Since its origins in the 19th century, modern schooling has been a continuously contested domain within nation states. Underlying this contestation dynamic lie competing value systems about the social purpose of education; competing values around which are generated different discourses, and which in turn generate inherently contradictory social and organisational structures. As reflected in other areas of society, the 20th century expansion of state-provided schooling has essentially developed around variations of a bureaucratic model Thus, organisational cultures based around bureaucratic values have come to permeate the enterprise of schooling on a world wide scale. Concomitantly, the value for education to be fundamentally associated with human emancipation from psychological, social, political, or economic states of being, persists as a recurring theme in modern schooling. Premised on these understandings, the thesis argues that the development of the practices of school psychology as a profession, like education in general, and special education in particular, has similarly been influenced by tensions between different and competing constellations of values. It is argued that throughout the 20th century, the pervasiveness of formal schooling systems suggest that schooling may be understood as a modernist cultural archetype. As a socially constructed reality, the phenomenon of schooling has become unproblematic the apparent cultural inevitability of formal schooling in the modern era can also be understood as a premise of a systemised way of looking at the world; that of bureaucratic consciousness. Dialectically, bureaucratic consciousness persists in influencing every manifestation of schooling; structurally through its organisational forms, and epistemologically through the institutionalization of teaching and learning. A particular illustration of the dialectical relationship between bureaucratic consciousness and the social forms and social practices of schooling is the school psychology profession which has developed as a part of school systems. The thesis argues that the epistemic archeology of psychology as a knowledge discipline can be traced through an earlier European intellectual and cultural tradition, but in the 20th century, has come to develop a symbiotic yet contradictory relationship with compulsory schooling in the modern nation state. The research study employs historical and fieldwork methods in a study of the development of the school psychology services within the Victorian Education Department, particularly between 1947 and 1987. The thesis also draws upon several usually distinct literatures; the philosophical and theoretical discourse of modernity and post modernity, the history and development of modern schooling, the ethnography of schooling, the international comparative literature on the school psychology profession, and the literature on action research in education practice and curriculum development, As a case study of Victorian school psychology, the research eschews a quantitative statistical approach in favour of qualitative investigatory genres, which have in turn been guided by the values of action research in education, as well as those of critical theory. The important focus of the thesis is its investigation of some aspects of the development and transformations within the Victorian state education bureaucracy, and the dialectical relationship that has persisted between the evolution of change processes and the shifting conceptions of school psychology practices in the 20th century. A history of the organisational development of school psychology services in Victoria constitutes an important part of the thesis. This is complemented by specific illustrations of how some school psychologists have been influenced by and have contributed towards paradigm shifts within the profession, shifts relating to how the changing nature of their work practices have come to be understood and valued by teachers and by school administrators. The work of J. R. MacLeod from the 1950s is noted in this regard. Particular attention is also drawn to the dialectical relationship between bureaucratic consciousness and school psychology's professional orientation in the 1980s. As a means of providing field data to explore this relationship, ethnographic case studies with two school communities are included as part of the fieldwork of the thesis, and are based upon the author's own work in the mid 1980s. These case studies provide a basis for conceptually refraining the school psychologist's professional experience within schooling systems, and an opportunity to examine how competing value systems impact upon the work of the school psychologist. The thesis concludes with some observations about bureaucratic transformations within educational organisations, and about the future relationship of the school psychology profession with schooling systems, as framed by the theoretical parameters of the modernist /post modernist debate. The issue of competing value systems within the administration of public education is re-examined as is the value of promoting human empowerment in the ongoing work of the school psychologist. Finally, some scenario building with reference to the future of school psychology in Victoria in is undertaken.

Thesis (Ph. D.)--University of Texas at Austin, 2007. / Vita. Includes bibliographical references.

Thesis (Ph. D.)--University of Texas at Austin, 1999. / Vita. Includes bibliographical references (leaves 172-190). Available also in a digital version from Dissertation Abstracts.

Thesis (Ed. S.)--Miami University, Dept. of Educational Psychology, 2002. / Title from first page of PDF document. Document formatted into pages; contains iv, 38 p. Includes bibliographical references (p. 33-35).

No description available.

Major questions regarding the roles of school psychologists and delivery system reforms have appeared in the school psychology literature over the last of couple decades (Benson & Hughes, 1985; Fagan & Wise, 2000; Jackson, Balinky, & Lambert, 1993; Jerrell, 1984; Lacayo, Morris, & Sherwood, 1981; Reschly, 1988; Reschly & Wilson, 1995; Roberts & Rust, 1994). Consequently, many U.S. national survey studies have been conducted (Anderson, Cancelli, & Kratochwill, 1984; Benson & Hughes, 1985; Curtis, Chesno Grier, Walker Abshier, Sutton, & Hunley, 2002; Fischer, Jenkins, & Crumbley, 1986; Hutton & Dubes, 1992; Lacayo et al., 1981; Reschly & Wilson, 1995; Smith, 1984; Smith, Clifford, Hesley, & Leifgren, 1992; Stinnett, Havey, & Oehler-Stinnett,1994). However, there is little current empirical research on the roles and functions of school psychologists in British Columbia. Research is needed to help assess the state of the art in this province and explain what psychologists are doing. The profession of school psychology is unregulated in B.C. and so it is possible that persons practicing in the schools have a variety of training and offer a variety of services. Further, there is much existing uncertainty regarding the future path of the profession (Benson, 2002). The purpose of this study is to explore the job roles and functions of practicing school psychologists in B.C. and to examine the impact of various personal, professional, and job-site characteristics and external influences on job roles and functions. Survey methodology (N=42) was used with five select follow-up interviews for a sample of school psychologists around the province. Results revealed that the majority of respondents held a masters degree in school or educational psychology. Although respondents allocated a majority of their professional time to the role of assessment, school psychologists occupied a broad number of roles and desired to increase their time allocated to the other roles of interventions, consultation, counseling, and research and evaluation. Further, job roles were impacted by the number of students and schools served by psychologists, and psychologists' supervisors' field of specialization.

The purpose of this study was to determine if the type of recommendations made by the school psychologist on the psychological report affected teacher perception of the school psychologist and if the type of recommendations influenced the frequency of utilization of the report. An attempt was made in this study to make the recommendations of the report more useful to special education teachers. Since their training included knowledge of methods and materials to use with children with problems, areas typically covered in the recommendations of a psychological report, these areas were deleted. In this study the recommendations were made which directed the teachers to prewritten goals which could be used in writing a student's individual educational plan (IEP). As a requirement of the Education for Handicapped Children Act, 1975, an IEP with long and short-range goals must be written for each child in special education. An assumption was made that by lessening the teacher's work in writing the IEP, the school psychologist might be perceived as more useful. An end result might be a more positive attitude toward the school psychologist as well as an increased utilization of the report. The pre-written IEP goals used in the study were the 2,400 "identifying behaviors" of the Behavioral Characteristics Progression published by the Vort Corporation. These field-tested behaviors were developmentally sequenced into 59 goal areas.The subjects included all of the Coweta county (Georgia) special education teachers (N = 32) whose students were required to have a psychoeducational evaluation before entrance into those teachers' respective programs. All the teachers were licensed by the state of Georgia as certified or provisionally certified special education teachers.The posttest only control group design was used. The subjects were randomly assigned to groups Table of Random Numbers. Each group, control and experimental, had an N of 16. A six-month duration was set. Both groups received the exact treatment exception of the independent variable, the type of recommendations made in the written psychological report. All the subjects in both groups were asked to mark a tracking sheet which had been attached to each psychological report. The tracking sheet listed eight instances for which a psychological report could be used. The subjects were to mark the appropriate instance each time the report was used. The tracking sheet was developed by the researcher for this study. At the end of six' months the tracking sheets were collected and a semantic differential using 15 pairs of bipolar factor analyzed evaluation-loaded adjectives derived from C. E. Osgood's work was administered to all subjects. The semantic differential was used to measure attitude toward the school psychologist. The tracking sheets were used to determine frequency of utilization of the psychological reports.A t-test for independent samples was performed using the mean scores from the semantic differentials and yielded an insignificant difference (at the .05 level of confidence) in attitude toward the school psychologist as a result of the treatment of recommendations. One dimensional chi square statistical procedures were applied to determine if the frequency of utilization of the reports was significant between the two groups. The frequency of utilization was significantly greater (at the .05 level of confidence) as a result the treatment of the recommendations.Based upon analysis of the data the following conclusions were made:1. No significant difference in attitude toward the school psychologist existed between two groups of special education teachers as a result of the treatment of recommendations in the psychological report.2. As a result of the treatment of the recommendations in the psychological report, the frequency of utilization of the report significantly increased.

Clinical Psychology around the world has evolved dramatically over the last century. This evolution has led to the legislation of psychologists in some States of the United States of America to legally prescribe psychotropic medications. Since 1981 when the first published survey was conducted to assess the views of psychologists towards prescription privileges, advocates and opponents have loudly voiced their opinions. Some of the topics of debate include training, social, professional, economic and political issues. Comparatively, there has been little discussion of limited prescription privileges for clinical psychologists in Australia. The current exploratory study seeks to be the first study in the literature to address the views of South Australian psychologists-in-training and clinical psychologists' views towards limited prescription privileges for clinical psychologists. / An initial sample of 121 respondents were involved in the first stage of the study, whereby respondents clearly perceived more costs than benefits to the profession and the community, should psychologists attain the right to prescribe. A difference in support of prescription privileges was not found between psychologists-in-training, academic or practising psychologists. In addition, gender had no effect on the opinions of respondents. Of those 121 initial respondents, 51 returned the second questionnaire after reading an informal discussion document on the debate. Results indicated that the provision of information produced a significant, favourable change in opinion towards prescription privileges. / The current study reveals a lack of consensus in opinion and the prioritizing of other marketplace issues such as the desire for the profession to attain Medicare rebates as well as a desire for the profession to attain Medicare rebates as well as a desire for additional psychopharmacology training. / Thesis (PhD)--University of South Australia, 2004.

Clinical Psychology around the world has evolved dramatically over the last century. This evolution has led to the legislation of psychologists in some States of the United States of America to legally prescribe psychotropic medications. Since 1981 when the first published survey was conducted to assess the views of psychologists towards prescription privileges, advocates and opponents have loudly voiced their opinions. Some of the topics of debate include training, social, professional, economic and political issues. Comparatively, there has been little discussion of limited prescription privileges for clinical psychologists in Australia. The current exploratory study seeks to be the first study in the literature to address the views of South Australian psychologists-in-training and clinical psychologists' views towards limited prescription privileges for clinical psychologists. / An initial sample of 121 respondents were involved in the first stage of the study, whereby respondents clearly perceived more costs than benefits to the profession and the community, should psychologists attain the right to prescribe. A difference in support of prescription privileges was not found between psychologists-in-training, academic or practising psychologists. In addition, gender had no effect on the opinions of respondents. Of those 121 initial respondents, 51 returned the second questionnaire after reading an informal discussion document on the debate. Results indicated that the provision of information produced a significant, favourable change in opinion towards prescription privileges. / The current study reveals a lack of consensus in opinion and the prioritizing of other marketplace issues such as the desire for the profession to attain Medicare rebates as well as a desire for the profession to attain Medicare rebates as well as a desire for additional psychopharmacology training. / Thesis (PhD)--University of South Australia, 2004.

Thesis(M.S.)--Auburn University, 2005. / Abstract. Includes bibliographic references.