Education reform policies have focused on high-stakes assessments primarily utilizing standardized tests for accountability purposes. As testing practices have evolved due to a variety of factors throughout the past century or so, they have become fully integrated into public schooling in the United States. These tests are having a marked impact on teachers and education, as teachers feel pressure to produce exceptional student results and modify their instructional practices, often teaching to the test and narrowing the curriculum in order to focus on the requirements of the mandates. This study examines a survey of public school teachers to ascertain their experiences and perspectives regarding the impact of these testing policies. The results show that teachers are feeling an immense amount of pressure, their instructional planning and classroom practices are impacted by the tests, and they do not find the tests particularly helpful. Differences between teachers gender, education, experience, subject focus, and work with gifted and talented students are also examined. As testing is likely to be a force in public education in America for the foreseeable future, the results of this study can be used to ascertain teacher concerns and develop supports for teachers to help address those concerns.

This retrospective study explores how each disaster site needs to be considered as its own individual portrait for analysis and how inclusion of cultural elements contributes to the recovery of those affected by the disaster and helps in reinstating their cultural identity. This study was conducted after hurricane Katrinas landfall, at the largest FEMA trailer park, Renaissance Village, from its inception in October 2005 until its closure June 2008. It portrays how programs may ensure their sustainability if cultural elements are included in the program design, development, and delivery of services. The nuanced notions of culture are predominantly recognized in many realms such as curriculum theory, educational leadership, and especially in the social justice literature. Current post-disaster educational responses portray a predominant lack of, and dismissal of cultural values in educational responses to disasters. This is mainly due to time and funding constraints. This study presents a blue print for future post-disaster education programming, which promotes using local culture as the main driving force. This study contributes to the Emergency education field as well as culturally relevant pedagogy literature.

This dissertation draws on narrative, post-colonial, and curriculum theories to describe two book clubs in which twelve pre-service English teachers examined post-colonial young adult literature and explored the possibilities and challenges of using these texts in English Language Arts classrooms. The texts selected for the study focus on young protagonists of color living outside the cultural context of the U.S. because these narratives tend to be underrepresented in the international young adult literature market (Cart, 2010; Koss & Teale, 2009). The purpose of this dissertation was to explore the possibilities and challenges of using post-colonial young adult literature in education settings through examining such texts with pre-service teachers so that they might grapple with these ideas before they begin teaching and be in a better position to teach or recommend post-colonial young adult literature to their own students. The data collected for this dissertation included pre- and post-study questionnaires, participants written responses to each novel, audio recordings and transcriptions of each book club discussion, and field notes of each book club meeting. Using narrative analysis methods, I first coded this data thematically to generate categories across all data sources. However, as group discussions involved multiple narratives and speakers, I also used a dialogic approach (Riessman, 2008) to examine conversations in which participants discussed a topic in depth in response to an event described in the novel. The findings revealed that participants used a variety of strategies to establish meaningful connections for themselves across cultures. Participants used the novels to articulate and sometimes revise their understandings of post-colonial concerns such as race, ethnicity, nationality, and prejudice. They used the space of the book clubs to pool together their knowledge to form a collective learning environment. As pre-service teachers who were less than a year away from starting their careers, participants were concerned with how they might make post-colonial young adult novels relevant to their students lives while also expanding students global awareness. Taken together, these findings support the idea that reading and discussing post-colonial young adult literature in a book club setting can offer some critical and potentially transformative insights for pre-service teachers and, perhaps by extension, for their future students.

In August 1767 King Louis XV of France appointed Madame du Coudray, a 52-year-old midwife, to teach midwifery throughout the whole extent of the Realm. In so doing he acknowledged the science and experience and high degree of perfection that she had obtained in midwifery. Over the next 20 years Madame du Coudray traveled throughout France teaching midwifery to illiterate peasant women. It is estimated that she taught over 4,000 students. How did she teach midwifery to these women who had no previous experience with science? Could modern biology educators learn from her methods? This case study addressed these questions by studying her tools: a set of 26 teaching illustrations, a mannequin which served as an obstetric simulator, and a manual which contained her lectures. The illustrations were analyzed using Tuftes theory of graphic design. This analysis revealed that they are excellent examples of Tufte-style graphic illustrations. They minimize chartjunk while maximizing data ink. They use color appropriately. They are surprisingly truthful according to modern medical standards, and they use the principle of small multiples to teach the process of childbirth. The features of the mannequin were studied for their potential use for active learning and brain-based learning. This study revealed that the mannequin has a good fidelity, particularly for the eighteenth-century, and could have easily been used for active learning and brain-based learning. The manual was content analyzed for teaching methods. This study revealed that Madame du Coudrays method of teaching relied heavily on applications to real-world situations. It also showed that she taught her students their social and cultural responsibilities. In "Vision and Change: A Call for Action", the AAAS recommends that biology students in the twenty-first century should have experience with simulation and understand the role of science in society. It appears that modern biology instructors could learn much from Madame du Coudray.

Large numbers of students attending community college lack essential college success skills (motivation and study strategies). Many of these students do not complete their degree programs. Identifying learning and teaching methods that promote the development of lifelong learning skills in addition to content acquisition is essential. This quasi-experimental research design study examined the effect of alternative multiple-choice question design on student motivational strategies for learning and retention. Participants were 59 students enrolled in a Microsoft® Office applications course at a public gulf coast community college. The discrete-option multiple-choice (DOMC) test was designed to limit cheating and guessing on tests. The designers of the test suggested that the test format might require students to change how they prepare for exams. Results showed that the test format can change both the motivational beliefs and learning strategies of students. The present study indicates that it is possible, to affect student retention at the course level by changing the test format. Students who have low levels of interest and lower levels of intrinsic goal orientation may be at risk for non-retention. Students taking the alternate form of multiple-choice test versus the traditional format held higher levels of intrinsic value overall. Results indicate that the discrete-option multiple-choice (DOMC) question format promoted student self-efficacy (SE) and intrinsic value (IV) in the treatment group. The significant change in the control group (traditional multiple-choice test format) was the decreased score of intrinsic value from semester start to end. Student grade point average continues to be an indicator of college completion. This research may be of interest to educators and instructional course designers.

This investigation is focused on three critical issues facing educators in the 21st century: how technology is reshaping what it means to be human, the shift from the human era to the posthuman era and the implications of that shift on subjectivity, and the purpose of undergraduate education in a posthuman era. The current shift towards a posthuman worldview is a radical break from the modern and postmodern 20th century, when identity was constructed in terms of possibilities and multiplicities. Instead, in the hyperreal 21st century, subjectivity is complicated by homogenization and the radical sameness of simulated technological experiences. Also, whereas the modern and postmodern eras were human-centered, the posthuman era brings with it a shift from a human-centered to a machine-centered worldview. To illustrate a comparable historical shift, the investigation revisits the fifteenth and sixteenth centuries and the transition from the medieval period to the Renaissance. In that shift, the focus turned from a theocentric (God-centered) worldview to a humanistic (human-centered) worldview. From a genealogical perspective, this historical glance can help demonstrate how notions of humanness were privileged in the face of radical social chaos. In the end, when theorizing about the purpose of undergraduate education in a posthuman era, a poststructural examination of modernity is undertaken that explores threads of the lives of young people and the implications of ubiquitous screen culture on their daily lived experiences. Finally, a posthuman curriculum is proposed, which seeks to reawaken attention of the human experience in a digital age.

Video has long been used to support learner reflection in professional education programs in law, health, and education. Emerging video analysis tools offer learners the ability to highlight segments of video and focus their attention to specific moments or aspects of performance. These emerging tools afford opportunities for more systematic observation, analysis, and deliberate reflection on learner performance than was available previously. Expertise research has found that representative, rigorous tasks followed by immediate feedback and error correction constitute deliberate practice. Training environments that incorporate deliberate practice and emerging video annotation and analysis tools provide opportunities for learners pinpoint strengths and weaknesses in a systematic way. The purpose of this descriptive case study was to utilize a mixed method approach that would allow the identification and reveal the development of learner knowledge in an ill- structured professional domain. Data consisting of categorical, evaluative, and descriptive video annotations were collected from a legal interviewing and counseling course. Data were analyzed using Chi's (1997) verbal analysis approach. Verbal analysis is a methodology for quantifying the qualitative coding of the content of verbal utterances. Results imply that verbal analysis may be a useful method for other ill-structured professional domains. While the concept of reflection remains ambiguous, the method demonstrated in this study also provides a means to analyze reflective artifacts to reveal the content or object of reflections. Finally, results suggest that it may be possible to evaluate the development of learner knowledge in ill-structured professional domains.

The inception of No Child Left Behind (NCLB) has focused national attention on improving the academic achievement of all students. In response to this federal legislation, educators, policymakers and others have sought remedies to turnaround chronically low-performing schools. The academic achievement outcomes of implementing such strategies have been mixed. Some schools have experienced clear, unambiguous growth. Others have remained stagnant. Others have regressed. Because of these mixed results, the research was designed to ascertain the factors that determine what makes these strategies succeed or fail. The researcher took a qualitative approach, the multiple case study design. Using the characteristics of High Reliability Organizations, the researcher used an interview guide that was developed by the researcher to interview 10 participants who consisted of teachers, principals, and their immediate district-level supervisors, as well as reviewed artifacts from four high-poverty schools that were all labeled as academically unacceptable by the state of Louisiana in 2007. The outcomes of turnaround strategies were mixed as measured by their school performance scores. Two of the schools experienced clear, unambiguous growth. One of the schools remained stagnant. The other school regressed. Findings of the data analysis indicated that schools with clear, unambiguous growth demonstrated all five characteristics of High Reliability Organizations. The schools that either remained stagnant or declined did not.

Clegorne, Nicholas Anthony, B.M. University of Florida, 2002, M.M. University of Florida, 2004 Doctor of Philosophy Major: Educational Leadership and Research The Lived Experience of Discovery of Purpose in Student Affairs among Emerging Professionals Dissertation directed by Associate Professor Roland Mitchell Pages in dissertation, 146. Words in abstract, 297. ABSTRACT Some researchers estimate that as many as three out of five new professionals will leave the field of student affairs within the first five years. Furthermore low job satisfaction has been cited heavily among new professionals in student affairs. The alarming recognition that so many young professionals are unhappy and that more than half of the fields new professionals will leave very early in their careers has prompted a number of examinations regarding the education, training, induction and supervision of new professionals in the field of student affairs. However, such examinations focus primarily on environmental influences external to the new professional. Studies in similar fields have suggested low job satisfaction and high attrition rates are connected to a lack of articulated purpose in a given field. This study sought to examine the discovery of purpose as one possible intrinsic contributor to job satisfaction and retention among new professionals. A qualitative study was conducted to illuminate the stories of eight emerging professionals (first-year graduate students in higher education administration through third-year new professionals in student affairs). The research design utilized phenomenological and narrative lenses and engaged self-authorship and transition theory as theoretical frames in order to explore the lived experience of discovery of purpose among young student affairs practitioners. Significant statements suggest that participant journeys were marked by repeated transition. Furthermore, data suggests that the ability to identify a resolute, self-authored, and impactful purpose highly coincided with a commitment to remain in the field. Additionally, emerging professionals who were self-motivated to join the field said they were more likely to remain in the field. In an effort to increase persistence in the field of student affairs, a number of suggestions have been made with the intent to improve graduate preparation programs, induction processes, training designs, and supervision strategies.

ABSTRACT This dissertation conducted a narrative inquiry into the lives of Black women university teachers who self-identify as possessing strong faith commitments within a Christian denomination. Critical Race Theory, Womanism and Womanist Theology, the Theory of the Black Church, and Post-colonial Studies were employed in order to facilitate this inquiry. Every woman was reared in a predominantly Black congregation (PBC), and many still practice their faith in a PBC. The primary focus of this study was to consider the influence a religio-spiritual epistemology has on their academic understandings, theorizing, and pedagogical practices. Data collected for this study included recorded conversations, field notes, researcher journals, classroom observations, and personal narratives submitted by the women participating in the study. Using a narrative thematic analysis (Riessman, 2008), the data was coded to uncover themes and categories that were evident across all of the data. Findings revealed that the women held particular beliefs about their pedagogy and scholarship. The women often spoke about their perceptions of their students. These perceptions included ideals about their responsibility to their students, positioning themselves as facilitators in the classroom, and viewing their students as whole and/or spiritual beings. Surprisingly, many of the women also mentioned specific hopes and goals for their White students. They talked about their desire for their pedagogy and scholarship to have an impact in various ways. All of the women were explicit about not being perceived as proselytizers. Instead, they hoped to be living reflections of Christ. Several of the women mentioned some anxiety about being perceived by their colleagues as stereotypically Christian. Finally, the different ways the women did or did not take up issues such as homosexuality, abortion, and other religions was discussed. This study is significant in that it considers an often ignored and under-theorized religio-spiritual epistemology employed by many Black women academicians. The study hopes to position this particular segment of the academy as a source of knowledge that can aid academia in serving all of its members. Findings in this study can also potentially help in the process of advancing academia in its pursuit of equity and justice broadly.