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Purpose. The purposes of this study were three-fold. First, the study was designed to ascertain whether there is a difference in the levels of perceived burnout between elementary school principals working under the traditional calendar and those working under a year-round education plan. The second purpose was to determine whether there are differences in the rankings of stressful administrative activities between the two aforementioned groups. The last objective was to discover whether there are specific occupational stress factors which contribute to principal burnout more than others and if so, to conclude whether they differ for each group. Procedures. Two hundred California public school principals (100 working under a traditional calendar and 100 working under a year-round plan) were randomly selected and were mailed three assessment items: a Maslach Burnout Inventory (MBI), a Principals' Stressful Activities List and a Demographic Item Survey. The number of responses analyzed was 140. Findings. The principals from a year-round education plan did not differ in their reported levels of burnout on the three Maslach Burnout Inventory subscales from those on a traditional calendar. The reported levels of burnout among elementary school principals from both calendars did not significantly differ on the Demographic Item Surveys except for those with preschool children living at home. Principals from both calendars with preschool children reported experiencing higher levels of burnout on both the Emotional Exhaustion and Depersonalization subscales of the MBI. There is a substantial, positive correlation between the stressful activities of work overload, resolving parent/school conflict, imposing excessively high personal expectations, and telephone call interruptions and the MBI subscale of Emotional Exhaustion. A correlation exists between the stressful activities of imposing excessively high personal expectations, and trying to resolve parent/school conflicts, and the MBI subscale of Depersonalization. A positive relationship exists between evaluating staff members' performance and trying to resolve parent/school conflicts, and the MBI subscale of Personal Accomplishment. However, the only stressful activity that received a significantly different score when comparing principals working under a traditional calendar and those working under YRE was complying with state, federal and organizational rules.

This study is an evaluatioon of Zavala Elementary School in Austin, Texas in order to determine administration strengths and weaknesses.

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The problem of this study is to determine if school climate perceptions are stable among the departmental subgroups of the high school. In addition, the study seeks to determine if the subject area of the department or patterns of leadership behavior of the department head (as perceived by teachers in the department) have a significant relationship to how teachers within a department perceive the climate of their school.

The primary purpose of this study was to explore the correlations between students' perceptions of their relationships with teachers, students' academic achievement and students' classroom behavior. A secondary purpose of the study was to investigate if students' ethnicity, gender and socio-economic status moderate the relationship. A survey was used to assess sixth grade students' perceptions of relationships with their teachers when they were in fifth grade. Significant associations were found between student perceptions of positive relationships and high English Language arts achievement for African for African American, Hispanic, male and low socio economic status (SES) students. Significant associations were also found between higher CST scores in Math For African American, female and low SES students. Finally, negative teacher-student relationships were found to he associated with a higher probability of students receiving referrals for Hispanic, male and Low SES students. The results of this study suggest that positive student teacher relationships are associated with and may contribute to positive academic and behavioral outcomes for vulnerable students.

Response to Intervention (RD) has been shown to be an effective method for the identification and remediation of poor readers especially in the early grades. Given the extensive advantages of RTI school districts across the country are interested in adopting such a model however very little research in this area has been completed. This case study sought to discover how one school district in California successfully completed the task of adopting and implementing an RTI program with relatively few complications. Themes from interviews and documents revealed that adoption and implementation of the RTI model closely followed Rogers Diffusion of Innovation theory. Among other findings it is also suggested that teachers are more likely to support innovation when they consider themselves part of a team and when they feel their students will benefit from the innovation. Several practical implications regarding the adoption of and implementation of an RTI program are discussed. These include the development of teams to research and garner support for the program as well as administrative techniques such as allowing staff to modify the program to make it their own.

This dissertation examines the methods and techniques used by school administrators to bring in and keep parents of English Language Learners coming back to be part of the school. Administrators at twelve schools in the Southeastern central San Joaquin Valley in California were interviewed to determine what practices they utilized to make ELL parents part of the education experience. A series of questions were asked of each participant and their answers grouped into four categories to determine the common methods and techniques used by the sample. Once similar traits were established a comparison between the literature review and the findings was conducted to assert validity with established practices. This study found that the effective administrators used some aspects of the model Comer and other effective strategies they found to be effective in educating the ELL population. This study found that administrators in schools with large percentages of English Language Learners used techniques suggested in the literature review. Furthermore, the study recommends other areas that will be useful to increase parent participation in all schools.

This study examined the process for implementation of the SB 1969 Staff Development in Sacramento City Unified School District. This case study focused on the implementation process from its inception in 1995 to the full implementation of training K–12 teachers during the 1997–98 school year. The data revealed that the policy implementation process occurred in three stages: (1) the planning phase, (2) the K–8 implementation phase, (3) the full K–12 implementation phase with modifications to the K–8 training component. The analysis revealed that local choices about how to proceed from policy to practice have had more significance for policy implementation than did policy features such as program design, funding levels, or governance requirements. The recommendations in this study are based on the research, findings, and conclusions. They include: (1) districts need to plan for policy implementation as a gradual process, (2) districts need to understand that successful implementation can only be achieved through a developmental process that consists of frequent reviews and modifications, (3) there must be an effective and committed group of people in the district guiding the implementation process, (4) districts must anticipate resistance to change by dealing with it accordingly, with flexibility built into the process, (5) the State must continue to provide an alternative means of credentialing teachers, who work with Limited English Proficient students in California. The recommendations for policy makers include: (1) policy makers should obtain information about policies directly from educators at the beginning of the policy development process; (2) policy makers should create liaisons with organized groups that represent the educational community in order to obtain feedback about policies affecting education; (3) policy makers need to ensure that they are obtaining information from the key stakeholders that will be affected by the educational policy, or gather information from other education-related organizations; (4) policy makers should utilize the internet, and other forms of communication to disseminate educational policy information.