Thesis advisor: Vincent Cho / Fierce political and social pressure has intensified the demands for district leaders to narrow achievement disparities but research provides limited guidance for practice. Rorrer, Skrla, and Scheurich (2008) described a theory: district leaders should enact certain essential roles for school reform. Capacity-Building efforts of district leaders are essential to the role of Instructional Leadership. Building capacity comprises the specific actions of district leaders to improve the district’s ability to achieve complex goals. This qualitative case study explored the actions district leaders took and how they prioritized those actions to build capacity to improve student achievement. Data was collected from a single Massachusetts school district using semi-structured interviews and document reviews. This study found that leaders: established concrete learning practices (i.e. job-embedded professional development, instructional coaching model); created a supportive learning environment (i.e. establishing trust and providing time); and reinforced teacher learning (i.e. feedback and support). This study also found that leaders’ actions were driven by data. Recommendations include shifting to a data-informed decision-making process, coordination of leadership team efforts across the district and limiting initiatives to core priorities. / Thesis (EdD) — Boston College, 2016. / Submitted to: Boston College. Lynch School of Education. / Discipline: Educational Leadership and Higher Education.

Previous research indicates that pre- and in-service teachers are not receiving adequate training to implement data-informed instructional decision making. This is problematic given the promise this decision making process holds for improving instruction and student learning. At the same time, many educators do not see the value of different types of assessment data (e.g. accountability data), and lack the knowledge, skills, and confidence to use available data to guide instructional decisions. The purpose of this study was to conduct a formative evaluation of an online training designed to improve Iowa pre- and in-service teachers’ perceptions about data, data knowledge, skills and confidence working with data. The training along with a data literacy test was administered online to 29 pre-service teachers from two Iowa universities. A pre-post design was used to assess changes in these data constructs. Results indicated that participants’ perceptions about external accountability data improved significantly after completing the training, as did their confidence working with data. However, most participants’ data performance were relatively stable pre-post training. A content analysis of responses pre-post revealed qualitative changes in some participants’ thinking about data. Participants rated the value, effectiveness and quality of the training and complementary materials. Ratings were mostly positive, with participants signifying the training and materials as valuable and effective for enhancing their understanding of data as well as their confidence working with data. Participants also identified opportunities for improving the training. The author concludes with a discussion of the results, implications for future research, and how the study adds to the existing literature and informs practice.

In this mixed-methods study I report on a three-part investigation related to reading intervention at Grade 1 in one Ontario school board during the 2009-2010 school year. First, I report the results that Peer Assisted Learning Strategies (PALS) had on the reading outcomes for all Grade 1 students (n = 436) in terms of sex, aboriginal status, and at-risk status. Second, I use progress monitoring benchmark data to show how students unresponsive to instruction may have benefitted from additional instruction generated from monthly data-informed In-School Team meetings. Third, I report on educators’ perceptions of how monthly data-informed In-School Team meetings influenced their knowledge, confidence, and willingness to plan additional reading interventions for students persistently at-risk for reading failure. Findings indicate that compared to previous years, when PALS was not used, students in this study made significantly greater gains in reading scores. Boys made similar gains to girls, First Nations students made similar gains to non First Nations students, and at-risk students closed the achievement gap slightly with their typically-achieving peers. For students who did not make adequate progress in reading throughout the year a logistic regression analysis of the data indicates that the best predictor of at-risk status is not a student’s sex or First Nations status, but their letter sound fluency and word identification fluency scores at the beginning of the school year. Findings also indicate that the slope of improvement in reading scores for nonresponders begins to increase once In-School Team meetings begin. Educators’ perceptions of how the monthly In-School team meetings influenced practice differed according to the perceived role that each held of his or her position, and according to the level of involvement, training, and access that each had to the data used in this study. The more professional development that educators had in the theory, use, and application of progress monitoring data the more likely they were to report that they were willing to use it to inform their practice. Likewise, the more access that educators had to the data in terms of collecting, viewing, and interpreting it, the more likely they were in reporting knowledge, confidence, and willingness to use it to plan additional interventions for students. / Thesis (Ph.D, Education) -- Queen's University, 2011-09-13 10:03:09.664

Federal educational policy, No Child Left Behind Act of 2001, focused attention on America’s education with conspicuous results. One aspect, highly qualified classroom teacher and principal (HQ), was taxing since states established individual accountability structures. The HQ impact and use of data-informed decision-making (DIDM) for Texas elementary science education monitoring by campus administrators, Campus Instruction Leader (CILs), provides crucial relationships to 5th grade students’ learning and achievement. Forty years research determined improved student results when sustained, supported, and focused professional development (PD) for teachers is available. Using mixed methods research, this study applied quantitative and qualitative analysis from two, electronic, on-line surveys: Texas Elementary, Intermediate or Middle School Teacher Survey© and the Texas Elementary Campus Administrator Survey© with results from 22.3% Texas school districts representing 487 elementary campuses surveyed. Participants selected in random, stratified sampling of 5th grade teachers who attended local Texas Regional Collaboratives science professional development (PD) programs between 2003-2008. Survey information compared statistically to campus-level average passing rate scores on the 5th grade science TAKS using Statistical Process Software (SPSS). Written comments from both surveys analyzed with Qualitative Survey Research (NVivo) software. Due to the level of uncertainty of variables within a large statewide study, Mauchly’s Test of Sphericity statistical test used to validate repeated measures factor ANOVAs. Although few individual results were statistically significant, when jointly analyzed, striking constructs were revealed regarding the impact of HQ policy applications and elementary CILs use of data-informed decisions on improving 5th grade students’ achievement and teachers’ PD learning science content. Some constructs included the use of data-warehouse programs; teachers’ applications of DIDM to modify lessons for differentiated science instruction, the numbers of years’ teachers attended science PD, and teachers’ influence on CILs staffing decisions. Yet CILs reported 14% of Texas elementary campuses had limited or no science education programs due to federal policy requirement for reading and mathematics. Three hypothesis components were supported and accepted from research data resulted in two models addressing elementary science, science education PD, and CILs impact for federal policy applications. / text

abstract: A core reform area of President Obama’s Race to the Top (RTT) framework, the Statewide Longitudinal Data Systems (SLDS) program, offered funding to states for the development of their own data systems. As a result, Arizona received funding to build a longitudinal student data system. However the targeted audience—teachers—needed training to move from a state of ‘data rich but information poor’ to one of developing actionable knowledge. In this mixed methods action research study, six teachers from three schools participated in job-embedded data-informed decision making (DIDM) and root cause analysis (RCA) professional development to improve their abilities to employ DIDM and RCA strategies to determine root causes for student achievement gaps. This study was based on the theories of situated learning, specifically the concept of communities of practice (CoP), change theory, and the Concerns-Based Adoption Model (CBAM). Because teachers comprise most of the workforce in a district, it is important to encourage them to shift from working in isolation to effectively implement and sustain changes in practice. To address this concern, an online wiki provided an avenue for participants to interact, reflect, and share experiences across schools as they engaged in the application of new learning. The results from this ten-week study indicated an increase in participant readiness levels to: (a) use and manage data sources, (b) apply strategies, and (c) collaborate with others to solve problems of practice. Results also showed that participants engaged in collaborative conversation using the online wiki when they wanted to share concerns or gain further information to make decisions. The online collaboration results indicated higher levels of online discussion occurred when participants were attempting to solve a problem of practice during the learning process. Overall, participants (a) used collaborative strategies to seek, create, and/or utilize multiple sources of data, not just student learning data, (b) worked through implementation challenges when making changes in practice, and (c) sought further types of data collection to inform their decisions about root causes. Implications from this study warrant further investigation into the use of an online CoP as an avenue for increasing teacher collaboration across schools. / Dissertation/Thesis / Doctoral Dissertation Leadership and Innovation 2016

abstract: Data and the use of data to make educational decisions have attained new-found prominence in K-12 education following the inception of high-stakes testing and subsequent linking of teacher evaluations and teacher-performance pay to students' outcomes on standardized assessments. Although the research literature suggested students' academic performance benefits were derived from employing data-informed decision making (DIDM), many educators have not felt efficacious about implementing and using DIDM practices. Additionally, the literature suggested a five-factor model of teachers' efficacy and anxiety with respect to using DIDM practices: (a) identification of relevant information, (b) interpretation of relevant information, (c) application of interpretations of data to their classroom practices, (d) requisite technological skills, and (e) comfort with data and statistics. This action research study was designed to augment a program of support focused on DIDM, which was being offered at a K-8 charter school in Arizona. It sought to better understand the relation between participation in professional development (PD) modules and teachers' self-efficacy for using DIDM practices. It provided an online PD component, in which 19 kindergarten through 8th-grade teachers worked through three self-guided online learning modules, focused sequentially on (a) identification of relevant student data, (b) interpretation of relevant student data, and (c) application of interpretations of data to classroom practices. Each module concluded with an in-person reflection session, in which teachers shared artifacts they developed based on the modules, discussed challenges, shared solutions, and considered applications to their classrooms. Results of quantitative data from pre- and post-intervention assessments, suggested the intervention positively influenced participants' self-efficacy for (a) identifying and (b) interpreting relevant student data. Qualitative results from eight semi-structured interviews conducted at the conclusion of the intervention indicated that teachers, regardless of previous experience using data, viewed DIDM favorably and were more able to find and draw conclusions from their data than they were prior to the intervention. The quantitative and qualitative data exhibited complementarity pointing to the same conclusions. The discussion focused on explaining how the intervention influenced participants' self-efficacy for using DIDM practices, anxiety around using DIDM practices, and use of DIDM practices. / Dissertation/Thesis / Doctoral Dissertation Leadership and Innovation 2017

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The contribution of this thesis aims to investigate the current state of vulnerability of Italian Innerlands, crossed by continuous phenomena and by discrete or sudden phenomena, to represent the tangible and intangible space to fully understand the performativity of these territories. The methodology used lies in an intermediate space between the values process of landscape ecology, which sees as its starting point the investigation of tangible land effects, and the quantitative-qualitative approach of mapping. A scale of values is assigned using GIS-assisted multi-criteria evaluation. The proposed methodology is set and applied in the case of Val di Sole, Trentino, to spatialise the relationship between risk and resources in Italian Innerlands. Extreme Terres of Anthropocene In the world of town planning, architecture, and landscape, searching for a new phenomenology is a way of interpreting and explaining how the great environmental, social, and economic changes the entire Earth System is undergoing are manifested in borderline contexts. Therefore, most ordinary human landscapes cannot be attributed to a single person. No one can be labelled for the responsibility of creating most ordinary landscapes, and there is rarely an identifiable person we can ask about the significance of these changes (Lewis 2003). Within the literature review of this research, a new phenomenology is constructed from the need to describe how reality presents itself and manifests itself in territories subject to constant change, the Extreme Terres. For these reasons, Part 1 focuses on the social, political, ecological, and environmental conditions that remained rather unquestioned as the concept of Extreme Terres. The aim is to understand the causes and consequences of ongoing transformations, with a focus on human impact on the soil. In today’s context, where the impact of man has led to a severe crisis experience the need arises to give a new meaning to the concept of Nature, which can no longer be considered mechanical, simple and above all objectively observable (Morin 2017;p.15), but Extreme. Today the difficulty of deciphering the meaning of extreme in ordinary landscapes is more complex than interpreting other types of historical documents. Looking outside the large population centres allows us to investigate urbanisation from the perspective of its supposed ‘outsiders’, the areas commonly represented as rural, remote, wild and/or untouched by human impact. In these places, described between literature and geography, morphologically isolated from the city, man exploits their land, which is the primary resource, choosing it as the raw material for production processes (Lefebvre 1974). The raw material, that is, the resource extracted, such as a mineral or water, has been exploited for years without giving it value in the production process; or even more simply, man has never bothered to give back what he received from the “terre”. Thus, these lands, which contain precious minerals, water sources, fertile soils, forests, and many other resources on the edge of the maximum risk, are named here as Extreme Terres. To understand the Extreme Terres, it is necessary to think of the boundary between the space of maximum urban expansion and what is uninhabitable for humans: the lands of production. These lands are fragile, and highly productive because they are rich in resources and subject to great instability. Inland or isolated lands in Italy, predominantly mountainous and hilly, are characterised by recurring geographical conditions and social-ecological processes. Common trends, such as depopulation and accelerated ageing of local communities, and divergent trends between abandonment or overexploitation of local resources are observed in these inner areas. In general, their relative geographic isolation makes them highly sensitive to discontinuities or disruptive events such as natural disasters (landslides, floods, flows disrupting connections) or the construction of large infrastructures (suddenly opening new flows). Where these territories are endowed with significant local resources and at the same time are extremely sensitive to discontinuities and changes, we call them ‘Extreme Terres’: where ‘great resources and great risks can evolve rapidly. In these territories, the condition of relative isolation with respect to more densely populated areas has an ambivalent or ambiguous value: the distance from urban centres and services exposes them to a greater risk of demographic decline, and the same distance limits exogenous pressures towards economic overexploitation of local resources and motivates their maintenance. Places in the extreme exist on the margins of the built world: they are found almost everywhere on the margins and in the interstices of residual and ambiguous cities (Barron and Mariani 2013). In this regard, Italy consists of a very long spine that is increasingly marginal and abandoned. People choose to live in cities and, when they choose towns, they always make sure they are comfortable and flat. Nobody wants to be in the most extreme place: the Apennines (Fig. 15-16). Part of the Italian territory of radiations and places that are in danger of being lost. In the extreme points of the territory, the Italian population has lived for millennia consuming what little was sufficient to sustain itself, and there are even areas where the landscape is still unspoilt. Moreover, the pandemic situation of recent years has influenced people’s values and priorities, allowing us to reconsider the value of lands outside urban centres. In Italy, overcoming a contrasting vision between cities and inland areas brings out a relationship of interdependence between territories, a fragile balance to be investigated and reconnected. In this context, this thesis proposes a reflection on the need to rethink the design of soil. This moves beyond the concept of urban or rural soil as opposed to nature and moves to a more inclusive definition that finds similarities with the word terre (Brenner.; Elden 2010). A fragmentation of multiple meanings around the concept of terre has appeared in the Italian landscape, by urbanism itself, as if it were “something taken for granted or having already included it in its genetic code without the need to return to it, to know well what it was” (Pileri, 2018). In order to respond to contemporary challenges, it is deemed appropriate to broaden the gaze beyond the modern city to a trans-scalar vision that includes the transformation dynamics of the marginal territories (Brenner, Schmid, 2014). Today we need to reverse the vision: no longer starting from the “centres” to the “peripheries,” but from the “margins” themselves. A new central idea is needed: that these are not places of consumption (of nature, traditions, etc.), but first and foremost territories of production, comprising new cultures, social innovations, techno-rural knowledge and practices, renewed ways of exercising welfare and interacting with the environment. The territories of the Italian inner areas, predominantly mountainous and hilly, are characterised by recurring geographical conditions and social-ecological processes. These inner areas have observed common trends, such as depopulation, accelerated ageing of local communities, and divergent trends between abandonment or overexploitation of local resources. In general, their relative geographic isolation makes them highly susceptible to discontinuities or disruptive events, such as natural disasters (landslides, floods, mudslides that disrupt connections) or the construction of large infrastructure (which suddenly opens new flows). In these territories, the condition of relative isolation from more densely populated areas has an ambivalent or ambiguous value: the distance from urban centres and services exposes them to a greater risk of demographic decline; the same distance limits exogenous pressures toward economic overexploitation of the local resources, and it motivates their maintenance. Research Question and Objective Why does man today still aspire to reach and exploit isolated lands when he is contributing to their disappearance?
This is the central question posed by the research “Extreme Terres of the Anthropocene” to understand the relationship between risk and resources in marginal lands. Specifically, in the Italian context, this contribution is supposed to understand the relationship between the risk and the resource of the territory in the Italian Innerlands and the effect that man has on these territories. Moreover, it also exists to ask what effect the flows of temporary or permanent inhabitants have onthese lands. This research hypothesizes that the existing condition of Extreme Terres has a potential value demonstrable through spatialization and design methodology. Research Aims and Objectives
The main aims of this contribution are to explain the condition of the Extreme Terres in the Anthropocene era; to explore and analyse the complexity of the Extreme Terres and to understand their value.
Therefore, this methodological research sets, as the main objective, mapping the condition of the Extreme Terres through a critical analysis of a selected application case in the Italian Innerlands. Methodological Approach The analytical reading of the Italian Innerlands proposed is based on the social, cultural, and natural geographical conditions of the terre. Therefore, the experimental model applied by Carlotta Olivari and Margherita Pasquali illustrated in the project “Yuxtaposiciòn Extrema” (Maggioli 2019) is taken up. Concerning the Italian inner areas’ spatialization, it becomes necessary to talk about Espace: “the attempt Extreme Terres of Anthropocene is to introduce spatial categories into social criticism.” (Olivari, Pasquali 2019; p.47). In the “Production of Space”, the architectural and urban space does not consider natural and social opacity. Within the proposed process, it is necessary to think about “the representations of space as imbued with the knowledge that is always relative and in transformation.” (Olivari, Pasquali 2019). In this contribution, geography and mapping are understood as tools for representing space and for understanding formation and development of the reference context. The effort is to include a multiscale analysis of the inner areas context through the mapping process. Methods of Investigation: Mapping as a Design Tool
Once the conceptual framework is stated, the methods of investigation need to be clarified. The goal is not to propose predefined solutions to the Italian Innerlands but rather to re-imagine fragmented and Extreme Terres via methodology to manage territorial uncertainty. The research methodology aims to respond to the endemic problems given by the conditions of risk, instability, and sudden changes to which different inner areas are subjected. Thus, the proposed methodology is structured on Italian Extreme Terres’ natural and anthropogenic conditions: the desire is to create a methodological approach to estimate the vulnerable marginal areas through a multi-scale and multi-level approach looking at fragmented territory. The aim is to underline the critical issues, potentiality, and sustainability of the Italian Innerlands space concerning the morphological conformation of the territory. Mapping is critically understood as an active and planning tool; the reading of these data can be used to highlight one or the other form, opening them up to narrative speculation. It is, therefore, a matter of critically reading geographical data and images and understanding what generates influences and composes them. Despite the attempt at mapping construction—dictated by incredible technical and logistical effort—the globe is more readable as an ongoing process of change than as an absolute, unchallenged object. By identifying the map as an active investigation tool, the cartographic inquiry is seen as a process of selection and as a potential and central tool in reading and interpreting the transformation of the land. For this reason, it is essential to work with “cognitive maps that can more effectively grasp the rapidly changing geographies of our planetary-urban existence” (Katsikis, Brenner 2013) to reach the capacity to reformulate what already exists (Corner 1999). More precisely, digital data processing is used, through the Geographic Information System (GIS) tool, the use of evaluating criteria and the classification of data and the zenith representation: the map. The Italian Innerlands, as a “geography of possibility”, are therefore semiotic and cognitive, as defined by Almo Farina, and not disconnected from the cultural context (Olivari, Pasquali, 2022) Results From the critical and theoretical reading of the context, Italian Innerlands appear a place at risk of depopulation and hydrogeological risk where tourism is used as an economic engine to exploit parts of the local landscape resources in places that were characterised by extractive processes for raw materials for production processes (energy, marble, minerals,water). Based on the parameters defined during the terre mapping methodology described at the beginning of the process, the mapping and data collection phase was characterised by in-depth research of information necessary to configure maps expressing the strong relationship between risk and resource in the Italian Innerlands. Through the mapping process, it is possible to highlight criticalities in a selected specific case, that of the Val di Sole and the smaller Val di Rabbi focus area: its existing resources and the presence of risk. The mapping process demonstrated and tested the interpretation of the potential of Extreme Terres in the marginal and alpine territory of Trentino, the one chosen as an ap- plication case. The description of the results obtained for the tangible mapping process of the Extreme Terres is the starting point for the subsequent phases of the doctoral research project that the “Extreme Terres of Anthropocene” thesis is pursuing. Discussion and Perspectives The conditions of environmental degradation and social vulnerability of the Italian Innerlands, especially the Val di Sole, are considered in this contribution as new opportunities: the slopes of the ravines become the perfect condition to recover and preserve the terre. Italian Innerlands must deal with instability, as they are situated in risky areas. As local populations live precariously and in continuous movement depending on the fickleness of nature in these areas, so the Italian Innerlands carry in them an awareness of their local knowledge as a “cultural landscape” (Farina 2000). Moreover, in these unstable conditions, “authorities managing risk could improve their strategic objectives if they could access and integrate” (Marten; Abrassart; Boano) Italian Innerlands in urban planning information. “Furthermore, a collaborative hazard governance can provide equity to multiple urban actors that are usually left out of institutional DRM, including nongovernmental organisations, academia, and community groups.” (Marten ; Abrassart ; Boano ). Thus, understanding the mixing of both nature and culture and ecology, territorial planning, and economic science allows us to create a model as a paradigm for ecological surveys and innovative management methods. Alternative models, such as cultural landscapes, should be integrated to address the contemporary overexploitation of resources and ongoing social imbalances. At the same time, a processual methodology is proposed to put these frameworks into a systemic approach that integrates economy with ecology and culture with nature. It is essential to consider the feasibility and eventual fallibility of the developed process (Olivari, Pasquali, 2022). From the point of view of the applicability of the proposed mapping methodology, we observe the necessity of understanding where the possible unbalances and richness of the territories involved come from. The capability of dialogue with the territorial planners, residents and workers using maps is essential to leave a tool to understand where and which ecological strategies should be proposed in such territories. Moreover, the proposed methodology is considered a process that cannot be replicated with actual results. Still, the conditions for establishing, each time, a new complex and endogenous thought are repeatable.

In this study, the aim is to review principals' data-based decision-making process, which is based on analysing the discourses that are expressed in the documentation of their decision-making process. There are 84 decisions reviewed which come from 12 different principals in 13 different schools (pre-school class and year 1 - 9 compulsory school).  The theoretical startingpoint for the study is organisational theory and a model for Critical discourse analysis (CDA), which consists of three interrelated processes of analysis. Four different decision discourses are identified, efficiency discourse, knowledge discourse, documentation discourse and problem-based discourse. Previous research in the same field are confirmed. However, it contradicts with the idea that data-based decision-making process is following certain steps and fixed order in this kind of decision process in school. The conclusions are that despite guidelines and a strong focus on assessing results, the decision-making process seems to take other directions than planned in policies. Some parts in the process seems to be particularly complicated, and schools would gain from clarifying a designed data-based decision process. / I den här studien är syftet att granska rektorers välgrundade eller databaserade beslutsprocess, vilket sker genom att analysera de diskurser som kommer till uttryck i rektorers dokumentation om analys av resultat och planerade åtgärder. Utifrån en flerdimensionell analysmodell granskas 84 planerade åtgärder, från 12 olika rektorer i 13 olika grundskolor. Den teoretiska och metodologiska utgångspunkten finns i kritisk diskursanalys och organisationsteori. Resultatet stämmer till viss del överens med och bekräftar tidigare forskningsresultat inom samma område, men det motsäger att den välgrundade beslutsprocessen går till i bestämda steg och i en viss ordning. I studien identifieras fyra beslutsdiskurser: effektivitetsdiskurs, kunskapsdiskurs, dokumentationsdiskurs och problembaserad diskurs. Slutsatserna är, att trots riktlinjer och ett starkt fokus på att bedöma resultat verkar beslutsprocessen ta andra vägar än det som planeras i direktiv och policys. Vissa delar är särskilt komplicerade och av den anledningen kan alla organisationsnivåer vinna på att ge en mer tydlig form till processen för de databaserade besluten.