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This investigation focuses upon the nation of Finland. Described by its Ministry of Foreign Affairs (“This is Finland”, n.d.) as a parliamentary democracy, Finland is a free-market economy with a young but progressive history. While the nation’s scores on the 2015 triennial PISA continue to indicate above average performance on all three domains, science, reading, and mathematics, inconsistencies were disclosed with regard to equity. Scoring above average on equitable achievement related to social background, which includes factors such as parents’ education and employment, Finland fell short regarding equitable achievement as it pertains to gender and immigrant students (“Compare Your Country, n.d.). This investigation will survey Finnish policy-related texts, education and mathematics curriculum, and Finnish artifacts; through the analysis of these texts, the intent is to determine how inequities and power dynamics are decipherable within these documents and potentially jeopardized students’ accessibility to mathematics endeavors. Fairclough’s interpretations and applications of critical discourse analysis will provide the foundation for analyses of Bourdieu’s notions of field, doxa, and habitus as they relate to Finnish equity and mathematics education and performance. / Teaching & Learning

In discussions about education in Aruba and Curaçao, questions about the use of the mother tongue in schools have become a critical topic. It is part of a larger discussion on the language rights of multilingual students in a colonial educational system that prefers Dutch. In this presentation, I demonstrate how the language ideologies, language use, and the construction of identity occurs through formal education in Aruba and Curaçao. Specifically, how by translanguaging, students and teachers can navigate a system that still holds on to part of its colonial history, by subverting antiquated norms of school language. By investigating how ideas about Papiamentu/o, the mother tongue, and other languages on the islands are used in teacher-to-student and peer-to-peer interactions inside and outside of the classroom, I analyze whether this influences how students perform in class and, most crucially, how they see themselves within education. Finally, this dissertation shows how discussions about mother tongue and multilingual education have implications for how language policies in education are created and maintained. Overall, I assess how ideology, language rights, education, and identity intersect through a postcolonial Caribbean society in an era of shifting educational models. / Anthropology

<p> The research design is a quantitative causal comparative method. The Florida Comprehensive Assessment Test (FCAT) which measures student scores included assessments in mathematics and reading. The design study called for an examination of how type of small learning community (SLC) or the type non-SLC high school environment affected student achievement in FCAT mathematics, FCAT reading, graduation rates, and entrance into college/post secondary education, employment, and teacher job satisfaction using analysis of variance. Results indicate that students who participated in SLCs were more likely to graduate from high school than their non-SLC counterparts. SLCs seem to be supportive of both high school completion and education beyond the high school diploma. Participating teachers provided self-reported levels of employment satisfaction using the Mohrman-Cooke-Mohrman Job Satisfaction Scales (MCMJSS). Results of the ANOVA analysis indicate that SLC teachers do demonstrate a significantly higher rate of job satisfaction than their non-SLC colleagues indicate the probability that the relation between the variables found in the sample (<i> p</i> &lt; .001) was significant. The results of this study were that SLCs improve student graduation rates, students&rsquo; entering college and post-secondary education and further expanded the empirical evidence that teachers in SLCs have increased job satisfaction.</p>

<p> This dissertation argues that bullying is a fundamental response to bullies&rsquo; feelings of insecurity. Past research has found factors associated with bullying to include socioeconomic status and propensities towards violent behavior. Contextual factors posited here that produce the feelings of insecurity, which lead to bullying, include peer group dynamics, school climates, and teaching. </p><p> In relationship to peer groups, the theoretical framework of this dissertation draws primarily from the theories of Robert E. Crosnoe and Dorte M. Sondergaard. The assumption is that students are socially embedded in peer groups in which they struggle for social status (Crosnoe 2011) and in many cases experience the threat of social marginalization (Sondergaard 2012). Sondergaard, in particular, theorizes that the more insecure students feel about their social status in peer groups, the more likely they are to resort to bullying behavior. </p><p> All multivariate analyses in this dissertation are limited to white, black, and Latino boys. The resulting sample comprises N=6,491 student observations nested within 153 schools. The nested sampling structure requires multi-level modeling (MLM) for the calculation of unbiased estimates.</p><p> I find that individual-level student background characteristics are stronger predictors of bully identification than the school context, as measured by student body composition and teaching style factors. In addition, social status insecurity is a mediating factor for many of the student- and school-level predictors of bullying. </p><p> The dissertation distinguishes four types of schools, each of which is above or below average on two major dimensions. The first dimension is academic support (i.e., how caring and responsive teachers are), while the other is academic press (i.e., how strict and demanding they are). </p><p> I find that black male students are more likely to self-identify as bullies in schools that are below average on both academic support and academic press, compared to those that are above average on both. The pattern for Latino boys is different. For them, self-reported bullying is higher when the school rates high on academic support, but low on academic press. </p><p> I find no statistically significant role for teaching styles in predicting the amount of bully identification among white males.</p>

<p> To comply with The Family Educational Rights and Privacy Act (FERPA) regulations, parents of high school students taking college classes as part of a dual enrollment program have to employ alternative monitoring practices to remain informed about their students&rsquo; academic progress. This quantitative research study explored how parents&rsquo; perceptions of access to student academic progress information correlated with their students&rsquo; academic performance based on cumulative grade point average (GPA) in college classes. Credit-based transition programs (CBTP) and parent monitoring theory provided the framework. All 867 parents of students under age 18 enrolled in the dual enrollment program at an urban community college in a western state during the winter quarter 2015 were asked to respond a 10 question survey instrument, modified from Stattin and Kerr (2000) and six demographic indicators. The results of 59 returned questionnaires were linked to GPAs of students using descriptive and correlational statistics. A small response (6.8%) limited the ability to correlate parental perceptions and dual enrollment success in college courses. No significance was demonstrated; however, when cumulative GPAs and parent responses on the survey instrument were correlated using split-cases with demographic indictors, six significant correlations appeared. These indicated that parents do appear to play some significant role in supporting their dual enrollment student&rsquo;s success in college courses. As a result, colleges may want to find mechanisms for parents of dual enrollment students to stay engaged without compromising the FERPA regulations.</p>

<p> Changes in recent federal, state, and local legislation have added increased scrutiny of and pressure on the evaluation systems of educators across the nation. This scrutiny and pressure have prompted significant changes to both the systems and processes for determining and reporting the effectiveness of teachers and principals. One of the most substantial changes is the use of student growth goals in determining evaluation outcomes for educators. This qualitative study examined the practice and impact of student growth goals created by principals. How do principals describe the impact of evaluative student growth goals on their leadership practice? In what ways are teacher-created student growth goals reflected in the student growth goals that principals set?</p><p> To examine these questions, the researcher interviewed ten principals and analyzed the data using an open coding and thematic organization of the results. Several themes that emerged from the participant interviews included: (a) principals view improved evaluation as a crucial leadership practice; (b) principal level (i.e. elementary or secondary), rather than experience, is a critical factor in goal-setting effectiveness; and (c) principals must have expertise in collaborative leadership to effectively develop meaningful student growth goals.</p><p> The implications of these themes suggested that policymakers and practitioners increase professional development designed to improve the level of learning-focused conversations of teachers and principals, target increased professional development to secondary principals, develop student growth measures that are useful at the secondary level, and find ways to create time in the system for teachers, principals, and their evaluators to engage in these evaluation conversations. </p>

<p> This study explores teacher perceptions of Bring Your Own Device (BYOD) programs in the classroom, with a focus on teacher use, student equity of access, and student ability to use their devices as learning tools. While one-to-one laptop programs (students assigned identical school-owned laptop or tablet) has an extensive body of literature behind it, BYOD has relatively little peer-reviewed research. </p><p> A framework was developed to guide this research that related teacher technology use, equity of student access, and student ability to learn to use the devices they brought. Two instruments were created to collect data: (a) an anonymous online survey to collect information from 108 teachers already incorporating BYOD into their classes, (b) a semi-structured interview with eleven teachers who volunteered after completing the first instrument. </p><p> Findings suggested that teachers with constructivist compatible beliefs were likely to have more positive perceptions of BYOD, as were those who worked in schools with a more positive atmosphere. Very few teachers (12%) thought that BYOD programs were inherently inequitable, although 25% thought the programs in their own school was inequitable. Teachers were concerned that all students have access to an effective device when the student did not bring one and they primarily looked to school-owned technology to be available. Teachers also reported that students could learn to use their individual devices by working with other students and through working on assignments, while teachers had specific techniques they used to support this learning. Teachers overall did not view themselves as being responsible for providing technology support to students, and instead expected students to resolve their own technology problems. Many teachers (42%) liked that students had different types of devices. </p><p> A key advantage of BYOD is the knowledge the students bring when they bring their own device. These results provide tentative support for Bring Your Own Device programs as a viable, cost- effective way for students to use their own technology for learning.</p>