Trauma-informed care is a relatively new construct in K-12 education, and districts across the United States are seeking avenues to meet the needs of their students. The COVID-19 pandemic elevated the need for districts to develop appropriate supports to address student and adult trauma. Traumatic events can affect a child’s mental, physical, social-emotional, and/or spiritual well-being (Substance Abuse and Mental Health Service Administration, 2011). Furthermore, children with an elevated risk of trauma may not be able to access these supports outside of the school setting (Baweja et al., 2015). Therefore, educational systems need to develop trauma-informed care models for schools that furnish a sense of safety and community so that students receive the necessary support. This evaluation aimed to identify how the moderating factors of district administrators, site administrators, climate and culture, and teacher capacity affect trauma-informed care via a multi-tiered system of support (MTSS) framework. It included a specific focus on Tier 1, universal access, to improve timely support for students. This formative program evaluation explored the impact of the moderating factors through the viewpoint of a newly created conceptual framework. I used qualitative and quantitative data sources to explore the multiple aspects of the phenomenon. The ARTIC-45 provided descriptive statistics about educators’ attitudes toward trauma-informed care. The observational data and analysis of the Panorama Education social-emotional learning (SEL) survey that assessed 3rd-12th students social-emotional well-being provided character to the evaluation. The data analysis yielded inconsistent results. The observational data strongly indicated a trauma-informed environment in which students were given clear expectations and engaged in positive reciprocal interactions with peers and adults. The ARTIC-45 data showed that administrators, teachers, and support staff responded favorably to trauma-informed care approaches. Though statistical significance could not be obtained due to the sample size constraint of being too small, the data provided context to the other data sources. For example, teacher capacity could not be quantified, but the data provided context to the overall staff capacity. The review of the archival and current SEL survey data showed that favorability among domains varied by site and grade level. The variations in students' social-emotional favorability can be related to their lived experiences and it is important to track over time to monitor how experiences, expressions, and feelings change over time. Students' perspectives regarding themselves and their environment differed from the observational data. This indicates that educators should not solely rely on observational data to determine students’ social-emotional well-being. Furthermore, an SEL survey can be used as a tool to understand students’ well-being and thus provide them with timely support. The evaluation determined that district administration, site administration, climate and culture and staff capacity can positively impact a multi-tiered, trauma-informed care environment. In these settings, student behavior and social-emotional well-being is viewed in a healing-centered manner. Districts can create a multi-tiered, trauma-sensitive culture and provide support to enhance teachers’ capacity to implement trauma-informed care, take advantage of administrative influence, develop community partnerships, and create a culture that is open to systematic change.

ABSTRACT The researcher set out to gain an in-depth understanding of the possible influence of a reality-altering event on interaction behaviour (communication). The alteration in interaction behaviour referred to within the context of this study, is the communication phenomenon identified, explained and labelled as part of the study, which the researcher termed “re-communication”. This study partly aims at developing a re-communication conceptual framework that explains the re-communication phenomenon. In order to explain this unexplored communication phenomenon and develop a re-communication conceptual framework for it, the study focuses on how either strategic or spontaneous communication could be utilised in any reality-altering event to disclose information that would alter the co-constructed social reality between people. This information could be communicated either by the individual, who experienced a reality-altering event, or by persons or forms of communication external to the individual. Within the context of this study, the disclosure becomes the reality-altering event. Therefore, the proposed re-communication conceptual framework firstly addresses the elements that influence disclosure or non-disclosure. Secondly, it focusses on self-preservation communication strategies used to avoid disclosing or concealing the reality-altering event. Thirdly, the framework focuses on the actual reality-altering event, which, in this case, occurs when a gay individual’s sexual identity is disclosed to colleagues. Lastly, the framework looks at re-communication, which involves a perceived alteration in communication post-disclosure due to the altered reality. It is argued that the co-constructed social reality between a gay individual and a colleague is altered from a position of being unaware of the individual being gay to becoming aware. It is further argued that, because heterosexuality is regarded as the norm and the language and meaning ascribed to dominant symbols in society support heteronormativity, people often assume that a colleague is heterosexual and construct their reality based on this notion. Going into an interaction, both the gay individuals and their colleagues have their own social reality, which they have constructed through their experiences, as well as the co-constructed social reality they share with each colleague with whom they interact. This study was conducted within an interpretivist research paradigm and from the position of the theoretical foundation of symbolic interactionism, social constructionism and constructivism. A qualitative, exploratory research design was selected to collect the data by means of in-depth semi-structured interviews and narratives. Based on the insights provided by the participants, re-communication as a communication phenomenon was identified, explained and labelled and the resultant re-communication framework was developed. The re-communication conceptual framework was synergised by means of a thematic textual analysis and was guided by a number of assumptions and postulations arising from a strong theoretical foundation and a comprehensive literature review, which were supported by the findings. In this study, it was found that a reality-altering event is complex and multiple elements influence the way in which gay individuals’ sexual identity are disclosed or not disclosed within the organisational context. However, it has been discovered that communication is the vehicle for self-preservation and for disclosing information that will lead to a reality-altering event. Regardless of how small the influence or how limited the time, post the reality-altering event, the disclosure influences interaction behaviour (communication) and alters the co-constructed social reality between gay individuals and their colleagues. The colleagues go from a position of not knowing an individual was gay to knowing. It is noted that disclosure of a sexual identity and/or any other reality-altering event is not a once off reality-altering event, but rather a continuous process for gay individuals, because each time a new colleague enters the organisational contexts of gay individuals, they need to consider if – and if so, how – they want to disclose. In some cases, disclosure take places by others and the gay individual needs to decide how to deal with colleagues now knowing s/he is gay. The most significant contribution of the study is the identification, explanation and labelling of a previously unexplored communication phenomenon – that of re-communication – and the development of a re-communication conceptual framework that could contribute to the organisational reality in a two-fold manner. Firstly, such a framework will provide insights into and possible sense making of the disclosure experiences of gay individuals in the organisational context. Secondly, the outcome illustrates the importance of inclusive and positive organisational climates and/or cultures and the concomitant impact of positive engagements on organisational practices such as inclusive climates and cultures for sharing, employee loyalty, better team cooperation, trust among employees, increased employee wellbeing and more effective communication processes within organisations. / Communication Science / D. Phil. (Communication)

Thesis deals with monitoring of pupil integration options - foreigners into the educational process from the perspective of teacher development of intercultural competence. The very objective of this study was to monitor the process of developing intercultural competencies, and also to track and identify factors that influence this process in the course of educational activities in elementary school. The thesis is divided into theoretical and practical part. The theoretical part is divided into five chapters based on the analysis of literature related to this issue. The second chapter further defines the basic concepts of migration and intercultural education students - foreigners. The third chapter defines the concept of culture and concepts that connected with it, acculturation, cultural identity, culture shock, intercultural sensitivity, prejudices and stereotypes. The following chapter is responsible for defining the concepts of intercultural communication, bilingualism, intercultural conflict and intercultural friendship. The fifth chapter is devoted to teachers as a factor that significantly contributes to the educational process and the integration of students - foreigners. Furthermore, this chapter deals with intercultural competence and possibilities of their development, appropriate...

While much attention has been given to the ways local communities may be impacted by climate change, this dissertation focuses ethnographically on the local agencies decision-making processes, a less-studied aspect of this topic. The primary purpose of this dissertation research is to understand how government agencies in southern Florida integrate climate change into their decision-making processes while dealing with political resistance. This research expands our understanding on the cultural politics of a new kind of environmental change, where national and international climate-change politics is brought into local water politics to illuminate how new and not so new visions about life in the contemporary metropolis collide and collude. Using multiple research methods including ethnographic fieldwork, participant observation, semi-structured interviews, and document research, I analyze the activities of the Miami-Dade County Climate Change Advisory Task Force Committee (MDC-CCATF) as well as the water management practices of the regional water management agency, the South Florida Water Management District (SFWMD). My findings include the following: (1) the Task Force activities have spearheaded Miami’s institutional adaptation to climate change; (2) historic legacies have expanded and complicated decision-making processes at the District; (3) a focus on the certainties of climate-change science allows climate change to persist in politically contentious planning contexts. My dissertation concluded that while planning for potential climate-change impacts can be difficult due to multiple institutional constraints that resource agencies like the District have, scientists and policy-makers have crafted an innovative culture that is particularly visible at sites where science and decision making intersect.