<p> As graduate school enrollment continues to grow and more graduate institutions become responsible for their own fundraising efforts, attention to the specific context of graduate and professional school fundraising will be increasingly important. This study sought to identify the primary motivations of graduate alumni to make financial gifts to their graduate alma maters. Secondarily, it explored how prior experiences with undergraduate institutions, particularly through the lens of research related to organizational identification, affected their giving behavior. </p><p> Data gathered from alumni and development staff interviews at four graduate theological institutions indicated 11 distinct themes that could describe the variety of giving motivations mentioned by alumni. At the individual level, alumni were found to have a cluster of motivational themes, typically three to six themes, that they described as influencing their giving behavior. </p><p> The themes of mission, involvement, and vocational alignment appeared in alumni motivation clusters more frequently than others. Additionally, each institution had a particular motivation that was mentioned more prominently than others, leading to the conclusion that institutions are a major influencer on the motivations of their alumni. </p><p> Nearly all of the alumni not only gave equally or more frequently to their graduate alma mater than their undergraduate alma mater, they also reported equal or greater identification with their graduate alma mater. This affirms the prior research of Mael and Ashforth (1992) that organizational identity is a significant contributor to alumni giving and that having attended other institutions is not detrimental to the formation of a graduate school identity. </p><p> Overall, this study demonstrated that identifying the giving motivations of graduate alumni can be an important step in crafting strategies for effective alumni fundraising. Given the discrete set and limited range of possible motivations, graduate institutions similar to those in this study would be able to identify both the primary motivations of their alumni donors as well as the motivations unique to their own institutional identity. With that knowledge, they would then be able to cultivate alumni as donors in ways that are more engaging, relational, and authentic.</p><p>

<p> Summer bridge programs can be an ideal time for incoming freshmen college students to make valuable academic and social connections. Summer Bridge Programs have demonstrated success for in helping students make these connections. However, few programs have been studied extensively and been shown to have established success (Kallison &amp; Stader, 2012, Strayhorn, 2012). This study, using a qualitative method, examined student perspectives of a summer bridge program and questioned how the participants integrated academically and socially to the university. The study took place at a large, public university in the Southeastern United States. </p><p> Students reported favorable opinions of the bridge program. Students reported strong friendships developed over the 4-week program, positive impressions of the faculty, and a positive impression of the university.</p><p>

<p> Universities are under pressure from multiple directions with accrediting bodies requiring increased focus on institutional planning efforts. University staff who manage programs, provide student services, and serve in other specialized roles are at the forefront of this changing environment. These employees may have difficulty understanding how their daily work relates to institutional planning efforts and resist change imposed from the top.</p><p> While researchers have examined employee engagement during change efforts, staff participation in strategic planning in higher education constitutes an overlooked topic. The aim of the study was to address three questions: 1) How and to what extent have university leaders communicated the strategic plan and the steps in the planning process to staff? 2) How and to what extent have staff responded to the strategic planning process? 3) What are the perceptions of middle managers involved in implementing strategic initiatives?</p><p> The study occurred at Mid-Atlantic University (MAU), a public research university located in the Mid-Atlantic region of the United States. MAU began a strategic planning process and instructed schools and administrative units to align their strategic plans with the MAU plan before entering the implementation phase.</p><p> Study participants included eight middle managers, individuals who direct programs, supervise other staff, and are in the middle of the institution&rsquo;s hierarchy. A 45-minute semi-structured interview elicited information on staff reactions to the strategic plan, communication of strategic initiatives at the university and school level, and interactions between supervisors and employees. The researcher collected and analyzed documents from the university&rsquo;s strategic planning website, the staff governance association, and university publications.</p><p> Several themes emerged in the areas of communication, staff responses, and perceptions of implementation. These themes included: 1) communication of the strategic planning process did not permeate the organization; 2) staff members responded in three main ways: searching for understanding, getting excited, or becoming disillusioned or resigned to the ongoing changes; and 3) a disconnection between the planning process and implementation. This paper adds to the current body of literature and includes implications for practice and recommendations for future research in the area of staff involvement in planned change initiatives in higher education.</p><p>

<p> Investigating the validity and applicability of student success theories for minority students uncovers the nuance and context of student experiences. This study examines the validity and applicability of student engagement and involvement for Latino students. Specifically, this study employs a critical quantitative lens to question current constructs of engagement. The dataset for this study comes from the 2013 UNC Sophomore Survey and research questions are grounded in the context of public universities in North Carolina. Exploratory Factor Analysis and Logistic Regression methodologies are employed to investigate the research question, is there a relationship (and to what extent) between hypothesized constructs of engagement, socio-economic status, and academic preparation on Latino baccalaureate completion.</p><p>

<p> This qualitative study examined the lived experiences of key campus stakeholders and policy implementation. Using semi-structured interviews, key stakeholders were asked about their experiences with 15 to Finish: a 2014 completion message that led to a financial aid policy. Through snowball sampling, participants included administrators from the state higher education system, senior administrators from academic and administrative units, professional and academic advisors, and students. Data was also collected through meeting agendas and agency reports. Interviews were transcribed and all text was analyzed using hermeneutic phenomenology. Three key themes were constructed: (a) administrators and faculty help students because it is the right thing to do; (b) messaging and communication of a policy and campaign can be divisive and should employ a communications plan; and (c) Nevada is experiencing a change in college culture from access to completion.</p><p>

Although school improvement plans (SIPs) are common in American school systems, they are widely viewed as compliance documents that have little connection to the daily work of improving teaching and learning. In this capstone, I describe and reflect on my experiences as a resident in the Cambridge (MA) Public Schools. My goal was to build district- and school-level systems and structures to shift the role of the SIP away from a document that sits on the shelf and towards a component of an on-going process of improvement. To achieve this goal, I collaboratively designed SIP templates that focused on shorter-term outcomes and actions, developed a protocol for school teams to reflect on progress towards those shorter-term outcomes, facilitated the collaborative development of district feedback about SIPs, and piloted the Data Wise Improvement Process in two schools to promote the connection between SIPs and daily instruction. The results of these strategies were generally promising. Most principals and non-teachers (e.g. coaches) reported that this year’s SIP process was more likely to improve teaching and learning than last year’s process. However, principals were more positive than teachers about the improvements to this year’s SIP process, suggesting that the gains in shifting from a plan to a process had not yet reached classroom teachers. This pattern is problematic because it is classroom teachers who must change their practice in order for student learning to improve. My analysis led me to expand my initial theory of change to include the role of accountability in addition to the focus on support in my original design. My implications for Cambridge and the sector as a whole focus mainly on promoting the development of “internal accountability,” defined as an agreement about the norms, values, and expectations (Elmore, 2004) between teachers, principals and instructional coaches. In addition, my experience suggests that district leaders should create “external accountability” by holding schools accountable not just for writing the plan, but using it continuously with structured reflections. Finally, this capstone suggests that district leadership teams should also develop internal accountability for engaging in an on-going process of improvement.

Modern schools are complex organizations, tasked with wide-ranging responsibilities. Too frequently, schools have few tools and limited support to carry out those responsibilities. Much attention has been paid to instructional improvement in schools, but there has been less focus on improving administrative processes that consume substantial time and have an underestimated impact on whether students graduate from high school. In New York City, these tasks include programming students for the courses they need to graduate and registering them for required Regents exams. New Visions for Public Schools, the non-profit based in New York City where I did my residency, is a support organization for a network of 80 New York City public high schools. For the past two years, New Visions has been developing tools and resources to help schools carry out core administrative tasks. While these tasks sound straightforward, schools regularly miss routine opportunities. The accumulation of missed opportunities over the course of a student’s high school career can be the difference between graduating and dropping out. During my residency, I worked closely with a large comprehensive high school, attempting to implement New Visions’ tools and strategies as part of an organizational improvement process. I also worked on the development of these tools and strategies internally at New Visions. In my capstone, I reflect on the challenges of building infrastructure to change longstanding practices in mature schools from the position of an intermediary. I also analyze a new structure called the “strategic data check-in” (SDC) that we use as a primary strategy for capacity building and behavior change. I argue that the project of building administrative infrastructure is important, that New Visions’ progress has been hampered in part by an inability to create protected time and space for this work, but that the SDC approach is a promising approach to support learning by both New Visions and schools given these constraints. These lessons learned about creating tools to help manage schools as organizations, and the need for protected space in changing behavior, are generalizable to a wide range of challenges the education sector faces.

My capstone is an exploration into stages of boundary spanning and the challenges that result from attempting to work at the intersection of a critical power relationship: the school district and the community it serves. Denver Public Schools (DPS) recently unveiled the Denver Plan 2020, a strategic plan to lead the system towards the promise of “Great Schools in Every Neighborhood.” To embrace these goals, DPS announced an internal reorganization and committed to dramatic improvement alongside its community partners (charters, advocacy groups, political leaders and others). As a resident at DPS, I led as a boundary spanner between the Office of School Reform and Innovation (OSRI) and the Office of Family and Community Engagement (FACE) to facilitate stronger community engagement to achieve Denver Plan goals. Boundary spanning roles and teams process information, coordinate tasks between groups and represent teams externally, “linking organizational structure to environmental elements…buffering, moderating or influencing the environment” (Aldrich and Herker, 1977). My research concentrated on boundary spanning as an act to manage the relationship between internal and external authorization environments, boundary spanning in systems undergoing transition with “blended boundaries” (Scott, 2000) and developing boundary spanning capacity in myself and others. During the phases of the residency, I engaged in developmental leadership activities, both planned and unplanned, to build individual, team and networked team boundary spanning ability. The effectiveness of this work is measured by the largest of these projects, the Great Schools Community Conversations, which brought together teams across the district to engage the community. Various implications include recognition of limited ability to extend boundary spanning authorization to others and mitigated efficacy as activity approached the power relationship between the community and district without full authorization. Boundary spanning also represents a potential opportunity to manage fluctuating environments (with special relevance to portfolio school systems). I contend that given changes in the education sector and importance of managing shifting authorizing environments future transformational leaders ought to be deliberately trained to operate as boundary spanners. I argue that further research is needed to distinguish between general collaboration activities and boundary spanning. I also conclude that my calling is to help build and support education systems worthy of the communities they serve.

There is high demand for understanding the ways in which a central office can best support school improvement and student growth. This Capstone examines how a cross-functional senior leadership team collaborated to design a district-wide school improvement planning process with the goal of improving the quality of teaching and learning for all students. In particular, the analysis focuses on the functions of teaming and strategic improvement planning as drivers to help an organization achieve its goals. During the 2014-2015 school year, New Haven Public Schools focused on deepening and extending School Change, its broad-based district reform strategy, with the launch of School Change 2.0. Re-designing the district’s school improvement planning process and accompanying school support structures was a key initiative as part of this strategy. This Capstone explores the district’s shift toward a culture of collective responsibility through cross-departmental teaming and addresses the following research question: How can an urban school district use school improvement planning to enhance cross-functional work within the central office, and the partnership between the central office and schools, to improve teaching and learning? It provides insight into how an urban school district and public bureaucracy may structure its internal systems and processes to create a culture that enables continuous improvement. The process requires shifting from a culture traditionally focused on business and compliance functions to a culture that orients itself toward supporting schools and efforts to improve teaching and learning. To do this, district leaders must find new ways of working together and working with schools. In particular, the central office must shift from "organizing to execute" to "organizing to learn." This Capstone focuses on the possibilities and limitations of this process, and provides practical recommendations for making this transition in a context like New Haven Public Schools. In addition, it offers a reflection on key implications for three different levels of the system: my own leadership and work, the unique New Haven Public Schools site, and the broader education sector.

Over the past 20 years, State Education Agencies have expanded their traditional role, focused on distributing federal funds and compliance monitoring, to become responsible for developing state-level standards, measuring student progress and, in some cases, intervening directly in low performing schools. In Massachusetts, the state’s lowest performing schools are placed into Level 5 receivership, and the state’s education Commissioner selects school operators to run the schools on the state’s behalf. However, the availability of school operators is insufficient to meet the state’s needs and expanding current efforts is not financially sustainable. The Gateways to Achievement (GtA) Initiative attempts to catalyze school improvement efforts by: 1) increasing the supply of school operators able to successfully operate low performing schools, and 2) using the state’s authority of Level 5 receivership to incentivize districts to develop aggressive, voluntary school turnaround strategies. The goal is that the districts’ aggressive turnaround strategies, which include partnerships with school operators, will improve struggling schools such that Level 5 receivership is not required. The GtA Initiative was developed by Massachusetts education reformer Chris Gabrieli and Commissioner Mitchell Chester. My strategic project focused on building awareness and support within the Massachusetts Department of Elementary and Secondary Education (DESE) for the GtA initiative, and aligning it to the most important problems the agency was trying to solve. The GtA Initiative’s first manifestation was The Springfield Empowerment Zone Partnership (SEZP), an innovative partnership between Springfield Public Schools and DESE that utilizes many of the Level 5 authorities, but allows the target schools to remain under the control of local education officials. In a time of declining federal and state funds, the SEZP provides an example of how DESE may approach school turnaround efforts moving forward. However, DESE will first need to decide how the initiative, and indeed the naming of Level 5 receivers, fits within the state’s current theory of action guiding school and district turnaround efforts. Additionally, the agency will need to determine if it wants to bring the necessary capacity to identify and execute these types of innovative partnerships in-house, or continue to partner with outside groups.