Since at least the 1960s, federal and state policymakers have debated how best to hold public schools accountable for producing graduates who are prepared to fully participate in our democratic society. Since that time, reform efforts have led to Texas' current test-based A-F accountability system. This qualitative case study explored how one Texas school district worked to design and implement an alternative accountability system. A community-based accountability system (CBAS) is created in collaboration with local stakeholders and uses locally developed goals and multiple achievement measures to report student and school performance. A zone of mediation theoretical framework was used to evaluate how the studied district assessed and addressed the community's norms, values, priorities, and goals for public schools. Data were drawn from an analysis of relevant documents, five individual district leader interviews, and a parent and/or community member focus group. These data were analyzed using a combination of a priori and in vivo coding. The six themes that emerged from this analysis were: (a) dissatisfaction with A-F accountability, (b) developing an alternative accountability, (c) collaboration with like-minded districts and leaders, (d) engagement with internal stakeholders; (e) engagement with external stakeholders, and (f) assessing community values and goals for public education. The findings can be viewed as an exemplar for school leaders interested in designing and implementing a CBAS that falls within their community's unique zone of mediation.

Little information is available which specifically applies to determining Tech-Prep program quality, effectiveness, and goal attainment as determined by the directors/coordinators of the programs. This research sought to determine if program performance indicators exist that Tech-Prep directors/coordinators deem necessary to determine their programs' quality, effectiveness, and goal-attainment. If so, is there consensus of agreement among the directors/coordinators on which performance indicators to utilize, and is there a pattern of preference when grouped into evaluation focus components? A questionnaire was developed by the researcher and distributed to Tech-Prep directors/coordinators in the Southeastern United States and Puerto Rico. Sixty-seven program directors/coordinators were asked to participate, and 85 percent responded to the survey. The following conclusions can be reached from analysis of the data: 1) The responding Tech-Prep directors/coordinators are in agreement on which program performance indicators to use to determine the quality, effectiveness, and goal attainment of their programs. These findings are contrary to the existing literature which suggest a lack of consensus on which performance indicators to utilize for vocational education programs. 2) Three different techniques — consensual agreement, consideration of the questionnaire non-response rate, and data analysis ensuring a 95 percent confidence interval of the standard error of the mean — were used to analyze the extent of agreement among the surveyed Tech-Prep directors/coordinators on appropriate program performance indicators. Using the three techniques, the extent of majority agreement on the program performance indicators ranged from 97 to 67 percent of the sixty selected indicators. These data support the conclusion that agreed upon performance indicators are available for comparison and evaluation of Tech-Prep programs among this population. These data fill the void in the literature that addresses generalizable performance indicators that can be used in the evaluation and assessment of vocational programs, such as Tech-Prep. 3) Program performance indicators were grouped into six focus components. Although the determination of which focus components are more appropriate for vocational evaluation depend on many factors, data from this survey indicate the STUDENTS focus component is perceived as most important, the RESOURCES focus component is least important, and CAREERS, PROFESSIONAL DEVELOPMENT, ATTITUDE/PERCEPTIONS, and FACILITATORS focus components are deemed equally important by Tech-Prep directors/coordinators in the determination of program quality, effectiveness, and goal attainment. / Ed. D.

The purpose of this study was to produce a taxonomy of institutional effectiveness literature for public colleges and universities. The study was a theoretical and comprehensive analysis of the extant literature on institutional effectiveness from 1970 to the present. Conceptually, the study was an exploratory examination of the literature. It provides a framework for refining future institutional effectiveness research investigations, educational evaluation studies, or other assessment activities for colleges and universities. The study contained no a priori hypothesis or research questions in the traditional sense. The following objectives guided the study: 1. To determine characteristics of institutional effectiveness studies. 2. To determine institutional effectiveness measures applied as criteria for evaluation. 3. To determine if the measures reported as similar in the literature are the same upon assignment to the taxonomy. 4. To determine what independent variables are identified in the literature on institutional effectiveness. 5. To identify the various definitions of institutional effectiveness terms presented in the literature. 6. To determine the extent various literature addresses similar issues. 7. To determine if elements of effectiveness characteristics have been omitted or overlooked in the literature. 8. To detect and report trends, similarities, and conflicts existing in the literature. The literature items for the study were identified through queries into printed or computerized indexes. Published literature not indexed was also identified to the extent possible and was included in the study. Books, articles, monographs, or essays written on institutional effectiveness issues make up the study population. Five-hundred-thirty-one separate literature items were identified for the period. Journal articles, ERIC documents, and books were reviewed, separated into distinct classes and a taxonomy developed. Each literature item was assigned to a specific taxonomy classification by major subject content and by dimension. The literature items were also identified as to literature form, i.e., study, narrative, or opinion items. Further, a computerized database was created containing the literature items. The database was separated into three distinct files, one file for higher education, literature, one file for four-year college/university literature, and one file for community, junior, and technical college literature. Within the data files each item was numbered and coded by its taxonomy classification number and dimension. The items in each data file also contain a document identification number, author, title, publication date, abstract, and other relevant data. / Ed. D.

Performance measures have been used throughout the business sector as a means to assess productivity, allocate resources, and increase profitability. More recently, they have been utilized to answer increasing calls for accountability in public education. Legislation has been passed in both the United Kingdom and the United States that implements performance measures as a means to measure student achievement and assess school performance. This study, conducted both in the United States and the United Kingdom, examined the perceptions of 15 primary and 15 elementary school leaders with regard to the transnational issue of school performance measures. Q methodology was used to examine the opinions and perceptions of these leaders for the purpose of providing insight for stakeholders and identifying future areas of research. The data from the participants revealed patterns of opinion within the head teacher group, the principal group, and the participants as a whole. Common opinions included the balanced use of performance measures, the political nature of school performance measures, the appropriate use of standardized test scores, and the consideration of economic and social factors. This study also demonstrated the use of Q methodology in qualitative educational research by both obtaining and analyzing rich and insightful participant data.

This study had two major purposes: (a) to investigate and compare the perceptions of District Education Officers, principals and teachers about the management of secondary school effectiveness in Zimbabwe and (b) to probe contextualised secondary school management initiatives that could trigger school effectiveness in Zimbabwe. The study is divided into six interlinked chapters. In the first chapter, the problem of intractability in the management of school effectiveness in Zimbabwe's secondary schools is focused upon. The second chapter attempts to highlight the resource, social, economic, political and cultural realities of secondary school life in developing countries (including Zimbabwe) from which any theories of school management and school effectiveness must derive. The third chapter, explores different ways to understand and interpret the realities described in chapter two. To do this, the chapter focuses on ways in which "modern" and traditional" practices intersect in secondary school in Zimbabwe to produce bureaucratic facades. The fourth chapter, which is largely imbedded In the context theory, emerges from chapters one, two and three and focuses on the methodology and methods used in this study. Chapter five, which subsequently matures into a suggested framework for managing secondary school effectiveness in Zimbabwe, contains perceptual data which were obtained from 16 District Education Officers, 262 secondary school principals and 5 secondary school teachers drawn from 8 provinces, 4 provinces and 1 province respectively. Factor analysis of the existing situation In Zimbabwe's secondary schools produced 7 major variables that were perceived to be associated with secondary school management intractability In Zimbabwe: • lack of clear vision about what should constitute secondary school effectiveness; • management strategies that lack both vertical and horizontal congruence; • inappropriate organisational structures; • rhetorical policies and procedures; • inadequate material and non-material resources; • lack of attention to both internal and external environments of secondary schools; and • inadequate principal capacity-building. These perceptual data, subsequently crystallized into the following suggested management initiatives: • establishment of goals and outcomes achievable by the majority of learners; • establishment of clear and contextualised indicators for secondary schooling goals and outcomes; • establishment of democratic and flexible organisational and secondary school management processes; and • replacement of ''ivory tower", rhetoria~l policies and procedures with contextualised ones / Teacher Education / D. Ed. (Education Management)

Submitted in fulfillment for the Degree of Doctor of Technology: Public Management, Durban University of Technology, 2010. / In South Africa, the transformation of public higher education has placed much emphasis on the accountability and performance of individual institutions. Various indicators are used to assess institutional performance, as is the case internationally. Examples of such indicators include teaching and learning, research outputs, graduate employability, financial sustainability and productivity and the use of resources. This case study which is predominantly qualitative, examined: i) Performance by a selected South African University of Technology, the Durban University of Technology (DUT), in specific performance indicators as determined by policy on student enrolment planning. Student enrolment planning is an important strategy adopted by government to address a number of distortions in the higher education system which had been developed over a number of years within the ideology of apartheid. ii) The measures taken by the institution to give effect to the policy. The case study utilised multiple methods of data collection within three units of analysis. The three units of analysis of the case are: Unit of analysis One: The practices used at the DUT for marketing, student recruitment, student selection and admission to achieve the input indicators of the student enrolment plan. Unit of analysis Two: implementation strategies for meeting the output (success) indicators of the plan. Unit of analysis Three: The problem of low student retention. The original contribution made by this research study is that it provides detailed insight into the implementation of policy of student enrolment planning, using the Durban University of Technology as an example. In so doing, the researcher has identified critical areas that impact on student enrolment planning in South Africa, as well as specific weaknesses in the implementation of the policy at the DUT. A part of the study’s findings is that the DUT is well–placed to meet the performance indicators of the enrolment plan. However, the addressing of weaknesses in the areas of student selection, marketing and recruitment could improve the DUT’s ability to exert more influence over its enrolments. The study determined that the problem of low student retention is a factor that threatens the DUT’s throughput and graduation rates. Broad and specific recommendations are made for implementation, including the adoption of the organisational framework of enrolment management supported by institutional research.

Thesis (MEd)--University of Stellenbosch, 2005. / ENGLISH ABSTRACT: The facilitation of human rights values might be considered a means to rethink and redefine values education in South Africa. This study aimed at determining how human rights values were addressed in the context of independent Waldorf Education and government initiated outcomes-based education in South Africa, and how educators facilitated these values in various circumstances. In exploring the philosophies, theories and practices of these education models against the background of paradigmatic and post-paradigmatic philosophies in support of the socially constructive curriculum theory, important notions were highlighted that have preceded, and might follow, the facilitation of human rights values. The epistemologies, ontologies and methodologies of the emancipatory paradigm and postparadigmatic framework appeared to provide appropriate philosophical departure points regarding the facilitation of human rights values. This study anticipated the theoretical clarification of the concept human rights values and included a discussion on the importance of these values in various school contexts. Values identified from the Manifesto on Values, Education and Democracy (2001), that were also present in the Curriculum: Waldorf Schools in South Africa (1995), were discussed as possible human rights values. Empirical research was conducted to explore how human rights values were attended to in good practice scenarios in order to provide insight into the questions posed regarding the facilitation of human rights values. Through systematic ethnographic observations and semi-structured interviews it appeared that in both school contexts human rights values were more frequently addressed in incidental situations than in formal curriculum contents. This is interesting seeing that the outcomes-based education model has a number of documents to guide the facilitation of human rights values within formal curriculum contents, whereas the Waldorf approach has no such supportive documents. One might question the value and influence of numerous documents if basic knowledge that is required for the meaningful interpretation of such documents is not communicated from the outset. Moreover, it became evident that since Waldorf educators are adequately trained in Anthroposophy, the philosophy to which Waldorf schools adhere, they deal with curriculum matters such as socially constructing a curriculum more effectively. The training of outcomes-based education educators can be questioned regarding the philosophy, theory and methodology of outcomes-based education in view of the hasty implementation of this new model for government schools. As a result of this hurried process, educators of outcomes-based education are experiencing numerous uncertainties when they have to manage curriculum matters such as socially constructing a curriculum. Recommendations and related examples were provided after the completion of the study. This included, among others, the notions of dialogically facilitating human rights values to promote learners' understanding of their rights, and the rights of others; to transform incidental facilitation of human rights values into worthwhile teaching-learning experiences; to use human resources - including learners - to convey human rights values; and to focus educators' training (both in-service and pre-service) toward the inclusion of human rights values and promoting an understanding of socially constructing a curriculum. The study was concluded with the remark that human rights values might be an appropriate means to redefine values education, provided that the facilitation of human rights values are based on suitable theoretical and philosophical premises; and that those held responsible to facilitate such values are assisted in this task. / AFRIKAANSE OPSOMMING: Die fasilitering van menseregte-waardes kan beskou word as 'n wyse om waarde-opvoeding in Suid-Afrika opnuut te deurdink en te herdefinieer. Hierdie studie het ten doel gehad om vas te stel hoe menseregte-waardes in onafhanklike Waldorf Onderwys en staatsgeïnisieerde uitkomsgebaseerde onderwyskontekste in Suid-Afrika aangespreek word, en ook hoe dit in die praktyk gefasiliteer word. Die verkenning van teorieë, filosofieë en praktyke aangaande die twee opvoedingsrnodelle teen die agtergrond van paradigmatiese en post-paradigmatiese filosofieë, ter ondersteuning van kurrikulumteorie, het kardinale aspekte wat die fasilitering voorafgegaan het, en moontlik tot gevolg kan hê, uitgelig. die sosiaal-konstruktiewe van menseregte-waardes Dit kom voor asof die epistemologieë, ontologieë en metodologieë onderliggend aan die emansipatoriese paradigma en die post-paradigmatiese raamwerk 'n genoegsame filosofiese aanvangspunt bied met betrekking tot die fasilitering van menseregte-waardes. In die studie is die konsep menseregte-waardes konseptueel-teoreties verklaar. Dit het ook 'n bespreking oor die belangrikheid van hierdie waardes in verskeie skoolkontekste ingesluit. Waardes geïdentifiseer uit die Onderwysrnanifes oor Waardes en Demokrasie in die Onderwys (Manifesto on Values, Education and Democracy, 2001) wat ook sigbaar was in die Waldorf-kurrikulumdokument (Curriculum: Waldorf Schools in South Africa, 1995), is bespreek as moontlike menseregte-waardes. Empiriese navorsing is onderneem om die wyse waarop menseregte-waardes in goeie praktyk-scenarios aangespreek word te verken ten einde nuwe insig te verkry rakende die fasilitering van menseregte-waardes. Deur die sistematies-etnografiese waarnemings en semi-gestruktureerde onderhoude het dit voorgekom dat menseregte-waardes in beide skoolkontekste meestal in toevallige situasies aangespreek word, eerder as deel van formele kurrikuluminhoude. Dit is interessant, gegewe die feit dat die uitkomsgebaseerde opvoedingsmodel heelwat dokumente beskikbaar gestel het om die fasilitering van menseregte-waardes te rig, terwyl die Waldorf-benadering geen ondersteunende dokumentasie in dié verband bied nie. Mens kan tereg vra wat die waarde en invloed van sulke dokumente is as basiese kennis, wat nodig is om hierdie dokumente betekenisvol te interpreteer, nie eerste oorgedra word nie. Dit het ook gelyk asof Waldorf-onderwysers beter met kurrikulumverwante sake, soos die sosiale konstruering van 'n kurrikulum, omgaan weens hul goeie opleiding betreffende Antroposofie, die filosofie wat Waldorf-onderwys onderlê. Opvoeders in uitkomsgebaseerde onderwys se opleiding in die teorie, filosofie en metodologie van die onderwysmodel, wat beïnvloed is deur die haastige implementering van die nuwe model in staatskole, kan bevraagteken word. Laasgenoemde aspek blyk onsekerhede te veroorsaak wanneer hierdie onderwysers kurrikulumverwante sake, soos die sosiale konstruering van 'n kurrikulum, moet hanteer. Ná afloop van die studie is sekere aanbevelings en verwante voorbeelde gegee. Dit het onder meer die volgende ingesluit: dat dialoog na 'n wenslike fasiliteringstrategie lyk in die bevordering van leerders se begrip van hul regte, asook dié van andere; dat situasies waartydens menseregte-waardes toevallig aangespreek word omskep kan word in waardevolle onderrig-Ieerervaringe; dat menslike hulpbronne - insluitende leerders - gebruik kan word om menseregte-waardes oor te dra; en dat onderwysersopleiding (beide indiens en voordiens ) op die insluiting van menseregte-waardes en die bevordering van begrip vir die sosiale konstruering van 'n kurrikulum moet fokus. Die studie is afgesluit met die opmerking dat menseregte-waardes tot die herdefiniëring van waarde-opvoeding mag bydra, gegewe dat dit op gepaste teoretiese en filosofiese begrondinge gebaseer is, en dat diegene wat verantwoordelik gehou word vir die fasilitering van sulke waardes, die nodige ondersteuning in dié verband sal kry.

published_or_final_version / Education / Doctoral / Doctor of Philosophy

published_or_final_version / Education / Master / Master of Education

The purpose of this study is to document and analyze patterns of institutional constraints and supports that emerge when an urban elementary school, sponsored by a local university, is conceived and created in a high-stakes accountability environment. The study considers the regulative, normative, and cultural-cognitive pressures placed upon the school in its early years. In its mission to provide a model of exemplary education to a minority population, it is influenced by institutions of governance, traditional schooling, the local community, the university, and others. The author documents the social and political context of the school's creation, in addition to the institutional pressures related to the school's regulatory environment, normative outlook, and cultural-cognitive beliefs and assumptions. This study uses New Institutional Theory as a framework for analyzing data from interviews, documents, and observations. The study is both a theoretical effort to demonstrate the value of New Institutional Theory in education research and a case study which attempts to answer the question: In what ways is the elementary school constrained or enabled by the institutional nature of its creation and on-going effort to be a demonstration site for best practices for elementary level education in an urban setting? This study provides a review of literature regarding New Institutional Theory and the many issues surrounding the current accountability movement. It also suggests avenues of research, including research for education policy development that may usefully address the needs of urban education today. The author aims to provide a case study that is rich enough in detail to provoke discussion of the challenges inherent in the creation of this new educational model, the university sponsored charter school in an urban environment. The author also wishes to draw a theoretical connection between the New Institutional Theory and the dynamics of teacher practice in today's political climate. The case study exemplifies the difficulty of policy implementation when the policy is not designed inclusively. Policymakers need to be sensitive to a diversity of viewpoints and sub-cultures actively operating in the environment in order to develop policy that will build local capacity for increased learning and school improvement. / text