This presentation tells the story of two partnerships co-initiated by the ETSU Center of Excellence in Mathematics and Science Education. The first partnership, Eastman Scholar MathElites, demonstrates how a 7+ year partnership between business and an institute of higher education (Eastman-ETSU) has brought a regional impact in Grades 3-8 math. The second partnership, G6-12 Science and Literacy project, introduces how a local education agency and institute of higher education (Hawkins County Schools-ETSU) have worked together to provide teacher professional development (PD) that focuses on Grades 6-12 English Language Arts and Science. This PD seeks to build confidence and understanding about using reading as a tool to understand STEM literacies. These two programs do not only benefit K-12 education in the Northeast Tennessee region, but also bring practical implications for future development in state-wide and national issues.

Educators have regarded building leader-member relationships using collaboration as a fundamental component to successfully improve students' academic achievement. Ineffective collaborative leadership practices may lead to achievement deficits particularly for many urban charter schools operated by educational management organizations. The purpose of this case study was to explore collaborative leadership practices educational management organization leaders need to assist school principals in low-performing K-12 urban charter schools to improve academic achievement. Guided by Fiedler's contingency theory, this case study explored the successful collaborative leadership practices of educational management organization leaders and school principals in a midwestern urban charter school to improve academic achievement. Data collection included semistructured interviews with 3 educational management organization leaders and 5 urban charter school principals and reviewing archival company documents. Data analysis involved coding and theming significant phrases and emerging patterns related to successful collaborative leadership practices until reaching data saturation. The emerging themes revealed included collaborative practices; academic achievement; implementation to change; school improvement; professional development; compliance and regulations; organizational culture, and community involvement. Findings from this case study resonated with Fiedler's contingency theory and indicated the significance of collaborative leadership practices. A significant positive social change implication is that the awareness of collaborative leadership practices in low-performing K-12 urban charter schools can enhance student academic achievement.

In an urban Georgia school district, teacher satisfaction surveys revealed that technology-based professional development was not equipping teachers with the skills or support needed to implement technology into their teaching practices. The purpose of this mixed-methods case study was to explore teachers' experiences and perceptions of technology-based professional development and its effect on self-efficacy. Guided by Piaget's constructivist theory, this study was based on the perspective that teachers often construct knowledge rather than gain it. Guiding questions explore the experiences teachers have had with technology integration in daily teaching practices, their self-perceived competency level and self-efficacy regarding technology, their attitudes about provided professional development and time and resources provided for their collaborative professional work, and perceptions about their technology related professional development needs. A purposeful sample of 35 teachers was used to collect quantitative data through a survey and 8 of these teachers were interviewed. Interview data were transcribed, coded, and member checked. Three themes emerged: teacher-centered versus student-centered use; necessity of differentiated professional development; and lack of support, resources, and time. Descriptive analysis revealed that most teachers were using technology daily. Factors contributing to the frequency and quality of technology use included resources, support, and self-efficacy. As a model intervention, the final outcome is a comprehensive professional development plan to provide teachers with a platform to share and improve their teaching practices, which when implemented will offer positive social change, in the form of support for these and other teachers, which will lead to improvements in teaching and learning and achievement of educational outcomes.

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Education is a critical social process and is the responsibility of the society of which a child is a member. Education and Schooling promote the cognitive development and professional skills acquisition that produce economic development and positive socio-economic outcomes. In the modern world, education is strongly correlated with employability, access to food, housing, social status and associates strongly with measures of individual health and wellbeing. However, despite moderate gains in education outcomes for Inuit students, school engagement and graduation rates remain low across Inuit Nunangat in the K-12 system, and entry into post-secondary education has increasingly lagged behind that of the rest of Canadians. All the while, Inuit remain the most socio-economically disadvantaged people in Canada. At the root of this education gap is the collision of two cultures and world views. In the last sixty-five years (roughly just two generations), Inuit non-monetary social and economic systems, as well as teaching methods, have been eroded and replaced by dominant Western pedagogical and economic practices. This has caused tension between Inuit and Western pedagogy and provoked re-examination of what gets taught in the dominant Western education system in order to prepare Inuit students to participate in Canadian society. This study narrates the experiences of six Inuit students' education journeys and explores how they navigated cultural tensions to successfully reach and complete their post-secondary education. Findings indicate that the presence of Inuit Qaujimajatuqangit (Inuit epistemology), or rather its prescriptive Guiding Principles (the branch of Inuit social epistemology) when practiced, supported their success. Further, the lack of these Principles, evident in microaggressions from educators, segregation, racism, suicides, and lateral violence from peers all served as barriers to their educational goals of being able to participate bi-culturally in both the Inuit and Western ways of living.

One of the main aims of inquiry is to engage students as active, not passive, participants in science. The purpose of this study is to describe science educators’ and students’ views about inquiry-based instruction in order to better understand and improve implementation of evidence-based teaching strategies. Inquiry-based techniques have been shown to improve student understanding of scientific concepts, yet, there continue to be challenges in implementing these techniques. This research project utilizes Q Methodology, a research method that captures both common and disparate measures of subjectivity, to identify commonalities and defining viewpoints about inquiry-based teaching and learning. Three significantly different viewpoints were identified and each viewpoint represents differences in teaching styles and classroom environments. Additionally, consensus items reveal students and instructors highly value relating science to everyday life; however, a lack of importance is placed upon peer learning and use of open-ended questions.

The purpose of this study was to address a gap in the organizational leadership research related to the sharing, or alignment, of leadership vision across organizational levels, with a focus on educational vision alignment in Florida K-12 public school districts. The study also sought to determine to what extent, if any, there were differences among Florida school districts exhibiting different levels of educational vision alignment. The broad question addressed by the current research was this: To what degree are the educational visions of superintendents and principals aligned within Florida K-12 public school districts? The following research questions further guided the study: 1. What common themes can be found in the published vision statements of the 67 Florida K-12 public school districts? 2. To what extent, if any, do Florida K-12 public school district superintendents and their respective principals agree with one another on the importance of the common themes found in Florida school districts' published vision statements? 3. What is the relationship, if any, between educational vision alignment levels in Florida K-12 public school districts and principals' perceptions of their superintendents' leadership styles? 4. To what extent, if any, are there differences among Florida K-12 public school districts exhibiting different levels of educational vision alignment? The Florida Educational Vision Questionnaire Superintendent Form (FEVQ-S), a researcher developed questionnaire, was administered to all 67 Florida K-12 public school district superintendents. With superintendent approval, two additional questionnaires were administered to a sample of 242 principals in 23 school districts. The Florida Educational Vision Questionnaire Principal Form (FEVQ-P) and the Multifactor Leadership Questionnaire Form 5X Rater (MLQ-5X) (Avolio, Bass, & Jung, 1999) were returned fully completed by 105 principals in 21 districts. A total of 81 principal responses in 20 districts were usable, yielding overall usable response rates of 29.9% (superintendents) and 33.5% (principals). Comparisons of FEVQ responses of superintendents and principals in each school district were made using a researcher developed measure, the Educational Vision Alignment Index (EVAI). Within each district, the EVAI was compared with the superintendent's leadership style as measured by the principals' responses to the MLQ-5X. School districts were then compared using data obtained from the FEVQ demographic items, the Florida School Indicators Report (FSIR) (FLDOE, 2003a), the 2004 School Grades by District Report (FLDOE, n.d.), and the online Florida Public School Superintendents report (FLDOE, 2005c). The FSIR contains data on district characteristics such as operating costs, per pupil expenditures, school staff composition, student membership, student mobility rates, student stability rates, and teacher descriptors. The 2004 School Grades by District report contains both the school grades for each district and the total number of schools per district. The Florida Public School Superintendents report contains general school district information and superintendent status (i.e., elected or appointed) information. Detailed data analyses related to each of the four research questions indicated that: 1. Several common themes can be found in the published vision statements of the 67 Florida K-12 public school districts, 2. Florida K-12 public school district superintendents and their respective principals agree with one another on the importance of some of these common themes, 3. Several relationships exist between the educational vision alignment levels in Florida K-12 public school districts and principals' perceptions of their superintendents' leadership styles, and 4. There are differences among Florida K-12 public school districts exhibiting different levels of educational vision alignment. The current study illustrated that in Florida K-12 public school districts whose superintendents were perceived to be transformational leaders, a strong alignment of educational vision between the superintendents and their principals was also apparent, particularly in those districts having elected superintendents. Using the two researcher developed tools, the Florida Educational Vision Questionnaire (FEVQ) and the Educational Vision Alignment Index (EVAI), it was shown that this alignment pertained to specific content items, or themes, derived from an analysis of the educational vision statements of the 67 Florida school districts. These results indicate that the current emphasis in Florida on the development of transformational leaders who are knowledgeable in techniques for developing and communicating shared visions is therefore warranted.