This investigation examined the practice of relying on field test item calibrations in advance of the operational administration of a large scale assessment for purposes of equating and scaling. Often termed “pre-equating,” the effectiveness of this method is explored for a statewide, high-stakes assessment in grades three, five, and seven for the content areas of language arts, mathematics, and social studies. Pre-equated scaling was based on item calibrations using the Rasch model from an off-grade field test event in which students tested were one grade higher than the target population. These calibrations were compared to those obtained from post-equating, which used the full statewide population of examinees. Item difficulty estimates and Test Characteristic Curves (TCC) were compared for each approach and found to be similar. The Root Mean Square Error (RMSE) of the theta estimates for each approach ranged from .02 to .12. Moreover, classification accuracy for the pre-equated approach was generally high compared to results from post-equating. Only 3 of the 9 tests examined showed differences in the percent of students classified as passing; errors ranged from 1.7 percent to 3 percent. Measurement equivalence between the field test and operational assessment was also explored using the Differential Functioning of Items and Tests (DFIT) framework. Overall, about 20 to 40 percent of the items on each assessment exhibited statistically significant Differential Item Functioning (DIF). Differential Test Functioning (DTF) was significant for fully 7 tests. There was a positive relationship between the magnitude of DTF and degree of incongruence between pre-equating and post-equating. Item calibrations, score consistency, and measurement equivalence were also explored for a test calibrated with the one, two, and three parameter logistic model, using the TCC equating method. Measurement equivalence and score table incongruence was found to be slightly more pronounced with this approach. It was hypothesized that differences between the field test and operational tests resulted from 1) recency of instruction 2) cognitive growth and 3) motivation factors. Additional research related to these factors is suggested.

ABSTRACT A STUDY OF THE LEARNING-FOCUSED SCHOOL IMPROVEMENT MODEL AND ITS EFFECT ON THIRD GRADE READING SCORES IN A SUBURBAN, METROPOLITAN SCHOOL SYSTEM by Douglas A. Daugherty In 2001, Congress passed the No Child Left Behind Education Act (NCLB). This act calls for a measurable annual increase in student achievement such that students reach, at a minimum, proficiency on challenging state academic assessments. A historical review of political involvement with education will add to that statement one more objective of the bill: to render more U.S. students globally competitive. Federal funding to state education is tied to the achievement of state standards. To achieve these heightened standards many schools and school systems are adopting whole-school reform models. According to Herman & Stringfield, 1997; Lappan & Houghton, 2003, whole-school reform should address organizational change, staffing, administrative support, curriculum and instruction, supplies and materials, scheduling, and monitoring of student progress and performance; all referred to as central components of the educational process. The purpose of this dissertation was to investigate the effectiveness of one specific whole-school reform model, Learning Focused Schools Program (LFSP), in a suburban school system for its ability to effect student achievement. The Learning Focused Schools Program was studied through its implementation and use in three suburban elementary schools and compared to three similar elementary schools not using the program. Data from students’ test scores were collected and analyzed for student growth. There were several notable findings in this study. For all the students who participated in the LFSP continuously for a period of 3 years, more children met or exceeded standards than those not exposed to LFS. The results were different when the total population was broken into subgroups. Hispanic students and Multiracial students did not show any statistically significant improvement in any assessed category using the LFSP. More ELL students in the LFS treatment group exceeded standards than their peers who were not exposed to LFS. White students and Students with Disabilities did show statistically significant improvement resulting from the LFSP environment. Black students fared best overall when exposed to the LFS Program and mirrored the results of the “ALL Students” subgroup.

<p> This mixed methods, case study research examined the teacher education program at Illinois State University (ISU-Normal, Illinois) as related to the views and assessment practices of the dispositions of its teacher candidates. Five years of quantitative and qualitative data from ISU&rsquo;s Disposition Concern form was collected and analyzed currently and formulated the basis for a sequential qualitative study through interviews in order to gain a more holistic picture of dispositions and the dispositional process at this university. In teacher education, content knowledge and pedagogical skills are easier to teach and assess than the subjective nature of dispositions. This grounded theory study found that the very system that views and assess dispositions of teacher candidates may augment the subjectivity of dispositions and its essentials for &ldquo;responsive&rdquo; (Thornton, 2006) teaching which systematically should include clear definitions, assessment practices, communication, and support for both faculty/staff and students.</p>

<p> Attrition among students costs individuals, institutions, and communities. As a result, alternative schools are growing rapidly. In 2010, over half a million students were enrolled in public alternative schools in the nation (Carver, Lewis, &amp; Tice, 2010). Alternative programs offered at secondary, middle, and elementary schools exhibiting a variety of practices, structures, and philosophies combat this epidemic of attrition. This mixed study investigates best practices in an alternative middle school setting from a student's perspective. Uncovered exemplars could allow administrators to implement strategies best suited to meet alternative middle school students' needs. Qualitative data consisted of two rounds of interviews with 10 participants. Quantifiable data collected included Idaho Standard Achievement Test scores (ISAT), grade point averages (GPAs), and attendance records prior to attending Span Academy and after completion of the program. Results from the ISAT scores revealed eight to 13 points of growth, equivalent to two to three years of growth. GPAs on a 4-point scale improved 1.5 points in language and 1.3 points in math. Students who achieved Level 5 and transitioned had 26 fewer absences while attending Span Academy than their previous year in school. In accordance to research protocol, two questions were rephrased to eliminate ambiguity and retain the integrity of student responses. Finally, it also became apparent that students attending alternative programs carry a stigma. This understanding provided an awareness that resulted in changed practices and procedures at Span Academy. Additionally, this research revealed that alternative middle schools, like Span Academy, contrary to the original design as a transition school, are better served as a 2-year intervention program, where the research revealed few students transitioned as of 2009 to present, and most preferred to remain at Span Academy through their eighth-grade year. Accordingly, Span Academy redesigned its program from a typical transition school to a comprehensive 2-year intervention program. Overwhelmingly, the student responses, supported by the quantifiable data, resulted in two overarching themes of accountability and relationship. The results from this research not only lend to best practices in an alternative middle school environment, but provide answers and strategies to best assist students in a traditional setting as well.</p>

<p>Over my Ph.D. study, I work on various projects about the school choice reform in New York City, with a special focus on understanding how students or parents choose high schools and evaluating education policies. Specifically, my dissertation consists of two essays: the first one aims to detect whether small schools are effective in improving students' academic performance; the second one measures how one's own school choice is affected by his or her neighbors. </p><p>In the first chapter, which is coauthored with Atila Abdulkadiroglu and Parag Pathak, We use assignment lotteries embedded in New York City's high school match to estimate the effects of attendance at a new small high school on student achievement. More than 150 unselective small high schools created between 2002 and 2008 have enhanced autonomy, but operate within-district with traditional public school teachers, principals, and collectively-bargained work rules. Lottery estimates show positive score gains in Mathematics, English, Science, and History, more</p><p>credit accumulation, and higher graduation rates. Small school attendance causes a substantial increase in college enrollment, with a marked shift to CUNY institutions. Students are also less likely to require remediation in reading and writing when at college. Detailed school surveys indicate that students at small schools are more engaged and closely monitored, despite fewer</p><p>course offerings and activities. Teachers report greater feedback, increased safety, and improved collaboration. The results show that school size is an important factor in education production</p><p>and highlight the potential for within-district reform strategies to substantially improve</p><p>student achievement.</p><p>In the second chapter, I use the exact home addresses and the complete high school application records to estimate neighborhood impact on the choice of high schools in the New York city. This paper converts home addresses to location coordinates and exploit that metric to rank students' neighbors by distance and estimate the marginal influence of the school choice of the immediate (ten nearest) neighbors relative to that of more distant neighbors. With the assumption that one's immediate neighbors are formed roughly randomly within the reference group, I find that students are 20\% more likely to rank the identical schools as their immediate neighbors than their more distant neighbors. The estimated effects are stronger among students with homogeneous ethnic and academic backgrounds. For a robustness check, I match the home addresses with the 2010 census data to group students into different census blocks and block groups. This alternative definition of neighborhood peers by census geographic boundaries further confirms the existence of social interactions on school choice. Further, I study if elder neighbors' experience of school choice benefits younger neighborhood peers. On one hand, information sharing can be beneficial: experience from older students improves their nearest neighbors' probability of being matched with their top choice. On the other hand, inefficient herding for students living in the less informed areas can be a disadvantage of neighborhood interactions.</p> / Dissertation

<p> Required experiential learning within the context of higher education is on the rise. This dissertation endeavors to expand current understandings of resistance to required experiential learning including root causes, implications, and opportunities to address and alleviate resistance. The debate regarding the merits of required service, service-learning, study abroad, and other experiential learning opportunities is examined. In addition, access to such opportunities, causes and effects of resistance that develops for some participants, and ways of addressing this phenomenon are identified. To this end, an exploration of existing literature related to required experiential learning and reluctant participation is offered. In addition to a case study of Susquehanna University&rsquo;s Global Opportunities program, data for this study was gathered through research methods including focus groups and semi-structured, open-ended interview. Findings reveal a variety of causes of resistance, why resistance manifests for some students prior to required study away, and strategies that practitioners in the field of experiential education employ to address such resistance.</p>

<p> The academic achievement of African American male students has been one of the most over- researched topics in the education community for the past decade. Most of these studies report findings of social issues as predictors for the underachievement of African American male students. Examples of such issues are poverty, culturally irrelevant curriculum, disengaged families, involuntary immigration due to the slave trade and sociopathological issues. These findings are being debated among prominent educators to determine whether or not they are valid. This study was conducted using a qualitative approach to hear the voices of African American parents in order to determine what other factors could contribute to the decline in academic success among this group of students. The conceptual framework was framed around the works of Pedro Noguera, Linda Darling- Hammond, John Ogbu, and Michael Gurian, social scientists, who have concluded that the achievement level of African American males requires additional research. In this qualitative study, narrated stories from parents, teachers, and students at a private secondary school in Savannah, Georgia were collected. The stories were identified and placed in categories of experiences and events narrated by the participants. In evaluating the responses, the study unfolded themes that provided insights into the perceptions of parents and the importance of their views in future discussions regarding school reforms for academic success of African American male students.</p>

PhD / When the problem of young people using illegal drugs for recreation emerged in New South Wales in the 1960s drug education was promoted by governments and experts as a humane alternative to policing. It developed during the 1970s and 1980s as the main hope for preventing drug problems amongst young people in the future. By the 1990s drug policy experts, like their temperance forbears, had become disillusioned with drug education, turning to legislative action for the prevention of alcohol and other drug problems. However, politicians and the community still believed that education was the best solution. Education Departments, reluctant to expose schools to public controversy, met minimal requirements. This thesis examines the ideas about drugs, education and youth that influenced the construction and implementation of policies about drug education in New South Wales between 1965 and 1999. It also explores the processes that resulted in the defining of drug problems and beliefs about solutions, identifying their contribution to policy and the way in which this policy was implemented. The thesis argues that the development of drug education over the last fifty years has been marked by three main cycles of moral panic about youth drug use. It finds that each panic was triggered by the discovery of the use of a new illegal substance by a youth subculture. Panics continued, however, because of the tension between two competing notions of young people’s drug use. In the traditional dominant view ‘drug’ meant illegal drugs, young people’s recreational drug use was considered to be qualitatively different to that of adults, and illegal drugs were the most serious and concerning problem. In the newer alternative ‘public health’ view which began developing in the 1960s, illicit drug use was constructed as part of normal experimentation, alcohol, tobacco and prescribed medicines were all drugs, and those who developed problems with their use were sick, not bad. These public health principles were formulated in policy documents on many occasions. The cycles of drug panic were often an expression of anxiety about the new approach and they had the effect of reasserting the dominant view. The thesis also finds that the most significant difference between the two discourses lies in the way that alcohol is defined, either as a relatively harmless beverage or as a drug that is a major cause of harm. Public health experts have concluded that alcohol poses a much greater threat to the health and safety of young people than illegal drugs. However, parents, many politicians and members of the general community have believed for the last fifty years that alcohol is relatively safe. Successive governments have been influenced by the economic power of the alcohol industry to support the latter view. Thus the role of alcohol and its importance to the economy in Australian society is a significant hindrance in reconciling opposing views of the drug problem and developing effective drug education. The thesis concludes that well justified drug education programs have not been implemented fully because the rational approaches to drug education developed by experts have not been supported by the dominant discourse about the drug problem. Politicians have used drug education as a populist strategy to placate fear but the actual programs that have been developed attempt to inform young people and the community about the harms and benefits of all drugs. When young people take up the use of a new mood altering drug, the rational approach developed by public health experts provokes intense anxiety in the community and the idea that legal substances such as alcohol, tobacco and prescribed drugs can cause serious harm to young people is rejected in favour of an approach that emphasizes the danger of illegal drug use.

<p> The main purpose of this qualitative study was to explore school counselors&rsquo; experience with restorative practices including their knowledge and skills, role, and how they incorporate restorative practices into their comprehensive school counseling program. The results of this research will contribute to the growing body of literature suggesting the negative effects of current zero tolerance discipline practices while suggesting the implementation of restorative practices as an alternative practice within the educational system because of the potential positive outcomes it has on student development and success. Five school counselors were interviewed with open-ended questions to gather data on the research questions presented. This data was analyzed using Interpretative Phenomenological Analysis. Results of this research have the potential to inform future research, training needs, and best practices for school counselors working in schools where restorative practices are in place.</p><p>

<p> Although districts and schools have implemented several types of parental engagement programs, numerous programs fail to meet the needs of African American parents, especially during the high school years. One reason may be the lack of awareness and sensitivity toward the needs of African American parents. Using a two-part conceptual framework informed by Hoover-Dempsey Sandler&rsquo;s (1995, 1997) model of parental engagement and critical race theory, this qualitative case study examined how African American parents defined parental engagement during the high school years. This study also explored parents&rsquo; role construction and self-efficacy, and if and how parents understood district parental engagement policies. Data were collected from documents and semi-structured interviews from 15 African American parents of high school children. Data were analyzed using thematic network analysis (Attride-Stirling, 2001) and a variation of constant comparative analysis (Strauss &amp; Corbin, 1990). Study findings revealed that parents described high school parental engagement as a fluid process that changed over time to best fit the academic and nonacademic needs of their children. This impacted parents&rsquo; parental engagement behaviors and practices. Whereas parents were unfamiliar with the district&rsquo;s parental engagement policies, they were familiar with other school practices and policies that impacted their engagement behaviors. Parents defined their role in broad terms, such as being their children&rsquo;s protector, teacher, and advocate. Parents&rsquo; self-efficacy was mainly based on their children&rsquo;s academic performance in school and a village of supporters. Parents reported creating informal information networks to access information and services to assist them in supporting their child academically during high school. Although parents reported engaging in school-based activities, the primary method of engagement was home-based engagement practices.</p><p>