Thesis (Ph. D.)--University of Missouri-Columbia, 2002. / Typescript. Vita. Includes bibliographical references (leaves 140-149). Also available on the Internet.

Thesis (Ph. D.)--University of Texas at Austin, 1998. / Vita. Includes bibliographical references (leaves 153-168). Available also in a digital version from Dissertation Abstracts.

Thesis (M.Ed.)--University of Hong Kong, 1998. / Letter to the parents also in Chinese. Includes bibliographical references (leaves 125-139). Also available in print.

Thesis (Ed. D.)--University of West Florida, 2003. / Title from title page of source document. Includes bibliographical references.

abstract: This dissertation is based on an empirical study that focused on student reenrollment, an essential but largely overlooked element of school choice policies. Based on the school choice literature, I extended the hypothesis of parental charter school choice to the subject of reenrollment. In doing so, I referred jointly to theories from the fields of public choice and business, in order to better understand student reenrollment in a maturing education market. By tracking student enrollment records over multiples years and linking them to school attributes (socio-economic status, racial/ethnic composition of the student body, school quality label), student demographics, and student academic performance, I established a complex student reenrollment database. I applied a rigorous statistical model to this data, allowing me to identify a number of important insights about student reenrollment in a maturing education market. I described the reenrollment patterns at the state level, as well as a predictive model of reenrollment outcome at the individual level. My analyses indicate that student reenrollment was the most common school choice outcome: most students reenrolled in their present schools, regardless of that school's quality label; however, the student reenrollment rates in charter schools were lower than those in traditional public schools. I observed patterns of segregation in student reenrollment within Arizona, as reenrollment appeared to be significantly polarized with respect to school attributes and students' characteristics. There were two distinct patterns that appeared to coexist in Arizona's student reenrollment data: quality-oriented reenrollment and similarity-oriented reenrollment. The findings of this study extend the school choice literature to include student reenrollment. This study challenges the application of market metaphors in the context of school choice, which generally advocate the reform of public schools through encouraging students to switch, promoting school competition and thereby improving public education quality. Instead of using command and control policies to shame schools into improvement, however, policymakers and parents should employ school accountability policies and the practice of school labeling as a trigger to reinvest in struggling schools, rather than encouraging students to find a new one. / Dissertation/Thesis / Ph.D. Educational Leadership and Policy Studies 2012

Authorities in early childhood education and child development point out the importance of the early years of a child's life in the development of habits and attitudes which are important as the basis of his mental and emotional health. / Typescript. / "January, 1960." / "Submitted to the Graduate Council of Florida State University in partial fulfillment of the requirements for the degree of Master of Science." / Advisor: Sarah Lou Hammond, Professor Directing Paper. / Includes bibliographical references (leaves 39-40).

Charter schools have become a widely accepted and rapidly growing option for educational reform especially for low-income, inner-city students. In Los Angeles, the charter movement has promised teachers greater autonomy and collaboration than in the traditional public schools, yet the working conditions of teachers in charter schools have weakened the conditions for this movement to truly reform public education. By using a neoliberal theoretical framework and a qualitative case study design, this study captured the voices of charter school teachers and documented their beliefs and experiences in an environment shaped by a culture of choice. This study uncovered a) the culture and environment that led teachers to seek unionization, b) the relationships between teachers and management, and c) their model of unionism. The participants’ voices detailed a collaborative culture that lured teachers to escape the negative environment in the local district schools. Still, teachers faced an exhaustive workload and they chose to leave the charter school environment. Teachers valued their autonomy while not realizing that the true choice existed only for the management of the school that had the ultimate power over their working conditions. When teachers decided to unionize they faced antagonism from their school leaders, and a backlash for their involvement in the unionization. Teachers fell prey to the intimidation of the public’s perception on tenure and gave up this fundamental protection. They also moved away from the traditional model and were left without a clear understanding of what being a union meant.

Thesis (M. Ed.)--University of Hong Kong, 1984. / Includes bibliographical references (leaf 73-75).

Thesis (M.Ed.)--University of Hong Kong, 1984. / Includes bibliographical references (leaves 73-75). Also available in print.

School choice is touted to alleviate inequities in students' schooling experiences. It is seen as a way out of under-performing neighborhood schools. However, it can be challenging for marginalized students to leave their neighborhood school and transfer into a school of their choice. The reason for this challenge is the inequitable opportunities surrounding school choice, such as elite charter schools located outside of city centers and credit-recovery schools targeting marginalized youth (Garcia, 2008). As marginalized students try to navigate the school choice landscape, they may engage in sequences of transfers increasing the chance that they will ultimately drop out. Since most school choice research explores student experiences using quantitative research, general school mobility patterns and outcomes are understood. What is not well established is the individual student's more nuanced experiences engaging in school choice, the choices they make, and the resulting outcome, particularly for marginalized youth. Additionally, little research has explored the impact of transferring on students' mathematical learning. This dissertation examined how highly mobile, marginalized youth described their experiences transferring schools and learning mathematics. This study used an analytic framework that foregrounded students' empowerment, their ability to achieve their goals. The framework focuses on agency and opportunity structures as key components of empowerment. This framework was used to examine three highly mobile, marginalized youths' experiences engaging in school choice and learning mathematics. This analysis of empowerment highlighted the challenging opportunity structures these youth faced when engaging in school choice and the assets they utilized in making decisions. It also identified important opportunity structures that supported, or hindered, these students' mathematical learning. Finally, the resulting empowerment (both mathematical and school choice empowerment) that these students' experienced was examined. The findings demonstrate the complexity of engaging in school choice and reveal both challenges and successes engaging in school choice and mathematical learning. The school choice findings indicate that students may be falsely empowered when engaging in school choice, they may engage in new chance transfers offering them a new start, and/or they may increase their mobility by "trying on schools" for a good fit. The mathematical findings suggest that students may experience mathematical learning empowerment and/or earning empowerment, and that recognizing this difference is important; develop a procedural understanding of mathematics that may create further challenges as highly mobile youth transfer schools; and experience productive opportunity structures that may be essential in supporting students' mathematical empowerment. The findings suggest important implications for highly mobile marginalized youths' mathematical achievement, school choice policy, and further research. Specifically, the findings suggest the importance of using a framework that examines opportunity structures, assets, and empowerment to better understand and support students' engagement in school choice.