<p> Data that follow students over time are not only important but necessary at all levels of education to make accurate policy and funding decisions. Districts have personnel responsible for collecting data from their schools and then reporting the data to the state. Using critical realism as the frame, a multiple case study was conducted to develop an understanding of how perspective and context influence actions of the district data personnel responsible for collecting and reporting data, provide those personnel with a voice, and contribute to the improvement of the federal reporting processes. </p><p> A review of the literature offers several points of reference for understanding this work. Researchers found that barriers to district data use do not tend to be technical issues, but human, state support of districts improves data use, and individuals bring their own context and understanding into any process in which they participate. </p><p> Four case studies of school districts in Virginia with exemplary data reporting were used in this research. Data were collected through interviews with district data personnel. All cases had data audit processes that were followed and documented, and all had distinct philosophies surrounding data in their districts, however, there was not a one size fits all organizational context or process. Challenges to state reporting included conflicting priorities of the school data personnel and lack of district data personnel. Recommendations include states support of communities of practice among school districts and federal funding support for school and district data collection and reporting. </p><p>

<p> The low employment rates of individuals with intellectual disabilities (ID) are a major concern. In 2011 only 34% of adults with ID were employed compared to 76% of adults without disabilities (Siperstein, Parker, &amp; Drascher, 2013). Higher educational attainment is associated with higher employment rates for students with ID (Smith, Grigal, &amp; Sulewski, 2013). postsecondary education has been shown to increase employment (Carnevale, Rose, &amp; Cheah, 2013). Increasingly postsecondary education is becoming an option for individuals with ID. </p><p> This study examines the effect of postsecondary education on employment and earnings for individuals with ID and the effect of state variation on those outcomes. Research hypotheses were developed from Human Capital and Social Capital Theories. </p><p> This dissertation employed secondary data analysis of the Rehabilitation Services Administration&rsquo;s RSA 911 from 2008 through 2013 to examine the effect of postsecondary education on employment for individuals served by state Vocational Rehabilitation Service Agencies. The RSA 911 includes variables on attendance of postsecondary education, employment outcomes, earnings, as well as individual and demographic information. Additional economic and state level demographic and policy variables were added to the dataset. Multi-level modeling techniques were used to understand state variation, such as various economic and programmatic features that influence outcomes. Those outcomes for those individuals with ID who had postsecondary education were compared to those who did not. </p><p> This study found postsecondary education improves odds of employment, increases weekly earnings, and decreases reliance on SSI benefits for individuals with ID. In addition, postsecondary education increases their odds of obtaining employment in positions not typically held by individuals with ID. Gender, race, cost of services, and the receipt of Medicaid moderate these results, but when all these factors are included the results are that postsecondary education increases the odds of employment more than twice that of an individual with ID without postsecondary education. </p><p> This research provides greater understanding of the effects of postsecondary education for individuals with ID and its effect on employment and earnings. This research informs policy makers by examining ways to increase employment and earnings for individuals with ID through postsecondary education.</p>

<p>Across the globe, the viability of welfare states depends on the success of policy adaptations to a post-industrial, internationalized economy and domestic demographic changes that encompass family formation, declines in fertility, and lifespan extensions of the elderly. One of the most important issues facing contemporary welfare states is the need to adjust social policy to the demise of the male breadwinner model in favor of the increased participation of women and mothers in the workforce. Whereas childrearing was traditionally the central occupation of stay-at-home mothers, their workforce participation has necessitated out-of-home care for children under the ages of five or six, before the start of primary school. Providing financial supports and investing in early childhood care and education are several policy instruments that can be used, not only to ease the burden of care faced by working mothers and their partners, but to promote the well-being and long-term economic productivity of their children as adults. In turn, the increased economic productivity of future generations can mitigate social risks and threats to the survival of the welfare state. Using a social investment approach based on human capital development in children, a set of indices is constructed to measure public investments in early childhood by ten member countries of the OECD from 2001 through 2011. The indices permit a theoretical exploration of patterns of expenditure and characteristics of policy design relative to their conformity to acknowledged types of welfare state regimes. The indices are also used to detect empirical changes in welfare state expenditures for early childhood investments pre- and post- the fiscal crisis of 2008. The study contributes to the literature of welfare state theory by situating investments in early childhood as a stage in the evolution of family policy; by creating a set of measures that characterizes public investments from a child-centered developmental perspective, one that is less prominent than work-family balance and gender equity viewpoints; and lastly, by combining expenditures and policy design components into a single measure.

<p> This study investigates parental health literacy and parental health seeking behavior for pediatric primary care utilization as a response to childhood obesity among 220 parents from 12 Head Start and Non Head Start preschools in New Castle County, Delaware. Four paper surveys collected data with the Newest Vital Sign, STOFHL-A, a Parent Survey, and Consumer Assessment of Healthcare Providers and Systems (CAHPS). Green and Kreuter's 2005 Precede-Proceed model is applied to an original logical model for determining a need for a preschool health literacy intervention to inform better child health outcomes. Results indicate that low-income, minority families, have fewer health books at home, which is associated with lower parental health literacy, higher child BMI, and more health care referrals for managing childhood obesity. Nutritional health literacy scores are lower among Hispanic parents who are Head Start participants. Black parents who are Head Start participants had significantly lower parent functional health literacy. Head Start programs offer more parent health education and twice the rate of referrals for the same level of health seeking behavior as Non Head Start parents. Health seeking behavior was lower overall for Black parents from the Head Start program. Further study should explore cultural notions and family characteristics associated with lower pediatric health care utilization in relation to both health literacy scores and health care referrals. </p><p>

<p> The achievement gap between Students of Color and their Euro American counterparts has persisted for decades. Too many Students of Color are becoming disinterested in high school curricula and are being pushed out prior to graduation. This mixed-methods study identified the perspectives of California high school board members toward Ethnic Studies (ES) curricula and the extent to which these perspectives informed public policy. This study was completed in two phases. In Phase I, a link to a survey was sent to all California high school board members, which elicited quantitative data. In Phase II, semistandardized interviews that generated qualitative data were completed with a stratified sample of participants who indicated interest in being interviewed in Phase I. With the use of inductive coding, themes were identified that more deeply explored some of the results of the survey. </p><p> The findings revealed that most school board members were supportive of ES as an elective, but less supportive of ES as a graduation requirement. School board members supportive of ES in this survey were primarily Euro American, fourth generation or higher, had taken ES before, and identified as Democrat. Fourth generation or higher respondents&rsquo; higher level of support than second-generation respondents were a difference that had statistical significance. Findings also showed board member perspectives can be understood on a continuum. Board members identified as change agents on this spectrum had already taken steps to establish ES and were working to alter district culture to further advance ES in their districts.</p><p>

<p> The effects of the Constituency Development Fund (CDF) and the Free Secondary Education Policy (FSEP) on access to secondary school education in Kenya&rsquo;s Yatta sub-county have not been adequately explored in available public policy literature. Hence, this qualitative multiple-case study was designed to understand the effects of the 2 policies on both enrollment and dropout among secondary school age children in Yatta. The study was conducted in 1 mixed-boarding secondary school and 1 secondary day school in Yatta. The study was built on an adapted Huisman and Smits&rsquo; theoretical model on dropout among students in developing countries. The data were gathered through semi-structured interviews with 14 purposefully selected participants: 2 principals, 2 deputy principals, and 10 parents whose children had benefited from the CDF bursary scheme. Interview data were inductively coded and then subjected to Braun and Clarke&rsquo;s thematic analysis procedure, which aided in identification, analysis, and reporting of patterns (themes) in the data. Results showed that the CDF had contributed significantly to the improvement of enrollment with the establishment of new day schools that are more affordable, hence making secondary school education less costly and thus more available to low income families. The study&rsquo;s findings also showed that student dropout had declined with both the CDF and FSEP. The positive social change implications of this study are that it provides evidence for advocacy among policy makers for increased allocation of resources to the education sector through the CDF and FSEP. Increased allocations will contribute to Kenya&rsquo;s progress toward universal access to secondary education.</p><p>

This study explores the concept of partnership in community development programs. The purpose of this study is to investigate the concept of partnership, and acquire a comprehensive understanding of community development programs called partnership programs. In the past few years the international development community, especially the nongovernment organization (NGO) community, has been discussing the importance of establishing partnerships between organizations and people from the developed countries with organizations and people from the emerging nations. Also, during the past fifty years community development programs have become the dominant type of development program for communities working together to improve the living condition of the community members. In the last few years a new concept called, "partnerships and community partnerships" is being heard as a new type of development program. What are these partnerships? How are they different from community development programs? Are these partnerships worthwhile? And if they are, how, and to whom? These questions need to be answered in order to decide if and how development organizations should implement partnership programs. The following research hopes to answer these questions. Six programs have been studied, five short cases and one longer case study. The issue of power and empowerment have been examined in detail because it is important to understand exactly how partnership members empower themselves to improve their lives for themselves. Three other dimensions used in this dissertation to understand partnerships are: different types of teaching pedagogies, participation, and different types of community development organizations. By examining partnership programs through these four dimensions the author was able to better understand and explain why and how partnership programs are different from community development partnership programs of the past. The study concludes with a description of what partnership pedagogy is, and how the author believes that creating partnerships in development is one way of transforming our institutions into more effective systems for human beings to work and live together.

This study used secondary data to analyze the Saving for Change (SfC) program of Oxfam America in Mali. SfC uses a model of microfinance that is based on education and savings-led approach and self-help methodology. The program teaches the poorest women how to form and manage a group to handle savings and credit related needs. The group learns to systematically collect savings from its members; lend the money to its members with interest and keep a record of all transactions. SfC has created an oral recordkeeping system which is helpful for groups that have mostly or all illiterate women. The SfC women also learn about other social components such as malaria through their participation in the program. This study, however, focused only on the financial activities of the women. The secondary data analyzed in this study were collected by Oxfam America in two rounds of surveys that used mixed methods instruments. Both surveys were conducted in October and November, one in 2005 and the other in 2006. Most of the data collected from the surveys were quantitative. They were collected for Oxfam America’s own purposes and only some of them were used for this study. The study used three aspects of outreach—depth, scope and worth to the user—as the framework to explore the extent to which SfC had reached the poorest women. Three overarching questions were constructed, one to explore each of these aspects of outreach. They were: Were the women served by SfC poorer than other women who were not served? Did the SfC women utilize the program benefits? Did the utilization of the program benefits vary based on the women’s economic levels? Each overarching question also had a set of main and specific questions. Some key economic indicators such as the women’s literacy and schooling at the individual level and the ratio of school age children in school, food security, assets and the ratio of income contributors at the household level, as well as select program benefits such as savings and loans were used for determining the main and specific questions. Various statistical tests including one-way ANOVA, paired samples t-tests and bivariate correlations were performed to answer those questions. Most of the results of the statistical tests did not provide a clear answer whether or not SfC reached the poorest of the poor. Out of the four indicators, three showed that the women reached by SfC were as poor as the women in the control group. The SfC women were statistically significantly better off, as measured by household assets, compared to the other women in the area. The results of the paired samples t-tests showed that the SfC women utilized the benefits offered by the program, and their utilization was higher in 2006 than in 2005. Except for a few instances, the women’s utilization of the program benefits did not appear to have been influenced by their economic levels. None of their saving activities were significantly affected by their household economic levels. Their willingness to take loans also did not appear to be influenced by the difference in their household economic levels in a meaningful way. Although mixed, these findings adequately rejected the notion that Oxfam America had failed to reach the poorest of the poor. However, the results did not show that the women reached by SfC were the poorest. Future studies and collection of additional data may provide more conclusive findings about the level of poverty of the women reached by the program and the extent to which the very poorest benefitted equally from the services. Whether or not the results were statistically significant and all women were the poorest, the experiences gained by the women and the groups from their participation in SfC spoke directly to the core purpose of the program and to the economic benefits for the clients by any international standard. When their context was taken into consideration, poor women of one of the world’s poorest countries in the villages where there are very few or no opportunities became economically active in the SfC program. The level of engagement of the women was an important step forward toward reducing poverty. Regardless of their economic levels, those poor women saved a remarkable amount of money; borrowed money from the group; repaid loans with interest; and, most importantly, managed a financial system as a group to serve their financial needs.

The thesis provides a comparative analysis of the implementation of the EMPRETEC programme in Ghana and Namibia. The EMPRETEC programme is a unique entrepreneurship and business development programme developed by the United Nations Centre on Transnational Corporations in the late 1980s. Since then, it has been implemented in nearly 30 countries to support business development. The central aim of this research is to identify the major factors that influenced the implementation process of the EMPRETEC programme in Ghana and Namibia and to analyse how they afforded or constrained the achievement of seven so-called Critical Programme Components (CPCs). These CPCs are: 1) targeting high growth entrepreneurs; 2) developing an entrepreneurship training workshop that is adapted to the local context; 3) ensuring direction of the programme by a coalition of private and public sector leaders; 4) mobilising support from the private sector; 5) promote linkages among clients; 6) promote business linkages with foreign firms; and 7) establish a sustainable foundation. The theoretical concepts of the research are based on the implementation literature which emerged as part of the policy sciences during the second half of the last century. A new approach is developed to study the highly complex implementation process: in a first step, an analytical framework is developed that comprises five analytical lenses: 1) a contextual lens focusing on the context in which the entire implementation process is embedded; 2) an inter-organisational lens focusing on interactions of the involved stakeholders; 3) an organisational lens for the identification of institutional strengths and weaknesses; 4) an intra-organisational lens for the analysis of intra-agency relationships; and 5) an individual lens focusing on the individuals who were involved in the implementation of the programmes. These lenses cover the entire spectrum and levels of the implementation process. In a second step, 15 major implementation factors are derived from implementation theory. These factors and their influence on the implementation process are then assessed with the help of 100 distinct measures. The influence of the 15 factors on the implementation process and the seven CPCs is subsequently analysed and finally tested using evidence from 18 additional EMPRETEC centres. The study's contribution to knowledge is twofold: (i) The study provides insights into the underlying factors that influenced the implementation of the EMPRETEC programme in Ghana and Namibia. Overall, the implementation conditions were more favourable in Ghana as compared to Namibia. The research hints at the importance of the context and implementers' (both organisations' and individuals') characteristics as crucial factors for successful implementation. Finding the right implementers and aligning implementation objectives to existing development discourses and implementers' ideologies can help to improve effective implementation. (ii) The study proposes an innovative approach to study implementation processes across narrow cases. Based on third-generation implementation models, a unique data collection and analytical framework is suggested that allows comparing and testing various implementation factors and their influence on the implementation process. The emerging results are of high relevance to governments, donors, private organisations and other stakeholders, as many lessons could be derived to improve the implementation and effectiveness of donor interventions, especially in the area of business development programmes.

The financial provisions of the HE Act (2004) were intended to introduce market forces into the relationship between higher education institutions in England and their full-time Home/EU undergraduates. The policies that underpinned that legislation were established by Parliamentarians during a period of intense public and political debate which accompanied the passage of the Act and now, as suppliers in a nascent quasi-market, universities are de facto responsible for their delivery. With that market beginning to stabilise, this research compares those political objectives with observed outcomes of the introduction of the Act. Primary data has been collected through semi-structured interviews with key decision-makers in six sample universities – chosen to reflect both the spread of institutions in the sector and the range of pricing policies in operation – and with those involved nationally in shaping the legislation. From this material, supported by secondary quantitative and qualitative evidence, university pricing strategies are considered, in the context of theories of marketing and of higher education management, to provide an understanding of how institutions have structured their financial offerings with the aim of targeting specific markets for applicants. Data from the sample institutions is then used to build a profile of the quasi-market that the suppliers within it are generating. Even though members of the sample have taken diverse approaches to price-setting, there are some clear consistencies that typify this emerging national market: prices are set through adjustments to bursaries, not fees; and complex financial offerings have created barriers to effective communication. Furthermore, as institutional managers analyse the effects of their own pricing strategies locally, they are observing these trends and thus, where any changes are being made, these tend towards simplification of bursary schemes and hence increasing homogeneity across the sector. However, with the (index-linked) £3000 cap which currently applies to fees, it is increasingly apparent that the current quasi-market for full-time Home/EU undergraduates at English universities has not reached its price-sensitivity point and hence, this research argues, the market is not operating fully. Therefore, while this study offers an understanding of motivations behind current institutional actions and the nature of the resulting quasi-market, it also explains why it is not feasible to extrapolate from this information to forecast how the market might work were regulatory parameters to be changed significantly.