<p> There is an enormous educational disparity among schools in the United States. One reason for this disparity is the teachers employed by well-performing schools and low-performing schools. This study reports the factors and financial tradeoffs that would influence well-qualified teachers to work in low-performing schools. Teacher employment is viewed as a set of discrete choices made over time and based on a finite group of factors. This study uses a multinomial discrete choice experiment to determine how the school-related factors (alternative-specific variables) and teacher-related factors (case-specific variables) influence the willingness of experienced teachers in well-performing schools to transfer to low-performing schools. A discrete choice experiment (DCE) using an optimal, fractional factorial, experimental design (D-efficiency = 96.5 and A-efficiency = 92.9) with an adequate sample (<i>n</i> =111) was employed. The data are analyzed using alternative-specific conditional logistic regression, nested logistic regression, and latent class conditional logistic regression. The latent class conditional logistic regression with 3-classes was deemed the best fit and its results were interpreted. The first class has high job satisfaction and generally stays in their current school. The second class is most likely female and does not value salary, but rather better student behavior and school climate. The third and largest class has similar values with Latent Class 2, but fiscal incentives could impact their decision. This study shows that teachers are willing to work in low-performing schools, but school- and teacher-related factors impact the overall attractiveness to well-qualified teachers.</p>

<p> The purpose of this multiple case study was to explore how the facilitation of clinical experiences for early childhood education candidates impacts the cooperating teacher. The tenets of school reform initiatives often require longer and more frequent clinical experiences for pre-service teachers. The success of student teaching relies on the effectiveness of cooperating teachers; however, research has not addressed the development and sentiment hosts experience while facilitating this process. </p><p> Qualitative interviews and observations produced four single case studies and one cross-case comparative. All of the participants taught in Northeast Georgia and hosted student teachers prepared by a single school of education. Research themes included control and autonomy, personal and professional impacts, and the benefits or costs associated with hosting pre-service candidates. </p><p> Findings indicated that cooperating teachers had complete autonomy in the facilitation of the student teaching process but expressed a strong preference for collaboration. Self-preservation and student achievement influenced decision-making and were associated with minimal shifts in control. Professionally, host teachers felt their roles were ambiguous and evidence indicated key concepts were undefined. Participants did not experience an increase in professional capital although they did request professional development in several areas. These hosts described their experiences as intense and stressful yet personally rewarding. Future implications for practice include strengthening selection and pairing processes as well as training members of the student teaching triad to utilize collaborative methods. The study also exposed a need to research implementation errors in outcome-based evaluations of teacher education programs.</p>

<p> In community colleges, over 70% of faculty members are adjuncts, and over 52% of these adjuncts are women. Community colleges have been celebrated as institutions that include women in their philosophy of equity, openness, and democracy (Bailey, 2008). Women may be more likely to work at community colleges where the minimum requirement is a master&rsquo;s degree for employment, compared to 4-year institutions that require doctorates, and allow them to balance their work and personal lives (Cohen &amp; Brawer, 2008; Wolf-Wendel &amp; Ward, 2006). </p><p> This study examines the work-life balance of female adjunct instructors working at the community college level and utilizes the work-life balance theory to help understand the identity, relational style, motivation and drive, adaptive style, and strategies for these women. This study utilized a phenomenological, qualitative approach by having female adjunct faculty participate in one semi-structured interview; 20 women participated. Findings showed that the participants were often first generation college students, which resulted in the majority of the women having goals of achieving a different education level than their family members. Relationships also played an important role in helping participants balance work and family life. Most participants were very driven and have high motivation to pursue career goals and to become a full-time faculty member. Female adjunct faculty also demonstrated high levels of adaptability due to the inconsistent nature of being an adjunct faculty and having schedules that fluctuated and changed on a semester-to-semester basis. </p><p> In community colleges, over 70% of faculty members are adjuncts, and over 52% of these adjuncts are women. However, there is a significant lack of research regarding these women and their experiences. Due to the sheer number of women faculty members represented in community colleges, it would be assumed that this would be a highly researched group (Townsend, 1995a, 1995b). However, there is a paucity of research on women faculty, particularly female part-time faculty, in community colleges. The topic of women within the community college level is an area that has been severely overlooked and under researched within higher education literature (Townsend, 1995a, 1995b; Twombly, 1993; Wolgemuth, Kees, &amp; Safarik, 2003).</p>

Thesis advisor: Marilyn Cochran-Smith / In recent years, the theme of social justice in teacher education programs has been the subject of considerable controversy, as it has become at once more popular and more vulnerable to criticism. More and more teacher education programs claim to prepare teachers to teach for social justice. Yet we know little about the experience of teacher candidates learning to teach in programs with explicit social justice agendas, and we know little about the impact of this agenda on teachers, and in turn, on the students they teach. This dissertation aims to increase our understanding of what it means for teacher candidates/graduates to be prepared in a teacher education program with a stated commitment to social justice. By focusing in depth on two cases studies with very different outcomes, my study examines the impact of this agenda on teachers and the students they teach over a relatively long period of time. A qualitative case study design was employed to collect and analyze data for two master's level teacher candidates/graduates over three years. Data included extensive interviews and observations, teacher candidates' coursework, the assignments the teachers created, and their students work in response to these assignments. In addition, interviews were conducted with teacher education faculty, as well as with cooperating teachers, mentors, supervisors, and principals. Based on a sociocultural framework, and drawing on Bakhtin's theories of discourse and ideological becoming, this dissertation argues that learning to teach in a program with a stated social justice agenda was a complex process of negotiating several different and, at times, competing discourses of social justice. These discourses represented a range of ideas, interpretations, and practices that the teachers had to investigate and adapt as they developed their own authentic perspective. Furthermore, the development of an authentic perspective as teachers for social justice required embracing tensions within and among these discourses, and recognizing that these tensions were essential to their development as educators for social justice. Finally, this dissertation argues that the case study teachers' relative success or failure engaging in this ideological struggle was influenced by the contexts in which their learning took place, the support they had to negotiate the challenges and tensions associated with learning to teach for social justice, and their own personal capacity to handle the conflicts they encountered. / Thesis (PhD) — Boston College, 2009. / Submitted to: Boston College. Lynch School of Education. / Discipline: Teacher Education, Special Education, Curriculum and Instruction.

Thesis advisor: Marilyn Cochran-Smith / Teacher quality is a central concern of the profession. College-based teacher education, the core of teacher preparation in the United States, has increasingly included some form of practitioner inquiry in the pre-service program to encourage teacher candidates to be reflective, adaptive teachers who systematically and intentionally examine practice to improve pupil outcomes and continue their own professional development. While it is assumed that pre-service practitioner inquiry has a positive influence on pupils' learning, there is still little empirical evidence to support this assertion. Most empirical data on pre-service practitioner inquiry is confined to a short time period and does not examine what happens to pre-service candidates when they enter their own classrooms. Additionally, this research is generally conducted using interpretive qualitative methods. Thus, this dissertation uses a longitudinal mixed methods approach to examine what happens when teacher candidates engage in practitioner research in a pre-service program focused on inquiry with the goal of improving pupil learning. A modified sequential explanatory mixed methods design was employed as the best means of addressing this complex question. The study included data from three sources in a teacher preparation program focused on practitioner inquiry. The first analysis took a broad view of the quality and range of teacher candidates' research papers through the analysis of rubric scores for 92 teacher candidate inquiry papers in two cohorts (spring, 2006 and spring, 2007). Looking at the quality and nature of these projects, content analysis on a sample of twelve papers taken from the range of these scores was conducted. Finally, in-depth case studies of two participants were developed using data accumulated during the one-year pre-service program and through the first two years in the classroom. Findings in the quantitative analysis indicated that the rubric was reliable in differentiating among papers, but that there were fewer outstanding inquiries than expected, which were not explained by analysis of the scores. Content analysis of a sample of these papers indicated that differences were in how questions were formed; candidates' ability to interpret and use data recursively; whether and how candidates connected their learning to pupil learning; and if candidates connected their inquiry to issues of social justice in meaningful ways. The case studies showed that several factors influenced whether and how candidates moved toward the development of inquiry as stance. These factors included candidates' view of inquiry; teacher capacity; demands of curriculum planning and development; understandings of learning to teach for social justice; as well as school support and context. Overall, the three analyses in this dissertation indicated that requiring teacher candidates to engage in pre-service practitioner inquiry did not guarantee that they would understand inquiry as intended, develop an inquiry stance, or continue to inquire into practice in their own classrooms. These findings suggest implications for research, practice, and policy, which are discussed. / Thesis (PhD) — Boston College, 2009. / Submitted to: Boston College. Lynch School of Education. / Discipline: Teacher Education, Special Education, Curriculum and Instruction.

<p> Science teachers in the United States are not prepared to teach the students in their classrooms. Teachers are most often White females, while the children in their classrooms are from diverse backgrounds. Multicultural pedagogies exist, but teachers must be educated during their teacher preparation courses to understand their own relationship with race before they can enact such pedagogies in their classrooms. This qualitative study sought to examine the lived experiences of eight science education doctoral students in a course called Critical Voices in Teacher Education, through the qualitative method approach of transcendental phenomenology. The participants&rsquo; experiences were examined through three theoretical frameworks: transformative learning theory, White racial identity, and racial literacy. Interviews, field notes, and student reflections were used to collect data for this phenomenological study. The findings showed that through the process of critical reflection and group discussion, participants had a transformative experience in which their racial identities developed, and perceptions of students and curriculum shifted to include multicultural pedagogical approaches. The findings from this study supported the idea that teacher education programs must use racial identity development and multicultural curriculum as a foundation for all education programs.</p><p>

<p> The problem addressed in this study was the issue of technology integration in the classroom by alternate route teachers. The goal was to find a possible correlation between teacher personality and their ability to integrate technology. In this quantitative study, 174 completers from the New Pathways to Teaching New Jersey (NPTNJ) alternate route training program were surveyed to obtain information leading to the possible correlation between personality traits and technology integration skills. Of the surveys distributed, 141 had adequate qualifications, so only these were used. The key findings were that extraversion was positively correlated to technology integration skills and neuroticism was negatively correlated to technology integration skills. The results showed statistically significant positive correlations between completers who had a high score on the extravert personality trait and their proficiency in technology integration skills. Additionally, there was a statistically significant negative correlation between neuroticism and technology integration skills. The study showed there was no identifiable correlation between the personality traits of openness, conscientiousness, and agreeableness and technology integration ability. The implications of this study can be used to identify candidates who are likely to be successful at integrating technology into the classroom. Training modules and professional development can be developed to train teachers in the habits and characteristics associated with the extraversion personality trait and how to avoid the behaviors associated with neuroticism to increase the likelihood of technology integration in the classroom. Further research should be focused on other factors that may influence technology integration and alternate route teachers who completed the NPTNJ training program. </p><p>

The aim of this research was to investigate stakeholder attitudes towards people, with dyslexia, training to be primary classroom practitioners. The study examined stakeholder awareness and understanding of the term dyslexia; their perceived strengths and challenges, of those training to be teachers, with dyslexia. The study explored the impact of attitudes on disclosure of dyslexia and the potential of their employability as primary teachers in light of inclusive legislation and whether attitudes, held by a range of stakeholders, were on a neutral to positive or neutral to negative spectrum. The research entailed the implementation of an online questionnaire completed by 214 current stakeholders (including Initial teacher Education lecturers, school staff, Initial Teacher Education students and parents) and 11 semi-structured interviews. Findings suggest that there is uncertainty and confusion about the term dyslexia, its associated characteristics and its causes. Many stakeholders perceive dyslexia negatively with key characteristics being linked, predominantly, to deficits in reading, writing and spelling. This research has found that stakeholders identify a number of strengths that those with dyslexia bring to the teaching profession. These key strengths include empathy, inclusive practice and ease of identification of children with dyslexia. The main challenges/concerns identified by stakeholders, of those entering the profession, with dyslexia, were - the demands of the profession; the inability to teach particular age groups/subjects and the level of support needed to ensure success and retention following qualification. This latter concern constitutes a key finding of this research, as the level of support afforded by universities is perceived as being unrealistic in the workplace. The ethical responsibility that universities have, in preparing students for the demands and reality of the workplace, has emerged. The notion of what constitutes ‘reasonable adjustments’ is questioned by many stakeholders. This research concludes that a number of ‘reasonable adjustments’ are perceived as being unreasonable within the teaching profession due to the professional roles, responsibilities and requirements of being a teaching professional. Furthermore, uncertainty about legislation exists with regard to reasonable adjustments, whose responsibility it is to enforce reasonable adjustments and how schools can actually support those with dyslexia, in light of professional standards. Overall, this research has found that 16.1% more stakeholders display attitudes on the neutral to positive spectrum than neutral to negative with regard to those with dyslexia training to be primary classroom teachers. However, this masks major differences between stakeholders and between responses to particular statements/questions. A significant majority of stakeholders demonstrated a negative attitude towards the notion of people with dyslexia entering the teaching profession, believing that parents should be concerned if their child is being taught by someone with dyslexia. Both of these findings could have serious implications on the future disclosure of those with dyslexia. This research has found that a fear of stigmatisation and potential discrimination, which deter those with dyslexia from disclosing on course and job applications are justified and real. This research concludes that employability chances are lessened upon disclosure of dyslexia.

<p> This qualitative study examines the perspectives of teachers in a small, rural community and the influence of the school counselor who support students returning to school after a death by suicide. The researcher took an autoethnographic approach because of the years of personal and professional experience and knowledge within the professional setting used in this study. A thorough review of the existing literature in the areas of the conceptual frameworks of grief, theories of grief, theories of suicide, policies and culture of rural school communities informs the study. Data triangulation was used to understand how different data sources show consistency using the same method. Data triangulation contributes to verification and validation of qualitative analysis (Patton, 2015). </p><p> A purposeful sample was used to select recently retired teachers with classroom experience. Retired teachers were selected because of years of classroom experience and knowledge in the professional setting with students who return after a death by suicide. Criteria for selection of retired teachers within a small group of professional educators in a small, rural Midwestern community are comprised of retired teachers at the secondary level of public education. Retired teachers have experience as a classroom teacher, have worked with the school counselor and have experience with students who returned to school after a peer death by suicide or family member death by suicide. Retired teachers were selected that have good recall of events and experiences in the classroom. </p><p> This study is designed to understand school counselor influence and the perspectives of teachers in a small, rural community who support students after a death by suicide. Qualitative methods were used to collect and analyze data. An interview guide approach was used to increase the comprehensiveness of the data. Research questions were generated from an extensive review of the literature. Data were collected from the following methods: interviews, private anecdotal counselor notes, researcher reflections and member checking. Educational research has not investigated as to how teachers feel about their preparedness and ability to support students after a death by suicide. Lack of data from research on the role of teachers, the influence of the school counselor and their preparedness to support students after a death by suicide is particularly meaningful for rural school communities. Therefore, the need for this study is significant as rural school communities, researchers and those who experience death by suicide explore this phenomenon and the policy implications for best practice based on data that informs the research questions. Trustworthiness of data analysis and believability of the study assures transferability, dependability and confirmability. </p><p>

<p> This narrative inquiry explored the ways in which four mid-career English teachers construct themselves as W/writers and how those writerly identities are performed in their pedagogy. I curated data collected from extended interviews, journals, personal and professional writings to build narratives of these teachers-as-writers. Through these narratives and metaphorical thinking (Lakoff &amp; Johnson, 1980), I analyzed the wholeness of each participant&rsquo;s experience with writing.</p><p> Then, in stage two of the study, I used data collected from teaching observations to build a continuum of process &mdash;> product, employing Goffman&rsquo;s (1974) frame analysis to place the teachers within that continuum. This continuum represented the stable thread that continued through the teachers&rsquo; personal and professional identities and led to three insights: (1) Those teachers who identified as Writers were more comfortable teaching writing processes (2) The desire to be seen as a &ldquo;kind of W/writer or teacher&rdquo; brings risk writing instruction and (3) Agency provides Writers a way to mitigate the risk of teaching writing.</p><p>