The purpose of this study was to explore how and to what degree student involvement in a leadership program prepares them for responsible citizenship. Specifically, this multi-case investigation explored the differences between how curricular and co-curricular leadership development programs approach citizenship development. Students' perspectives and experiences were collected through interviews. Document review and interviews with program administrators were also conducted during the data collection process. A case report for each leadership development program was compiled in order to manage all raw data collected. Interviews were audio taped and transcribed for analysis. Data analysis included cross-case analysis, partially ordered meta-matrices, and the use of taxonomies. The results of the study may provide student affairs administrators with empirical based knowledge regarding student values that will offer guidance and recommendations in altering program structure in order to prepare students be active citizens in their community.

With increasing demand for school accountability following the NCLB Act of 2001, school leaders have a greater responsibility to students with disabilities than ever tinclude special education leadership due to the leadership imperative to meet the needs of all students (Lashley, 2007; Yell, 2012). Little attention, however, has been paid to special education and special education law in leadership preparation programs (Cusson, 2010; Pazey & Cole, 2013), leaving school leaders inadequately prepared to serve all students. The purpose of this study was to explore how six current school leaders who are graduates of a university-based “high-quality” principalship program created an inclusive school culture. Guided by the theoretical framework of sensemaking (Weick, 1995) and a phenomenological approach (Creswell, 2007; Patton, 1990), this study examined the ways in which six school leaders used what they know about special education and special education law to develop their understanding of such policy and sought to gain insight into why they made sense of and constructed their interpretations of the policy in a particular way. Of particular interest was their perceived roles in working with special education staff, and the effects their construction and application of inclusive education policy had on students with disabilities. The findings of this study suggest that these six school leaders’ sensemaking of inclusive education policy was influenced by three factors: knowledge, experiences, and personal contexts. Each of these three factors were situated within the context of the school leaders’ constructed identities. If the school leader perceived his or her role as a leader for special education, he or she was more inclined to seek special education and special education law content knowledge, ensure their campus staff attained and maintained the capacity to meet the needs of all students, and continuously searched for specific experiences and opportunities that they could make available to themselves and others that required them to grapple with difficult issues related to special education. In doing so, they were able to effect deeper-level change on their school campuses. / text

Tidigare forskning visar att det finns svårigheter för deltagare av ledarskapsutbildningar att implementera kunskaper de får med sig från utbildningen till sitt arbete. Detta kan bli en förlust både för organisationen samt för deltagarens kunskapsutveckling. Det gör att organisationer behöver veta vilka förutsättningar som krävs för att främja implementeringen för sina medarbetare. Denna studie är en kandidatuppsats i Personal och arbetslivsprogrammet på Högskolan Dalarna. Studien syftar till att skapa förståelse för vilka förutsättningar respondenterna upplever att de behöver för att implementera kunskaperna från ett ledarskapsprogram som de deltagit i. Sex respondenter från den utvalda organisationen har medverkat i semistrukturerade telefonintervjuer, vars svar sedan analyserats och sammanställts med hjälp av en tematisk analys. Resultatet visar att respondenterna behöver den egna motivationen, sociala relationer samt organisatoriska förutsättning för att implementera sina kunskaper från ledarskapsprogrammet. / Previous research shows that there are difficulties for participants in leadership training programs to implement the knowledge they gain from training into their workplace. It could mean that both the organization and the participants lose important knowledge and development opportunities. Therefore, it is of great importance that the organizations know how to promote and ease the necessary implementation for their employees. This study is a bachelor's thesis in the program Personnel and work at Dalarna University. The study aims to create an understanding of what conditions the respondents feel that they need, to implement their knowledge from a leadership program in which they have participated. Six respondents from a selected organization participated in semi-structured telephone interviews, whose responses then were analyzed and compiled using a thematic analysis. The results show that the respondents needed their own motivation, social relationships and organizational prerequisites to implement their knowledge from the leadership program.

The primary concerns of this study were to describe the most common practices of current college student leadership training programs in the United States and to compare the 1979 and 1997 findings by replicating the 1979 Simonds study. This study provides an overview of related literature on the history of leadership theory and the research on leadership training in higher education, a detailed description of the methodology, results of the survey, a comparative analysis of the 1979 and 1997 findings, and discussion of the current status of leadership training at institutions of higher education. Conclusions are drawn, and implications and recommendations for student affairs professionals are made that may improve the quality of student leadership in higher education.

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This retrospective, nonexperimental, quantitative study was designed to explore nontraditional students’ perceptions of satisfaction with their graduate education experience in a customized transnational educational context. This study was undergirded by theories and concepts gleaned from multiple disciplines. Disconfirmed expectations theory of consumer satisfaction derived from expectancy theory, which describes the motivations and behaviors of consumers who purchase a service but cannot fully evaluate the service until it has been consumed, provided the overarching conceptual framework for the research. This research analyzed data from 62 graduates of a customized, transnational Master of Education program in educational leadership. Participants responded to a quantitative instrument that contained 18 questions related to various aspects of the respondents’ educational experience. The qualitative component involved responding to six open-ended questions. Descriptive statistical analyses were conducted on the quantitative data. The analyses performed include frequency distributions, means and standard deviations, Cronbach’s coefficient alpha, and a correlation matrix for the dependent and independent variables and for the six subcategories. To examine whether differences in satisfaction with specified aspects of the program were reflected in differences in subscale satisfaction, t tests were also conducted. Conventional content analysis was employed to analyze qualitative data. Statistical analyses indicated that participants were satisfied with every aspect of their educational experience. This empirical study contributes to the knowledge bank of student satisfaction in a transnational context. When the particular and peculiar needs of nontraditional learners are considered when designing graduate level programs, institutional accommodations are provided, courses that are relevant to students’ needs are taught by instructors with relevant andragogical skills, the appropriate support systems are in place, and the overall goal is to provide education that is relevant to the personal and career goals of the students, students will be satisfied with their educational experience.

As sustainability challenges increase in both frequency and magnitude, there is a growing need for leaders who can deal with such complexity. Education for Sustainable Development (ESD) develops knowledge,skills, and attitudes to enable the development of such leaders. This thesis focuses on the elusive “attitude” piece, more widely referred to as the affective domain. The research team interviewed experts on affective learning in either higher education or ESD contexts. Additionally, staff members from the case study organisation, Teach for Austria (TFA) were interviewed to determine how affective learning can be further developed within their fellow program. The five-level model (5LM) was employed to frame the findings of each interview set to provide recommendations for TFA. A feature of the Framework for Strategic Sustainable Development, the 5LM provides a strategic planning approach that allows for easier adaptation and implementation of the findings for other programs that wish to learn from this research. Therefore, this thesis serves to provide recommendations for developing affective learning in sustainability leadership programs. Making affective learning explicit and empowering one to reflect their own affective domain and their perspective on the world can have a positive impact on their life, as well as on their environment.

Historically, being self-reflective has not been evidenced as critical to the career advancement of teachers aspiring to leadership roles. Five teacher leaders in a southwestern school district participated in a district Teacher Leadership Certificate Program (TLCP), which included self-reflective practices to broaden their understanding of the tools necessary to be an effective leader in 21st century schools. Theories of change suggest that teachers must acquire new knowledge and apply this new knowledge in practice. The theoretical framework for this project study was Mezirow's transformative learning theory. A narrative design was employed to identify the change process experienced by the 5 teacher leaders using elements of transformational theory. A questionnaire, observation protocol, and multiple interview instruments were used to examine 1 elementary and 4 secondary school teacher leaders, concluding with an essay. Interviews focused on the perceptions of the participants through inquiry that described their transformation to leaders as agents of change. Emergent themes were identified from the data through open coding and thematic analysis. Themes included teachers using self-reflection to enhance leadership goals and career development. The subsequent project was a 3 day professional development for all teachers at the study site on developing teacher leadership. The implications for promoting positive social change include providing research results to the local site on the use of self-reflection practices of teacher leaders and supporting professional development to improve teacher leadership educational practices.

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