study inquired into principals’ processes for determining when a subjective student discipline referral warrants a suspension, and how their perspectives, beliefs, and experiences influence their use of exclusionary discipline actions. Student discipline referrals and suspension data were collected and reviewed from five elementary schools in Success Public Schools, as well as interviews from the principals in the identified schools. The findings from the examination of the sampling of classroom referrals and suspension data revealed that African American male students had two to three times as many student discipline referrals and suspensions as African American females in each school. Across the total population of all five schools for student discipline referrals, there were 49% for subjective offenses and 51% for objective offenses. In addition to examining the student discipline referrals, this study also investigated the principals’ beliefs. All of the principals who were interviewed for this study reported that they believe that suspensions should be implemented as a last resort and that alternatives should be considered, such as the following: after school detention, positive behavior intervention supports, and restorative practices. This study confirms and highlights that students who are referred for subjective discipline offenses are suspended from school about half of the time. In addition, descriptions of behaviors that triggered a discipline referral for a subjective offense reveal that the interpretation of student behaviors heavily relies on teachers’ judgements and their perceptions of what constitutes disrespect and disruption. Moreover, the study revealed that how administrators respond to subjective student discipline referrals varied from school to school.Item CULTURAL RESPONSIVENESS IN THE CONTEXT OF A LARGE URBAN SCHOOL DISTRICT: AN ANALYSIS OF MATH & ELA TEACHER PERCEPTIONS OF CULTURALLY RESPONSIVE PRACTICES IN TEACHING LATINA/O ELLs(2019) Beato, Carlos Manuel; Eubanks, Segun; McLaughlin, Margaret; Education Policy, and Leadership; Digital Repository at the University of Maryland; University of Maryland (College Park, Md.)Latina/o English language learners are not achieving at the same levels as their White and English speaking peers. Research shows that 63% of ELLs, in large part Latina/o, are graduating high school, compared to an 82% overall rate. This study aimed to gather Math and ELA teacher perceptions around teachers’ ability to implement culturally responsive strategies. The researcher sought to answer three questions: (1) How do secondary Math and ELA teachers in District A schools with large populations of Latina/o ELLs perceive their own capacity to serve linguistically diverse students in their classroom? (2) What are the culturally responsive pedagogical practices that secondary Math and ELA teachers say they currently use to support Latina/o ELLs in District A schools with large populations of Latina/o ELLs? (3) What are the gaps that Math and ELA teachers perceive that exist in District A with building teacher capacity in culturally responsive practices in schools that have large populations of Latina/o ELLs? Based on a review of the literature on cultural responsiveness, the researcher distributed a web-based survey on the Qualtrics platform to 133 Math and ELA teachers at six District A high schools. The researcher used 18 statements from the Culturally Responsive Teacher Preparedness Scale [CRTPS] to gauge teachers’ perceptions on their ability to implement culturally responsive strategies. Teachers recorded their levels of agreement with their perceived abilities on each statement on a five point Likert scale ranging from “strongly agree” to “strongly disagree.” Teachers were also invited to participate in a focus group to gather specific examples of culturally responsive practices being implemented. Analysis of the survey indicated that teachers perceive to have the capacity to implement culturally responsive practices. The focus group, however, illustrated a need for deeper understanding of culturally responsive practices and how/when/where to implement them. On this basis, the researcher recommends that District A implement a collection of self-assessment data from all teachers that teach Latina/o ELL students, a curriculum review across major content areas, and the development of a network improvement community that addresses Latina/o ELL needs. Further research is needed in order to determine the influence of culturally responsive practices on academic achievement.Item Wording their own worlds: A phenomenological exploration of teachers' lived experiences of teacher leadership(2019) Hamilton, Kristin Buckstad; Hultgren, Francine H.; Curriculum and Instruction; Digital Repository at the University of Maryland; University of Maryland (College Park, Md.)Teacher leadership remains prominent in policy, career ladder programs, research, and professional discourse, yet few studies center what teacher leadership is like for teachers or what teachers are seeking when they construct their own career pathways. This gap is important to address. Teacher dissatisfaction certainly leads to recruitment and attrition challenges, but there is also an imperative for education as a human institution to attend to teachers’ needs. This study describes the lived experiences six teachers and the author had of teacher leadership. Following the methodology of hermeneutic phenomenology as articulated by Heidegger, Gadamer, and van Manen, participant descriptions and other lifeworld texts are analyzed to render themes that evoke the lived bodies, time, spaces, and relationships of teacher leadership. Metaphorically, teacher leaders travel into between-spaces, across borders, and over edges in response to their callings. Teachers experience teacher leadership bodily, insatiably growing and enacting pedagogic knowledge. They experience leadership as a following of a pedagogic need that compels them. They navigate the world with finely tuned sense-abilities that perceive what students, teachers, and pedagogy need. Lastly, they experience leadership relationally, feeling connected with other teachers near and far. Teachers in this study also experience a profound tension. The decision to accept new responsibilities as their professional vision expands is rooted in their being as a teacher, whether the roles are in the classroom or not. Yet, teacher leadership asks them (via policy, titles, and other cultural signals) to replace their teacher identities with teacher leader or educational leader identities. The teacher leader name does not always feel right to them. The final chapter of the study invites us to wonder about expanding the teaching profession’s scope in a way that resonates with teachers. In a world where “teachership”—the state of being a teacher, just as leadership is the state of being a leader—is recognized, the name “teacher” would be expansive enough to invoke all the opportunities teachers seek in pedagogy’s name. The study explores implications for a profession that empowers itself to claim teachers’ right of participation as teachers in other worlds within education.Item An Analysis of a Project Management Oversight Committee as a School Improvement Model in One School District(2018) Alston, Anthony Reginal; Imig, David G; Education Policy, and Leadership; Digital Repository at the University of Maryland; University of Maryland (College Park, Md.)There are persistent and significant gaps in performance between various racial and ethnic sub-groups, particularly between African American and White groups of students, on both state assessments and discipline measures (Rothstein, 2014). Effectively closing the gap requires improving the performance of all students while accelerating the achievement of low-performing student groups in order to catch up to their higher-performing peers. Researchers have found that a variety of school, community, economic and familial factors correlate with low student performance and the achievement gap, but views are mixed on how to improve performance for all and narrow the gap (Alliance for Excellence Education, 1999; Cancian & Danziger, 2009; Jacob & Ludwig, 2009; Janet, 1999; Mitra, 2011; Organization for Economic Co-Operation (OECD), 2012). Over the past decade, federal, state and local policies have made the improvement of low-performing schools and the closing of the achievement gap a top priority. This descriptive quantitative study focused on the efforts of one Mid-Atlantic system to address low performance among certain groups of students using a Project Management Oversight Committee (PMOC) model. The model utilizes data and a heightened level of accountability to yield quick, yet sustainable growth and progress. For this study seven schools (three high schools, two middle schools and two elementary schools) were identified as a result of persistent participation in the process. The academic and discipline data were reviewed to determine trends in performance. In addition to the achievement and demographic data, a satisfaction survey was reviewed to understand the impact of the PMOC process in improving low student performance. Analysis of the data did not find any relational impact upon achievement data. Although the PMOC process did not have the promised impact, it does not deminsh the possibilty that there were gains that would not have occured if the process had not been used. Based on these findings,it is recommended that the system consider allocating funding for further studies to examine the impact of the PMOC process.Item An Investigation of the Perceptions of Ninth Grade Latino Male Students on Factors that Impact ther School Success(2018) Briscoe, Janice; Fabian, Ellen; Education Policy, and Leadership; Digital Repository at the University of Maryland; University of Maryland (College Park, Md.)The high school dropout rate is a crisis for the nation, states and local school districts. While District X, a large urban/suburban district in the Mid-Atlantic region graduation rate increased, the Latino subgroup reflected a gap of 11 percentage points. Most of the students in this subgroup are males. This qualitative study investigated the perceptions of 29 Latino male ninth grade students in three District X high schools based on their Early Warning Indicator Report (EWIR) band-green (low risk) or red (high-risk) that support or challenge their successful school engagement and school completion. Further, the study examined the internal pushout, external pullout and supportive pull factors that contribute to or hinder Latino males’ school engagement to increase the number of Latino male high school graduates. Five forty-five minute focus group sessions were conducted. The students completed a nine question demographic survey and responded to a 12 question query to questions regarding their perceptions of the internal, external and supportive factors that support or hinder their school engagement. Using NVivo to analyze responses from the five focus groups, eight main themes were identified Overall, the findings pointed out that green (low risk) were more critical and reflective than their red (high risk) and mixed group peers in each of the eight themes including negative personal outlook.Item Perspectives of 1st and 2nd Grade Parents about Enrolling their Children in Public Specialty or Charter Schools(2018) Dimmie, Carol; McLaughlin, Margaret J; Education Policy, and Leadership; Digital Repository at the University of Maryland; University of Maryland (College Park, Md.)This qualitative study explored the awareness and perceptions of a select group of parents about specialty and charter school offerings in a large countywide school system in a mid-Atlantic state. The study utilized focus groups as the primary source of data collection to obtain information from parents about their knowledge and opinion of current specialty program offerings in the district. In addition, the investigation also asked parents, what additional public school choices if any they would they like to see. The research was guided by three primary research questions: How knowledgeable are selected elementary school parents about available non-traditional public school options? What features of non-traditional public school options do parents perceive as desirable/undesirable? What do parents report as potential or actual motivators for seeking to enroll one or more of their children in a non-traditional public school? Four cross-cutting themes emerged during the four focus groups: parents had limited and unreliable information about FUSD specialty and charter schools; parents preferences for program features stressed academic rigor, language immersion and parental engagement; and location of a specialty school and the lottery process were viewed as deterrents to parents’ choosing a school. The information shared by the parents were coded and analyzed. The data generated from the focus group conversations indicate: information about how to access specialty and charter schools was most commonly learned from friends, family or co-workers; the most common desirable features and/or attributes identified by most of the parents were: STEM focused schools, college preparatory curriculums and language focused schools; parents were unaware of all the options in FUSD or how to access them and the desire for schools that supported strong parental engagementItem THE PRINCIPAL’S ROLE AND IMPACT ON TEACHER ATTRITION IN AN URBAN SCHOOL DISTRICT: THE RELATIONSHIP BETWEEN THE VANDERBILT ASSESSMENT OF LEADERSHIP IN EDUCATION (VAL-ED) RATINGS AND TEACHER ATTRITION.(2018) Ashworth, Megan; Richardson, Pat; Education Policy, and Leadership; Digital Repository at the University of Maryland; University of Maryland (College Park, Md.)The most significant factor that influences student achievement is the quality and commitment of the teachers who are providing rigorous instruction. As efforts to recruit more individuals into the teaching profession have been successful, determining how to keep highly qualified teachers who provide meaningful and effective instruction remains a concern. According to the U.S. Department of Education, teacher attrition is a local, state, and national problem. Principals play a key role in improving the quality of instruction in their schools through their daily instructional leadership behaviors. If teacher attrition across the United States is going to decrease, principals will be one of the key factors to making this a reality. Discovery Education recently developed the Vanderbilt Assessment of Leadership in Education (VAL-ED) tool, which holds the potential to improve academic and social learning for students as well as supporting the teachers who are providing high-quality education. The purpose of this study was to determine whether there is a correlation between learning-centered leadership behaviors (average score measured on the VAL-ED assessment) and the teacher attrition percentages that determine whether teachers remain in a school longer than 5 years. In addition, the researcher wanted to determine whether there was a correlation between the core components of culture of learning and professional behavior as well as connections to external communities and teacher attrition percentages in an urban school district which are both core components within the VAL-ED tool inclusive of the development of a positive school culture which supports teachers. Findings that emerged from the analysis revealed a moderately significant relationship between attrition percentages and overall scores on the VAL-ED assessment and the VAL-ED scores on the core component culture of learning and professional behavior. According to the study, higher overall effectiveness ratings on the VAL-ED tool had moderately significant associations with lower teacher turnover rates, and culture of learning and professional behavior VAL-ED scores had moderately significant associations with lower teacher turnover rates. Last, connections to external communities scores on VAL-ED had associations with lower teacher turnover rates, but the relationship was not significant.Item IMPLEMENTING FULL-TIME GIFTED AND TALENTED PROGRAMS IN TITLE 1 SCHOOLS: REASONS, BENEFITS, CHALLENGES AND OPPORTUNITY COSTS(2018) Tempel-Milner, Megan Elizabeth; Croninger, Robert G; Education Policy, and Leadership; Digital Repository at the University of Maryland; University of Maryland (College Park, Md.)This collective-case study examined the implementation of community-based, full-time gifted and talented programs in three Title 1 schools within a large school system. It investigated the reasons for, perceived benefits of, challenges of, and opportunity costs of implementing full-time gifted programs in Title 1 schools. The findings from the study reveal that the community-based, full-time gifted program directly contrasts the pedagogical beliefs and instructional practices associated with Martin Haberman's pedagogy of poverty, which was the theoretical framework for this study. The program goes against the belief that students from low-income families need basic, low-level styles of teaching, and moves to a belief that students from low-income families need access to rigorous educational opportunities, similar to their more affluent peers (Haberman, 2010). The community-based program started as a way to retain students in local schools, which lessened accountability pressures at the school, as well as, provided access to gifted services for students who qualified without having to leave the community school. However, the community-based, full-time gifted program became more than a targeted program for high-ability students, as it became a culture shift across the three high-poverty schools. The full-time gifted program became an avenue to access needed rigorous, enriched, and accelerated learning opportunities which are not prevalent in many Title 1 schools in the country. The program changed instructional practices to that of high-level, hands-on, student-centered, problem-solving activities, instead of remediation and reliance on basic skills for not only the students in the full-time gifted class but across the whole school. It opened access for students who live in poverty, where typically low-income students are underserved for gifted services, which has long-term effects on their academic achievement. The schools relied on strong principal leadership and vision to guide the program, and the program was supplemented by Title 1 funds to finance staff positions that support gifted beliefs and practices, professional development, investment in curriculum resources. Across all unique cases, the budgetary and philosophy-shift challenges associated with implementing the program were outweighed by the benefits of the program.Item WHY DO THEY STAY? A STUDY OF HIGH SCHOOL MATH AND SCIENCE TEACHERS’ PERCEPTIONS OF WORKING CONDITION FACTORS IN A LARGE URBAN SCHOOL DISTRICT(2018) Laney, Nathaniel Richard; Richardson, Patricia M; Education Policy, and Leadership; Digital Repository at the University of Maryland; University of Maryland (College Park, Md.)In most U.S. school districts, a number of teachers are leaving the profession, and more specifically, math and science teachers. Moreover, school work conditions are important predictors of teacher attrition and it is important to understand both when and how these conditions affect teachers. The purpose of this mixed methods study design was to explore the extent high school mathematics and science teachers perceive the importance of specific working conditions and the principals control level in a large, urban, mid-Atlantic school district. Using purposive sampling the quantitative data collected used an anonymous web based survey distributed to 246 high school math and science teachers at eight high schools while using six items to collect background information (gender, ethnicity, years of teaching experience, certification status, current position, and grade level currently being taught). The qualitative data collected were face-to-face interviews with the eight high school principals for augmenting the survey data with layered and detailed expressions specifically pertaining to teacher retention. The results of the study indicate; teachers perceive pedagogical matters as the most important factors to teacher retention and that principals have a high level of control over the physical plant of a school as a working condition factor that may influence retention. In contrast, the principal identified that they have little to no influence on the physical plant and that it could be a factor to teacher retention for their specific school. However, all of the principals identified professional development and support as working condition factors that were important to teacher retention and that the responsibility was completely under their purview.