<p> This qualitative study explored the personal factors that promote the adoption of acceleration among community college mathematics faculty as well as the departmental and institutional relationships that support this adoption. Interviews with nine early adopters of acceleration revealed diversity in their educational backgrounds and career paths into community college teaching. This diversity may enhance the ability of faculty to view the mathematics curriculum as evolving, enabling them to investigate alternatives to the traditional developmental math curriculum such as acceleration. Study participants also demonstrated highly developed pedagogical content knowledge and noted the importance of participation in a community of practice in supporting their acceleration work. Participants used implementation strategies aligned with their departmental culture and identified ways the institution could support their adoption efforts. Recommendations outline strategies for faculty and institutional leaders interested in promoting the adoption of acceleration on their campuses.</p>

<p> Education reform has increased accountability measures for principals to ensure all students are achieving. Although student achievement should be the primary focus of a principal, the various responsibilities of the principalship can overshadow instruction. Due to the large number of students, multitude of course offerings, extra-curricular activities, discipline, and operational issues, many high school principals are inundated with responsibilities and challenges that may cause less time to be allocated to curriculum and instruction. These multiple responsibilities can also lead to principal burnout and high turnover rates. To understand how high school principals managed their time to ensure curriculum and instruction was a priority, a qualitative study was conducted. The researcher collected and analyzed data from semi-structured interviews, observations, and documents. The portraiture methodology was then employed to create portraits that would provide a realistic perspective of the high school principal&rsquo;s experience. The instructional principals in this study each had a co-principal to manage the principalship. This structure should have guaranteed curriculum and instruction would be a priority. However, there were still challenges that would disrupt the focus from instruction. Even with the division of responsibilities, principals felt ownership for anything that transpired on the campus. In spite of the demanding time requirements of the high school principalship, the leaders in this study were very dedicated to the role and student achievement</p>

<p> High levels of teacher turnover are the norm in American and International Overseas Schools. Studies in public and private schools in the United States established that high levels of teacher turnover are related to decreased academic performance, low levels of school climate and incur a financial burden. This study proposed the use of incentives to retain desirable teachers as a cost effective means to improve school climate and academic performance. Seventeen of forty-one American Overseas schools in Europe participated in this study. Teachers identified the incentives that are most influential on their decision to re-sign for at least one additional year. Heads of school identified the incentives they felt where most influential as well as those that they are allowed to use by tradition and school board policy. This study found re-signing bonuses, annual flights home and increased housing allowance to be the most influential incentives for teachers and the least accessible to heads of school.</p>

Graduate

This action research study examines the problems of a middle manager in a school, managing teams to deliver an operational project with little formal authority. The main objective of this study is to find out how a project can be managed in the most effective and efficient way when the teams involved have mixed work place loyalties and are operating within a restricted environment of limited resources. The management focus was on the micro-management of staff to influence performance and improve practice, including the performance of the practitioner-researcher. The study is set using a paradigm of symbolic interactionism based on qualitative research methods using action research. Primary data were gathered during two major research cycles each lasting an academic year. Data were collected using a series of participant logs, a detailed researcher log and indepth interviews with the teams and individuals. In the first cycle, a critical friend also provided data. The study presents the advantages and limitations of the methodology and suggests ways of reducing these limitations and enhancing the trustworthiness of the findings. The complexity of managing teams of form tutors who have multiple job roles and commitments in an inner city school environment is also highlighted. The study also raised sensitive issues and ethics in terms of the data that were generated when based on the performance and attitudes of participants. The main finding of this study was the importance of applying a range of methods which in isolation would have limited effects, but which produced a synergy of effect when applied together. These methods were based around the framework of Buchanan and Boddy's (1992), Public Performance-Backstaging Strategy. The framework included the use of traditional-rational-linear strategies backed up by a political management style. This study applied this basic framework to a specific school setting and introduced other strategies often at the micro level to influence staff. The study also shows the effectiveness of applying a different emphasis of strategy to different groups, from high to under performing staff. Some tactics were shown to be more effective; some worked well with some staff but had the opposite effect with other individuals. The efficiency of various techniques was investigated, some of which were shown to result in a high energy and emotional cost for the manager. The study concludes by showing that in certain circumstances it was more expedient to adopt a management of dilemmas approach rather than seek a total solution to a problem.

No description available.

The purpose of this study is two-fold: (1) to identify the differences, if any, between the perceptions held by urban school teachers of urban school principals’ administrative leadership behaviors and urban school principals’ self-assessments of their leadership behaviors and (2) to determine if the responses of the principals relative to school activities that implement the leadership behaviors correlated with their self-assessments. The study was limited to 209 teachers and 55 principals in the Atlanta Public School System, Atlanta, Georgia. Three instruments developed by Selective Research Incorporated were used: (1) the Teacher Administrator Questionnaire administered to teachers; (2) the Administrator Self-Assessment Questionnaire administered to principals; and (3) the Administrator Perceiver Interview, a face-to-face, taped, structured interview, administered to thirty of the fifty-five principals. These three instruments have a common basis; that is, each instrument is developed around the twelve life themes espoused by Selective Research Incorporated as characterizing administrative behaviors that facilitate the growth of teachers, which in turn facilitates the growth of students. These life themes are Mission, Manpower Development, Relator, Arranger, Catalyzer, Audience Sensitivity, Group Enhancer, Discriminator, Performance Orientation, Work Orientation, and Ambiguity Tolerance. Analysis of variance was used to test the first set of null hypotheses at the .05 level of significance as to the differences between the perceptions held by urban school teachers relative to urban school administrative leadership behaviors and the assessments of urban school principals of their administrative behaviors. The null hypothesis was rejected for each of the twelve hypotheses related to the twelve life themes. Teachers’ perceptions of principals’ administrative behaviors were different from the principals’ assessments of their own administrative behaviors. When the teachers were grouped by the variables sex, race, age, years of teaching experience, and academic training, they were consistent in their perceptions of principals’ administrative behaviors. However, teachers with more academic training rated the principals significantly higher on theme Delegator than did teachers with less academic training. When the principals were grouped by the same variables, only black principals and older principals differed in their self—ssessments. Black principals assessed themselves significantly higher than did white principals on seven of the twelve life themes, and older principals assessed themselves significantly higher than did younger principals on three of the twelve life themes. Pearson Correlation Coefficients were computed to test the second set of null hypotheses at the .05 level of significance as to whether the principals’ responses in a structured interview correlated with their self-assessments. The null hypothesis was accepted for each of the hypotheses. The principals’ responses during the interviews to questions regarding school activities that reflect administrative behaviors described by the twelve life themes did not correlate with their self-assessments relative to conducting school tasks in keeping with the twelve life themes. The major recommendations resulting from this study are as foIlows: I. A longitudinal study should be made using the teacher—rating and principal-assessment instruments as a basis for planning and conducting in-service training for administrators, followed by post administration of the instruments 2. On-going use of the procedure employed in this study can be used by individual school administrators in an effort to assess needs in relation to staff morale

This study examines the effectiveness of two reading interventionists and their teaching methodologies with students in grades K-2. The two interventionists were selected because they are the two teachers responsible for reading intervention in the primary grades. The students were selected because they are being served by the interventionists and they are performing below proficient in reading. Many students come into Title I schools underperforming for a variety of reasons. These include a lack of literacy resources in their homes and also a lack of outside experiences. Many parents in this school setting are working poor. They hold jobs, but do not have a much time to spend with their child due to making ends meet financially. A case study approach was used to gather data. The researcher conducted three observations on each teacher for a total of six observations. All three grades levels (K-2) were observed in a pull out setting. The observer utilized an observation instrument and also an interview protocol to interview both teachers. Additionally, student achievement was analyzed using DIBELS Reading 3D data. The data was collected at the beginning of the year and the end of the year and compared to measure student reading growth. The researcher found that both teachers regardless of age, race, and experience were effective at raising student achievement with at risk students. There were no significant differences in the achievement between males and females, between students who received free and reduced lunch and those who did not, or among ethnicities. First grade students however made significantly higher gains than the other two grade levels in this study. Both teachers showed 100% growth according to Reading 3D scores. Additionally, they agreed that given autonomy and time to plan and build trust with regular education teachers they were more successful. They believe in the importance of accountability and providing supports to underachieving students. The conclusions drawn from the findings suggest that various teaching methodologies which include differentiation, a focus on the big five components of reading, and small teacher to student ratios were successful. Strong connections with students were seen from each teacher as they both knew their children and their strengths and weaknesses. This research suggests that given full autonomy to deliver instruction without a scripted program, both teachers were highly effective. Districts should use teachers, such as the ones in this study, to conduct professional development trainings on best practices in literacy. Leaders are encouraged to give teachers more autonomy in their classrooms. Intervention should be considered in higher grade levels to bridge gaps in reading.

Hip-Hop educational research is critical to understanding the plight of black boys in public schools throughout the United States. This qualitative inquiry fills a void in the research literature that often fails to include the emic perspectives of the participants involved. To confront the challenges black male youth face in school studies that capture their salient voices about lived-experiences are crucial. Nonetheless, this critical ethnography provides a praxis for educational practitioners to use to gain valuable insight into the minds of school age black males. This study contributes to the canon of educational research by situating hip-hop culture and its various elements as independent variables that have a direct impact on black male youth and their attitude in school. This study is also different in that it adds three additional components to hip-hop culture that include fashion/style, language, and behavior. Historically, these three elements are discussed as a part of the four cornerstones: DJing, Rapping/emceeing, Breakdancing, and Graffiti Art. However, this investigation isolates these three as separate elements that should be included in discussions about hip-hop educational research due to their profound influence on the current generation of black male youth in public schools throughout the United States.

The purpose of this study is to examine dialectal diversity and to determine if there is a significant relationship between teachers' emphasis on standard English and their teaching styles and their perceptions about their teachers. This investigation involves a correlation study of the aforementioned independent and dependent variables in Cobb County Public School District in metropolitan Atlanta, Georgia. The independent and dependent variables were moderated in terms of ethnicity and gender. The findings of the study were that students perceived that their teachers' emphasis on standard English was significantly related to their teaching style and their expectations of students. Students perceived their teachers as having higher expectations for students that spoke standard English. In addition, students believed that their perceptions of teachers' emphasis on standard English resulted in teachers engaging them more with group work and classroom discussions. Further, a major finding in this study found that students concluded that they perceived teachers' emphasis on standard English was significantly related to their linguistic self-esteem. However, students held tightly to their dialects in spite of their perceptions. Thus, "dialect persistence" challenges traditional views about dialectal diversity and teachers' perceived impact on students' use of standard English. Thus, the findings of this study suggested that dialectal diversity among students critically effects their learning potential and potential for success within the educational environment.