An educator is more than a person who just transmits knowledge. An educator plays many different roles in the lives of learners, colleagues and their immediate community. Educators have the opportunity to influence the community, develop learners holistically, create lifelong learners and reflective thinkers. For an educator to demonstrate such competence across a range of teaching roles and contexts, a vast range of operational competencies are required. The purpose of this study was to examine secondary school educators‟ perceptions of the operational competencies required to function in public schools. The literature study explored the roles of the educator and the operational competencies needed to function in a secondary school. A quantitative survey in the form of a questionnaire was used in the study to analyse the level of agreement that educators attached to certain operational competencies. The level of agreement indicated by the educators is likely to indicate the level of importance that they attach to the operational competency. A probability sampling technique in the form of simple random sampling was used in this study. Random samples were drawn from educators in secondary public schools in the Fezile Dabi and Sedibeng districts. A sample size of 280 educators was used. Of the 280 questionnaires that were administered, 49 were not returned and 20 were incomplete, resulting in 211 usable questionnaires. The results of the survey indicated that the competency factors that educators perceived to be of importance were: communication and behaviour management, interpersonal relationships, planning and assessment, leadership skills and perseverance and organisational commitment. The level of correlation of these identified factors with teaching satisfaction was also assessed- indicating that interpersonal relationships had the highest correlation with teaching satisfaction and factors like planning and assessment, organisational commitment and communication and behaviour management had a moderate influence on teaching satisfaction. v Leadership skills and perseverance do not have a great influence on teaching satisfaction. The value of the research is that it makes a useful contribution for planners in the Department of Education of South Africa by making them aware of the operational competencies required by educators in public schools. The results of the research could be used to develop the operational competencies that are not perceived by educators to be of importance and to enhance the teaching satisfaction of educators.

Thesis (Ed.D.)--Boston University / PLEASE NOTE: Boston University Libraries did not receive an Authorization To Manage form for this thesis or dissertation. It is therefore not openly accessible, though it may be available by request. If you are the author or principal advisor of this work and would like to request open access for it, please contact us at open-help@bu.edu. Thank you. / An elementary school principal writes an historical analysis of a thirty-year period of growing immigration and changing education policy in Chelsea, Massachusetts, a city located near Boston. The history examines the years 1890-1920 and the transformation of an urban public school system, including its policies and practices regarding the education of immigrant, non-English-speaking children. Comparisons are made with immigration and the New York City public schools during the same years. A literature review of language policies and the schooling of immigrant children in New York one hundred years ago sheds light on past and present experiences of language-minority students. Attention is given to changing notions of assimilation and Americanization in U.S. society; to the teaching of English and the role of native-language maintenance in defining an ethnic-American identity; and to educational achievement and mobility rates among Russian Jewish and Southern Italian immigrants and their descendants a century ago, and among Hispanic immigrants today. Related questions include: What was the response ofthe New York City and Chelsea public schools to the task of educating immigrant children and how did this change over time? What educational options were available to the increasing immigrant populations? What attitudes and expectations did immigrants and educators have of one another in terms of public school education? How does the historical and sociological evidence confirm or deny the perception of "academic success" and "educational attainment" of immigrants in New York City and the Chelsea Public Schools at the turn of the 20th century? Earlier developments in education policy petiaining to immigration in Chelsea are compared with recent trends, including English literacy, bilingual education, teacher quality, curriculum, school facilities, class size, testing and standards, and graduation rates. The researcher used a mixed-method study of both quantitative and qualitative sources. As an extended reflection and interpretive synthesis, the paper draws from the vast literature on past and present immigration. Sources are varied, from historical accounts of immigrants, to census and school department reports, newspaper reports, statistical surveys, student essays and speeches, and several novels, memoirs, and biographies. / 2031-01-01

Digitized by Kansas Correctional Industries

Thesis (Ed.D.)--Boston University / PLEASE NOTE: Boston University Libraries did not receive an Authorization To Manage form for this thesis or dissertation. It is therefore not openly accessible, though it may be available by request. If you are the author or principal advisor of this work and would like to request open access for it, please contact us at open-help@bu.edu. Thank you. / 2031-01-01

My dissertation examines the distrust and trust that New York City African-American parents place in schools at a moment when market-based education policies and gentrification are transforming the landscape of public schools in many historically Black urban communities. In my study, I tease apart how the nature of parent trust in local public schools might be different from the nature of trust in the institution of public schooling or faith in public education, as Black parents may expect different things from the local school and the school system. I also explore how trust or distrust in parent-school relationships develops, by treating trusting as a dynamic process, shaped by past socialization and experiences, as well as current experiences with schools. I examine parents’ accounts of critical moments in their relationship with their child’s schools; such as finding and enrolling their children in a new school, impressions of teaching and classroom management and to what extent schools respected their parent involvement. I find that the parent-school relationship develops different for Black parents who send their children to traditional public schools and charter schools, but that in general, the parent perceptions of schools’ lack of care for Black children and lack of respect for Black parents are what drives distrust. By examining how trust in public schools might develop uniquely for Black Americans, my study develops treatments of trust in education research and theory by challenging the functionalist and power-neutral assumption that trust in schools is inherently constructive. By centering the perspectives of Black parents to better understand how legacies of institutional racism impede the development of trust in schools, I highlight how these normative assumptions about parent trust in schools often elide the role of socio-cultural exclusion, power asymmetries, discrimination, and a legacy of institutional racism and neglect—across many institutional contexts—that foreground orientations of parents of color toward educators and schools. Indeed, it is often prudent for Black parents to distrust schools and educators in order to protect their children because they have not been trustworthy. In addition, my study also illuminates whether changing urban school systems are deemed legitimate in the eyes of the public, and what kinds of parent-school relationships can foster greater trust.

Currently, in the United States, there is an urgency to address the perceived failure of contemporary public schools to educate diverse populations. This sense of failure is propped up by performance discrepancies between White, middle-class youth and low-income, including most often, youth of color. This disparity, frequently referred to as "the achievement gap," drives mandatory school improvement policies and practices designed to improve outcomes for underperforming, sub-categorically, school populations. Amid these interrelated policies and practices, all of which are dependent upon assumptions requiring predictability, generalizability, and stability as characteristics of sub-populations and their constituent subjects, the racial divide and the economic gap have been re-coded in terms of differences in exam scores (Taubman, 2009, p. 154). One significant implication of populational reasoning as recently deployed in contemporary U.S. public schools is that teachers-frequently White, middle-class women-are increasingly attributed with a categorical bias that "has increasingly served as a possible explanation [emphasis added] for the 'achievement gap,'" rather than as a contributing factor embedded in "demographic factors … far more complex than [previously] indicated" in education research (Farkas 2004, as cited in Takei & Shouse, 2007, p. 368; Ferguson, 1998; Perry, 2003). In this way, the frequent failures and non-proficiencies of both teachers and students, key components of crisis discourses, are often attributed to simplistically applied and unexamined "racial asymmetry" (p. 368) and undesirably framed within a "cultural and demographic mismatch" (Grant & Gibson, 2011, p. 25). In order to trouble commonsensical conceptualizations of this mismatch, this conceptual study works toward re-theorizing the mismatch as both a concept and as a subject-glomming "hub" in schools and society in ways that articulate difference differently. By diffracting feminist, new materialist and poststructural theories of subjectivity through the material discursive fields surrounding a contemporary work of art and a post-industrial city, notions of diffraction, as both a methodological tool and as a concept, are developed. Experimenting with the notion of concept as method, "mismatched" subjects are re-presented as non-individuated subjectivities that emerge within ever-changing material/discursive fields.

The research outlined in this thesis explores the issue of the effective principal through the perceptions of a sample of senior primary aged school students. The study originated due to a concern that too much of the current literature concerning effective schools and effective principals relies on the views of significant adults. Given that students are the focus of the school's and principal's energy it is difficult to understand why their views have not been sought more frequently. This study was initiated and conducted in an effort to determine what is was that students expected of the effective principal. The research is based on content analysis of the written responses from a sample of one hundred and ninety five senior primary aged school students aged between ten and twelve years from an education district in an education region of the New South Wales Public School System and in addition one to one interviews with a group of thirty students. The analysis resulted in the development of two sets of descriptors. One set of descriptors outline the fourteen most significant Behaviour Descriptors of the effective principal as perceived by the senior primary aged students surveyed while the other set outlines the eleven most significant Quality Descriptors of the effective principal. These two sets of descriptors of the effective principal have much support in the effective schools research. One area notably different however is the emphasis given by the students to the need for the principal to develop positive, warm and caring relationships with each student in the school. Although students were realistic in their understanding of what this implied they were adamant and consistent in their desire for such a relationship in order that the principal be deemed effective. The results of the study provide specific, clear, unambiguous descriptions of behaviours and qualities expected of the effective principal by the students surveyed. The descriptors are presented in a manner useful to practitioners.

Thesis (D.Min.)--Liberty Theological Seminary and Graduate School, 2007.

The purpose of this study was to determine the influence discipline has on teaching at public schools. In chapter 2 of the literature study, the researcher focused on aspects that influence discipline at school. In chapter 3, she also looked at education law aspects that have a direct influence on education. Two structured questionnaires were used in the quantitative research. These questionnaires were distributed separately between educators and learners at nine schools of the Free State Department of Education's Fezile Dabi District. From the findings of this study, it is clear that discipline indeed has an enormous influence on teaching at public schools. The Constitution (1996) and Schools Act (84/1996) make the application of effective discipline at schools possible. / Thesis (M.Ed. (Education Law))--North-West University, Vaal Triangle Campus, 2008.

There is an increased use of public e-services integrating citizens into public administration through electronic interfaces. The relation among parents and public schools is a daily and important relation that has to be trustworthy. On-line interaction among public organizations and citizens can be seen as e-government, indeed embedded into daily practices. A safe entry into such systems is essential for security and trust in the e-governmental systems and schools as well as public services in general. This paper addresses how electronic identification has been used for access to public e-services in schools in a Swedish municipality. The aim of the paper is to present a case study on how electronic identification is used and implemented in ICT platforms in schools. The analysis focuses on information security, organization and potential development of the platforms. The main finding in the case study is that there was an un-organized presentation of information in the system; both general and personal information had to be accessed with the same level of security (identification systems). The organization of identification and access to public e-services seemed highly dependent of the organizational structure of the public schools. The more general implication is that safe and well organized identification systems that are considered as trustworthy and useful among citizens are essential for increased use of the services and legitimate public e-services in general. / FUSe: Framtidens säkra elektroniska identifiering – framväxt och användning av e-legitimationer