Doctor of Philosophy / Curriculum & Instruction Programs / Kay Ann Taylor / African American males have the second highest dropout rate in this Midwest state‘s largest public school district. Often, African American male students take an abundance of elective classes but do not complete core classes that guarantee a diploma. This study documented and analyzed the experiences of African American male students who completed or attempted to complete their high school diplomas in an alternative setting. The study is significant because it reveals the importance of how time is structured in an alternative educational setting; it discloses the pervasiveness of racism in public education, and it exposes the widespread stereotyping of African American males by teachers and other authority figures. African American male students who have attended both traditional and alternative public schools have been overlooked in previous research. Self-ethnography comprised the methodology. The intersectionality of gender, race, grades, racism, athletic involvement, law, and relationships formed a crucial paradigm of this investigation. Research findings include: (a) the major difference between traditional public and alternative schools is how time is structured, (b) African American males believe that they often are stereotyped, (c) high school athletes receive special privileges that they see later as obstacles, (d) African American males sometimes deliberately assume a pleasing demeanor toward teachers, (e) African American male students respond positively to teachers who conduct themselves with clear purpose, (f) African American males returning to school for high school credit recovery demonstrate tenacity and resist stereotypes. The cornerstone tenets of CRT—racism is the norm, interest convergence, and the need for social justice for oppressed groups—were evident in the findings of the frequency of stereotyping and treatment of African American male high school athletes. In the interest of social justice for African American male students, it is recommended that teachers are provided with the following information: (a) how to avoid consciously stereotyping; (b) that African American males make conscious efforts to be approachable; (c) how to make necessary changes involving their authority. Recommended future research for African American males includes: (a) how the construction of time in traditional public schools affects their credit acquisition; (b) communication between the counseling and athletic departments; (c) the impact of athletic involvement on academics.

A credit recovery (CR) program was implemented at a rural high school in Texas to assist with high school completion. While graduation rates increased, the time for completion also increased for students in the CR program. The purposes of this correlational study were to examine factors that impact student learning in the CR program and to determine whether teachers were implementing student-centered instruction. Piaget's constructivist theory provided the framework for the study. The guiding question was to examine the relationships between student achievement and classroom environment, active learning, attendance, and student success from those enrolled in the credit recovery class at the target high school. A sample of 103 students in Grades 9-12 completed a 65-item Likert-scale customized form of the What Is Happening in the Classroom (WIHIC) survey with subscales in classroom environment, active learning strategies, student motivation, and student success. A correlational analysis was conducted using scores from the state assessment test, attendance data, and scores from the WIHIC. Results showed no statistically significant relationships among the variables. Based on these findings, a professional development program was crafted to assist teachers at the study site with writing CR curriculum to better align with the Texas Essential Knowledge and Skills and to include more hands-on constructivist learning activities. Implications for positive social change include the potential to improve secondary students' academic outcomes.

The purpose of this dissertation in practice is to address the problem of online credit recovery. Although online enrollments have skyrocketed in recent years and all preliminary research indicates a large percentage of those enrollments are from students seeking credit recovery, much of the curriculum currently being offered is not research-based. Following a literature review focused on the history of credit recovery as well as successful current methods, we designed CRIT (Credit Recovery Instructional Treatment), a research-based approach to curriculum design for credit recovery. CRIT is a standards based curriculum relying on criterion based assessments. This approach was then applied in the creation of specific curriculum for English 4 credit recovery and as a general approach for all subjects. A step by step evaluation plan for current and proposed approaches for credit recovery was then defined. Additionally, we provide a detailed implementation strategy specific to our organization but easily retrofitted for other organizations. We focus on the organization of Florida Virtual School (FLVS), a state run K-12 virtual school run as a special school district in Florida because it is a familiar organization; however, the model and results may be generalizable for online or traditional education.

The purpose of this dissertation in practice is to address the problem of online credit recovery. Although online enrollments have skyrocketed in recent years and all preliminary research indicates a large percentage of those enrollments are from students seeking credit recovery, much of the curriculum currently being offered is not research-based. Following a literature review focused on the history of credit recovery as well as successful current methods, we designed CRIT (Credit Recovery Instructional Treatment), a research-based approach to curriculum design for credit recovery. CRIT is a standards based curriculum relying on criterion based assessments. This approach was then applied in the creation of specific curriculum for English 4 credit recovery and as a general approach for all subjects. A step by step evaluation plan for current and proposed approaches for credit recovery was then defined. Additionally, we provide a detailed implementation strategy specific to our organization but easily retrofitted for other organizations. We focus on the organization of Florida Virtual School (FLVS), a state run K-12 virtual school run as a special school district in Florida because it is a familiar organization; however, the model and results may be generalizable for online or traditional education.

High schools in the United States are facing increased scrutiny to increase the number of students graduating with a diploma in four years. This pressure comes from many sources. First, the No Child Left Behind Act instituted graduation as a measure of a high school’s success at the federal level. States soon followed by increasing accountability in this area. Differences in how graduation rates were measured and advancements in data tracking technology led to many states measuring cohort groups of students who enter high school in the ninth grade and tracking them to see how many graduate in four years. This measure became known as an on-time graduation rate and, in many states, became a measure used to determine high schools’ accreditation. School districts responded to these changes in accountability by instituting new programs designed to increase graduation rates and decrease the number of students dropping out. One type of program that has increased in popularity across the country is the online credit recovery program. Online credit recovery programs utilize an asynchronous online learning platform that is designed for students who are repeating a course they failed in a traditional classroom setting. Features of an online credit recovery program include a one-to-one learning environment where students interact with digital curriculum that includes text, audio, video, and graphic information. Online credit recovery courses are designed so that students can demonstrate mastery of known content quickly and focus on material they did not master the first time they took the course. This instructional approach, along with the asynchronous design that allows students to work through course content at their own pace, enables students to earn a course credit in a reduced period of time. The purpose of the current study was to capture the perceptions of students who are enrolled in an online credit recovery program. The goal of the study to document what factors they believed contributed to their success. The study was driven by research questions which sought to analyze the (1) factors students attributed to their success in the online credit recovery program, (2) perceived chances of graduating from high school on-time after successfully completing the course, (3) relationship between the credit recovery course and the one-to-one laptop computing initiative supported by the school district, and (4) online learning environment of the credit recovery program, as compared to a traditional classroom setting. A qualitative, phenomenological, design was used to explore the research questions. Twenty retained ninth grade students were interviewed. Ten came from each of the two schools that first implemented the online credit recovery program in the school district. The researcher inductively coded these interviews which allowed themes to emerge through the voices of these students. These themes included a sense of control of the learning environment in the online credit recovery program that students did not feel in a regular classroom. This control was manifested by the self-paced, distraction-free, learning environment that was enhanced by the district’s one-to-one laptop computing initiative. Also, increased and varied opportunities to demonstrate mastery fostered this sense of control. Another major theme that emerged is that students believed that their chances to graduate on-time were improved because they were able to earn a credit in a course quickly that they had previously failed. The ability to recovery this credit allowed students to avoid traditional credit recovery options in which they felt they would not be successful. Students also perceived that they would continue to experience success if they were allowed to take other courses through the online credit recovery program.

This study examined the relationship between credit recovery outcomes and select causal factors. In this study, credit recovery was defined as the extent to which students successfully complete the following courses: coordinate algebra, biology, physical science, and analytic geometry. Independent variables explored in this research were student motivation, student engagement, self-regulation, blended learning models, and formative assessments. A mixed method design was used to triangulate the quantitative data with the teachers’ perceptions data collected from the qualitative data. The qualitative data examined how teachers used formative assessments to improve student learning, the perception of the effectiveness of the program, and how credit recovery helped students to graduate from high school. The quantitative data found that there was no significant relationship between the independent variables in the study and credit recovery outcomes. Additionally, the data revealed that there was no significant relationship between teacher perceptions and credit recovery outcomes. Although there was no significant relationship between the dependent and independent variables in the study, the data did indicate there was a significant relationship between gender and credit recovery outcomes. The study found there was a highly significant relationship between formative assessments and student motivation, validating what research has already demonstrated about the effectiveness of formative assessments and its potential to engage and motivate students. The research also found that there was a highly significant relationship between blended learning and student motivation, suggesting implications for how blended learning can be used to engage and motivate students in credit recovery programs.

Abstract The dropout rates of African American and Hispanic students in the United States are significantly higher than that of White students. Failure to obtain a high school diploma has adverse economic and social implications for these students and for society. The purpose of this study was to assess the relationship between a credit recovery program with key demographic variables and high school GPA, which is a graduation antecedent, for students in an alternative school. Knowles' framework of adult learning theory was used to examine how participation in the credit recovery process in a system of predominantly African American-serving alternative schools predicted GPA while accounting for the influence of student demographic variables. The ex-post facto causal-comparative design involved the analysis of an archival random sample of 168 former students, 84 of whom had taken credit recovery courses and 84 of whom had not. A multiple linear regression model (R =0.257, F(4, 163) = 2.770, p = 0.029) indicated that only gender (β = 0.188, p = .02) significantly predicted the students' GPA, with female students outperforming males. A conclusion is that the implementation of credit recovery programs in U.S. schools does not have any impact on students' GPA. The results suggest weaknesses in program delivery and training and that the review and revision of professional development opportunities for teachers is merited. Drawing from the extant literature, a professional development recommendation was made to improve program effectiveness based on documented best practice examples. Implications for the promotion of positive social change include the evaluation of more robust credit recovery programs capable of improving the graduation rates of U.S. Hispanic and African American students.

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Under the pressure of federal accountability for high schools in the United States to improve and maintain high rates of on-time graduation, online credit recovery has become an increasingly popular intervention to help students earn credit in a course that they have previously failed. While some studies have connected online credit recovery with positive outcomes for participants, others have found negative outcomes and poor learning experiences. Set in a large school division in Virginia, the purpose of this study was to (a) identify explanatory student factors that were associated with participation in online credit recovery and (b) compare the likelihood of on-time graduation of participants with the likelihood of on-time graduation of nonparticipants. Limited to the graduation cohorts of 2019 and 2020, there were 10,010 students in the sample from the participating school division. In the sample, 27% of students were eligible to participate in online credit recovery, but only 2.3% of students participated. Binary logistic regression models were designed to identify factors associated with participation and the likelihood of on-time graduation. Covariates considered for inclusion in the model were gender, race and ethnicity, status as an English learner, status as a student with a disability, status as homeless, status as economically disadvantaged, high school grade point average, and school. Both models failed to meet goodness of fit standards and were rejected as having fit the data. No student factors were found to have explained participation, and differences in the likelihood of on-time graduation were not identified. These findings indicated that there did not appear to be systemic participation given the studied factors, reinforced by the finding that participation was relatively uniformly distributed among the schools. The finding of a lack of significant difference in the likelihood of on-time graduation highlighted flexibility for schools in choosing their recovery interventions. State agencies may also consider collecting and publicly reporting data about student participation in online credit recovery. Opportunities for future studies include replication in other settings, particularly districts of different size and area/region, and qualitative inquiry into decisions made by school and district leaders related to credit recovery. / Doctor of Education / Under the pressure of federal accountability for on-time graduation rates, high schools have increasingly used online credit recovery to help at-risk students. Some studies have identified positive outcomes for students in online credit recovery; however, others have found negative outcomes and poor learning experiences. Set in a large school division in Virginia, the purpose of this study was to identify factors that were associated with participation in online credit recovery and the likelihood of on-time graduation of participants compared to non-participants. Limited to the graduation cohorts of 2019 and 2020, there were 10,010 students in the sample from the participating school division, of which 2.3% of students participated. Logistic regression models were created, and covariates considered for inclusion in the model were gender, race and ethnicity, status as an English learner, status as a student with a disability, status as homeless, status as economically disadvantaged, grade point average, and school. Both models failed to fit the data well; no associated factors were found, and graduation rates were not found to be significantly different. There did not appear to have been systemic participation, and schools appear to have flexibility in offering recovery interventions. State agencies may also consider collecting and publicly reporting of data about student participation in online credit recovery. Opportunities for future studies include replication in other settings and qualitative inquiry into decisions related to credit recovery.

The purpose of this study was to determine the extent to which online credit recovery is effective at allowing students to regain lost credits and to determine any differences that may exist in credit recovery based on a student's gender, socio-economic status, race/ethnicity, and course taken. This study analyzed these differences in respect to core and elective online credit recovery courses. Every school year, over 1.2 million students drop out of high school in the United States (National Center for Educational Statistics, 2001). One in four African American students and nearly one in five Hispanic students attend high schools where graduating is not the norm (United States Department of Education, 2013). Poor students (bottom 20 percent of all family incomes) are five times more likely to drop out of high school than high-income students (top 20 percent of all family incomes) (Chapman, Laird, Ifill, and KewalRamani, 2011). On average, 72 percent of male students earn a diploma compared with 78 percent of female students, a gender gap of 6 percentage points that has remained virtually unchanged for years (Education Week, 2013). Research has shown that students who miss or fail academic courses are at greater risk of dropping out of school than their peers. To re-engage these students researchers recommend that schools provide extra academic support (Dynarski, Clarke, Cobb, Finn, Rumberger, and Smink, 2008). Extra academic support has most recently come in the form of online credit recovery. The results of this study showed that online credit recovery is an effective instructional method for students in need of recovering lost core and elective credits. The results showed that females outperformed male students, and more affluent students recorded a higher pass rate than less fortunate students. Hispanic and Black students received a passing grade at a rate comparable to White students. Results varied depending on the course a student took. Instructional leaders, who are dedicated to the promotion of student learning and the quality of instruction, should consider it a priority to recognize the emerging trends in dropout prevention and to assess the effectiveness of online credit recovery programs. / Ed. D.