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This study sought to examine how schools influenced and promoted student resilience through the lens of persistence, leading to high school completion. The focus of this study was significant because there are few studies that focus on student resiliency as it relates to high school completion through the lens of persistence. Previous studies have generally identified at-risk factors for non-high school completion and either qualify or quantify the results. They have not taken into account the social and economic contexts of school and the communities and their influence on student resiliency. This study utilized a phenomenological methodology that identified the lived experiences of twenty-six 11th - grade students of color at an urban high school in Southern California that manifested resilience and persistence. Semi-structured interviews of participants drawn from a stratified variation sampling were utilized. A CRT framework was applied to examine the role of high school as a protective factor, the interactions of faculty and staff, and the perceptions of participants as it relates to school culture and climate. External factors such as supportive relationships in the familial and community context were also examined and discussed. The results of this study highlighted school climate that promotes belonging along with a collective focus on the study of student success, the role of teacher-student and counselor relationships as being pivotal to the development of resilience in students of color. The findings from this study provide examples for schools to develop supportive climates that focus on promoting and developing academic, social, and emotional resiliency in students of color with specific next step recommendations.

In the past two decades, a need in forming strategic alliance has become increasingly important, especially for small companies. Likewise, airline alliances act as a vehicle for small carriers to obtain their superior position or to survive competition in a competitive international market where they do not appear to be a dominant player. In strategic alliances, the greater integration conveys greater benefits. However, the level of failure and success are varied among alliance members. This thesis was underpinned by the aim to conduct an in-depth study under the concept of organisational culture to reveal the key issues and barriers that appear to distort the ability of an organisation to foster success as well as to boost up its ability to obtain the benefits from the alliances to the maximum level.The empirical investigation employed a qualitative approach as a mechanism, driving this thesis through the process of research design, data collection, and data analysis. Using a single case study as a main technique, the case company of this thesis is Thai Airways. Data was collected through in-depth and semi-structured interviews. Data was analysed using thematic grouping and organised through NVIvo software.This thesis displayed the findings into two main themes. The first theme is associated with the activity to diagnose organisational culture, whereas the Competing Values Framework (CVF) was adopted as an initial framework. The main objectives are to develop a cultural profile for Thai Airways and to identify the key issues and barriers that distort the ability of Thai Airways to foster success. The key finding derived from this theme offered the identified problems and barriers derived from organisational culture. Using the Critical Success Factors (CSFs) method, the second theme is associated with the activity to identify the critical success factors for Thai Airways, deriving as a set of CSFs proposed to help enhance the ability of Thai Airways to obtain big firm's benefits. The outcome of this thesis could be considered as a new reference for the areas of organisational studies and the success of airlines, where the literature appears to be limited. More importantly, this thesis believed that the research journey offered an empirical experience reflecting a piece of organisational culture study in a non-Western context.

District and campus leaders face enormous challenges as they try to address the ever-widening achievement gap. With increased accountability, the achievement gap-- which exists between students of color and students of poverty and their White, middleclass counterparts--is becoming impossible to ignore. Nationally, demographics are shifting toward a society of color and school campuses are following suit. Students are not getting easier to educate. Yet while schools across the nation bemoan their student populations as 'hard to educate,' there are some notable districts consistently having success with these student populations. However, there is almost no research on these schools. Their successes are nearly unknown to the educational world. Therefore, this study sought to examine the practices utilized on these campuses and the role of district and campus leadership in guiding the teachers of these student populations. The theoretical framework was the deficit-thinking paradigm and the Effective Schools Correlates. The study investigated schools that (1) earned high ratings in their state accountability system (2) named Blue Ribbon Schools and (3) were Title I award winning schools because they had gone from low performing schools with few systems in place to high performing schools with many systems in place. The study focused on the Area Superintendent of Area 10 and two elementary principals. This study was a mix method qualitative and quantitative study that involved only one urban school district: Martin Luther King Independent School District, one of the fifteen largest districts in the southwest part of the United States. This was a case study, which is an intensive description and analysis of a phenomenon or social unit such as an individual, group, institution, or community. The case is a bounded, integrated system (Stake, 1995; Merriam, 1998). Data collection included interviews, observations, and a reflective journal. Findings revealed that there are six prongs these schools had in common to go from low performing to high performing schools as well as earn distinction and awards. Acquiring these six prongs is called Creating a Culture of Success for Students of Color and Students of Poverty. There are also six conditions that permeate low performing schools; these schools once had these conditions on their campuses, but overcame them to become high performing. These conditions are called the Labyrinth of Solitude for Students of Color and Students of Poverty. As school districts and schools attempt to create a culture of accountability where high expectations and a sense of urgency prevail--conditions necessary to close the achievement gap and move from the deficit-thinking paradigm and its deleterious impact on achievement toward the Normed-Opportunity Paradigm--universities and school districts can use this research data to help superintendents, central office personnel, campus principals, teachers, as well as prospective teachers and administrators to move schools and school districts forward and help close the achievement gap. / text

Teenage parenting is widely constructed in prevailing research and public discourse as a social problem, with poor outcomes for parent and child. Teenage parents are regarded as a drain on state funds, too young to parent well, and at high risk of social exclusion, both educationally and economically. This thesis proposes that teenage motherhood is a turning point in a young woman’s life and identity, which can be an opportunity, rather than a problem, if there is adequate support for the mother and her child. It considers the role of a New Zealand School for Teenage Parents in providing this support. Using qualitative narrative methodology, ten young women, six family members and nine other members of the School community were interviewed about their experiences of its culture and practices. Six of the young women were also interviewed to gather their life stories. Informed by the narrative understanding that we story our identities from the narrative possibilities available to us within the varied discursive contexts of our lives, this thesis draws on these life stories to explore how the young women storied the fashioning of their own identities as young women, as learners and as young parents. It presents their stories of childhood and family life, teenage-hood and schooling, pregnancy and parenthood, their experiences at the School for Teenage Parents, and their lives since leaving the School, in order to consider the role of the School in supporting the positive refashioning of their identities. This thesis draws on social constructionist and narrative theories to interpret the storied contexts of the young women’s lives, and the role these often constraining and difficult contexts played in the fashioning of their multiple identities. Māori culturally responsive pedagogical theories are also drawn on to interpret the culture of the School for Teenage Parents, and its attempts to provide a supportive and affirming family or whānau environment for its students, in order to offer them more positive narrative possibilities of self and identity as young women, as learners and as young parents.