published_or_final_version / Education / Master / Master of Education

published_or_final_version / abstract / toc / Education / Master / Master of Education

This dissertation explores parent-gentrifiers’ lived experiences of the school-selection process, including the social networking and the influence of those social networks in their selection of schools. School choice and parent involvement are forms of social capital, and such social capital represents the results of social networking and parental agency. The unknown is how this scenario manifests itself in gentrifying parents’ school-selection process in Atlanta’s Kirkwood and Grant Park neighborhoods. Gentrifying children’s absence in urban public schools is of interest as residential areas integrate, while schools (re)segregate. The research paradigm is interpretivist as it investigates the qualitatively different ways in which people experience or think about a phenomenon (Marton, 1986). Purposive snowball sampling is used to reach 30 eligible participants in two neighborhoods. The methodological approach is qualitative phenomenographic interviews. The research found five options considered by parent-gentrifiers in the school-selection process that are consistent with the previous literature: public school, charter school, private school, homeschool and undecided/not yet. The forms of communication utilized in the social networking were face-to-face, phone, e-mail, social networking sites, and texting. Participants varied by work schedule, neighborhood communication infrastructure, and level of social network in their forms of communication. Parent-gentrifiers’ approaches to school selection included: activating agency, social networking, operating in social spaces, their social agenda with regard to diversity, and their educational agenda with regard to curriculum, instruction, and school characteristics. The results show that while parents espouse racial and socioeconomic diversity, their choices in the option-demand system in Grant Park resulted in racial segregation among the schools. In contrast, the lack of formal options in Kirkwood resulted in racial integration in the public elementary school. The actions interpreted and ideas constructed in the process of selecting schools as a parent-gentrifier are of practical value to district efforts to understand the urban middle-class school-selection process. In light of increasing school segregation and student attrition, continued urban revitalization efforts and the sustainability of those efforts for many major cities in the United States is highly dependent on their ability to regenerate and maintain quality schools that attract the middle-class.

Syftet med denna uppsats är att ta reda på hur gymnasieskolors webbtexter kan förstås i förhållande till diskurs. För att undersöka detta utgår jag från Norman Faircloughs kritiska diskursanalys och den systemisk-funktionella grammatiken (SFG). Jag undersöker fyra webbtexter som beskriver fyra olika gymnasieskolor – två privata och två kommunala skolor. Uppsatsens ansats är språkvetenskaplig. Stor vikt läggs därför vid den systemisk-funktionella grammatiken. Jag utgår från den interpersonella analysens språkhandlingar, modusmetaforer och modalitet. Texternas första- och andradeltagare analyseras även separat liksom texternas tilltal. Analysresultaten visar att alla fyra texter bär drag av marknadsföringsdiskurs. Detta realiseras bland annat av direkt du-tilltal och en rad erbjudanden till läsaren. Vissa erbjudanden uttrycks explicit i form av varor. Andra erbjudanden, som kunskap och utveckling, är mer abstrakta. Analysen visar också att texterna bär spår av bland annat elitistisk diskurs. Detta realiseras bland annat genom modalitetsmarkörer, modusmetaforer och placeringen av förstadeltagaren i olika satskomplex. Genom att använda diskurser utanför den traditionella utbildningsdiskursen visar skolornas webbtexter en förändring i samhället. Marknaden har flyttat in verksamheter som tidigare tillhört den offentliga sektorn. Detta skapar en ny relation mellan skolan och eleverna. Genom att element från marknadsföringsdiskursen har lånats in i skolans värld konstrueras eleven till en konsument av utbildning.

While race played a dominant role in determining how South Africans accessed quality education during apartheid this study reveals that in post-apartheid South Africa, particularly in racially homogenous communities, class has come to play a greater role in securing quality education. The following case study provides a compelling vignette of how residents from the formal and informal settlements in Umlazi interact with schools in the local educational market. The study uses qualitative interviews with residents of Umlazi S-section who have chosen to have their children educated in Umlazi schools to extract narratives which expose how they have experienced the process of choosing schools in Umlazi. Choice theories are invoked in order to understand how parents perceive the value of education and how their own choices demonstrate their understanding of the educational market. In examining the factors governing school choice and its effects, the study employs a number of theories which add value to understanding this area of educational sociology including Pierre Bourdieu’s ‘theory of practice’, which provides insight into how class positions influence individuals’ perceptions of their own rightful place in society. Household narratives reveal that parental school choice is dominated by concerns with affordability, safety and preservation of culture. The study also reveals that schools themselves play an influential role in determining who is selected and excluded from schools in the community. The study reveals that societies perceive education as critical to the development of their children and most importantly, that their efforts and educational choices are geared towards providing opportunities that ensure their children have better opportunities in life. However, it is also revealed that school choice is a weak tool for redistributing educational equity in an educational system where access is largely determined by financial positioning. In the community under investigation the manner in which parents exercise choice has resulted in poorer children being pushed out of the local school market. Such movements, in pursuit of educational opportunities, have far-reaching consequences for funding models in the South African education system. / M.Dev.Studies University of KwaZulu-Natal, Durban 2013.

Increased possibilitiesof choosing one’s school of preference hasbeen raised as a key factor in many countries to promote equal opportunitiesand higher quality of education. This has been endorsed by policymakers whoassume that students make well-informed rational choices and that students only stress academic quality whendeciding which school to attend. If this is true, it will benefit schools ofhigh academic quality, rendering improved school quality overall. To date,little research has examined the validity of these assumptions despite theprofound effects they have had for changing the school systems in manycountries. This study employs an experimental approach to investigate therelative importance of attributes in school choice. Specifically the study isbased on experimental data from 587 prospective high school students inHalmstad, Sweden. The purpose is to contrast the principal school qualityattributes behind the policy change (academic reputation and programfeasibility), with the presence of friends and geographical attributes such asdistance, location and accessibility, while controlling for individualcharacteristics. The results are disturbing as they reveal flaws in theassumptions that motivated the school choice policy reform. The study presents evidence of differencesin preferences and that grades are the most important background characteristic for this difference. The study also shows that all studentsare not rational to the same extent as theory predicts. Hence theSwedish school reforms have been based on a slightly biased theory. Finally, the study indicates that differentgeographic contexts (e.g. where the studentslive) affect students' preferences.

The aim of this study was to identify the reasons of parents&rsquo / preferring Curriculum Laboratory Schools (CLSs) for their children&rsquo / s education and to investigate whether the students attending Curriculum Laboratory Schools are satisfied with the physical, instructional and social opportunities (services) offered at these schools. The sample of the study consisted of 440 seventh grade students and 14 parents from seven curriculum laboratory schools in the province of Ankara. Two instruments were used for data collection / interview questions for parents and a questionnaire for students. To analyze quantitative data, descriptive statistics such as frequency analyses and percentages were conducted. The open-ended questions in the parents&rsquo / interview were analyzed through content analysis. The results indicated that parents preferred these schools for several reasons including convenient location, technological opportunities, physical conditions and instructional opportunities. However, the availability of the opportunities was not as defined in the CLS model. Nevertheless, the students who were attending CLSs were moderately to highly satisfied with the services provided in the CLSs.

Thesis (M.A.)--University of Canterbury, 1999. / Typescript (photocopy). Includes bibliographical references (leaves 123-129). Also available via the World Wide Web.

Thesis (M.BIE)--Unitec New Zealand, 2008. / Includes bibliographical references (leaves 50-56).

Thesis (Ph.D.)--University of Wollongong, 2007. / Typescript. Includes bibliographical references: p. 300-331.