<p>Higher education can present many challenges for students including managing and scheduling classes, assignments, projects, and professional and social obligations. This experience can be even more difficult for students living with chronic illness, many of whom face the additional challenges of debilitating pain, fatigue, social misconceptions, and frequent medical care. To succeed some students with chronic illnesses will need support and accommodation in order to achieve their goals and complete their degrees. In this thesis I explore the barriers I faced as a student with chronic illness in higher education and what accommodations may help remove those barriers for future students. With this thesis I hope to participate in social, political and academic conversations as a means to increase understanding among fellow students, faculty, staff, and administrators. It is my hope that these conversations will contribute to a movement that will help support and encourage students with chronic illnesses. </p>

<p> Corporal punishment is a controversial method of student discipline used in schools world-wide. There are opposing viewpoints to this practice; corporal punishment is considered as a viable means of discipline, while on the other hand, non-advocates associate corporal punishment with abuse. Currently, corporal punishment is permitted in 19 states, while 31 states have abolished corporal punishment in the school setting. The practice is most predominant in the south, which includes Louisiana. Louisiana is one of 19 states where corporal punishment is deemed legal in a school setting. </p><p> The purpose of this study was two-fold. The primary purpose was to examine and describe Louisiana corporal punishment data retrieved from the Louisiana Department of Education. Secondly, potential relationships between corporal punishment data and three demographic variables (at-risk student counts, district locale, and district performance scores) were explored. There are 54 districts that authorize such practices, but only 42 have reported data to the state for the three reporting cycles. The essential questions dictating this research are: 1) What were corporal punishment practices (student numbers and events) in Louisiana public schools for school years 2011-12, 2012-13, and 2013-14? 2) What distributional characteristics exist for students corporally punished and corporal punishment events in Louisiana during the school years 2011-12, 2012-13, and 2013-14? 3) What percentage of Louisiana school districts experienced changes in corporal punishment practices between school years 2011-12, 2012-13, or 2013-14? 4) What is the relationship between at-risk student count, district locale type, and district performance scores with corporal punishment (student numbers) from an analysis of school districts for school year 2013-2014? </p><p> The federal government has outlawed physical punishment in prisons, jails, and medical facilities, yet students sitting in a classroom are targets for getting hit. It has been 150 years since the first state banned this practice in schools. Since then, an additional 31 states have done the same, but it is still occurring every day in this nation and in Louisiana. </p><p> Results and conclusions from this study may assist local school boards in deciding if corporal punishment should be used within their school districts. </p>

<p> Administrators of 2-year colleges are working in an environment where they seek to balance the social development of the student and the community&rsquo;s demand for a trained workforce to achieve economic development. This balance has resulted in ambiguity about the mission and purpose of 2-year colleges. The purpose of this case study was to explore a community college&rsquo;s experiences with mission change by exploring the interaction between a neoliberal public policy environment and the traditional social democratic mission of academia. Harvey&rsquo;s conceptualization of neoliberalism was used as the theoretical framework. Data were collected through 15 semi-structured interviews with members of college leadership, faculty members, staff, and members of the college&rsquo;s advisory council. Other data included documentation about policy, mission, and publicly available documents related to the mission change at the institution. These data were deductively coded, and then subjected to content analysis. Key findings indicated that the college initially stalled in the mission change process, and as a result, identified alternative pathways to achieve the goals of career-relevant training the neoliberal environment demanded. In this sense, the perspective of academic capitalism was born from necessity for self-reliance and illustrates the commonality of finding entrepreneurial solutions. The implications for positive social change include recommendations to leaders of 2-year colleges on managing mission change in a way that responds to the needs of the college community while retaining the relevance of students&rsquo; social development.</p>

<p> For low-income minority and marginalized communities, American democracy&rsquo;s educational mission remains unfulfilled. Student voices have provided insight into ways that schools disserve and serve students and how schools can improve in promoting academic achievement; however, academically successful low-income students&rsquo; voices&mdash;particularly those at the elementary school level&mdash;are largely excluded from the literature. Providing a platform for student voices, this qualitative, intrinsic critical case study explored six high achieving low-income students&rsquo; views of their academic success and how that success was achieved. Participants were six fifthgrade students, their parents, and teacher, in a school-wide Title I urban public school. Data were collected over a 12-week period through individual interviews, observation, participation, and semiformal conversations. Using an immersive pattern analysis, four main categories emerged from the student interview data: student beliefs about their role; classroom structures; teacher practices; and family support. The study found four principal success factors: a dynamic effortdriven view of success and intelligence; a rigorous dialogic classroom that prioritized student voice, critical thinking, collaboration, and social imagination; an accountable classroom culture viii of high expectations and mastery learning; and the richly diverse experiences and teachings of parents and families as valuable funds of knowledge. Implications and recommendations are included for policy, practice, and future research.</p>

The Conservative Educationalists made their first appearance on the British political stage in 1950. After twenty-five years of vigorous political activity they were well on their way to becoming the most important body of individuals seeking to influence Conservative education policy. The thesis seeks to examine and explain the progress of the views of the Conservative Educationalists over the formation and formulation of education policy in the postwar Conservative Party. An historical analysis was employed to answer the main research question and the subsidiary hypotheses. Whenever possible, primary sources were used including the private papers of Lord Boyle, Professor Brian Cox and Sir Gilbert Longden, and papers held in the official Conservative Party Archive. The thesis establishes that prior to 1970 there was a vacuum in Conservative Party thinking on the aims of education (Chapters 2-3). It shows how the ideas of a body of individuals (termed the conservative Educationalists by Lord Maude in an interview with the author) came to fill this vacuum between 1970 and 1974 (Chapter 4). This body was strongly critical of the Party's existing treatment of education and pressed the Party to fashion a conservative educational policy more in line with Conservative philosophy (Chapter 5). This loose-nexus of individuals changed over a period of time but its intellectual base (preservationist/ excellence in education) became firmly rooted. Between 1975 and 1979 the actions and prescriptions of the conservative Educationalists were instrumental in the construction of a conservative educational policy premised on the notion of excellence in education (Chapters 5-6). Elements of this policy were adopted by the Conservative Government after 1979 (Chapters 7-10). The thesis demonstrates that the contribution of the Conservative Educationalists (notably the preservationists) to the making of Conservative education policy was far greater than has previously been acknowledged.

This study described the relationship between leadership behavior, parental involvement and student achievement in the areas of reading and mathematics in focus middle schools. A questionnaire designed by Bell South Laboratories was used to elicit teachers' perceptions of their principal's behavior in the areas of discipline, climate, communications, community relations, and instructional leadership. The instrument was field tested by a panel of experts whose feedback was used to improve the instrument. Information relative to parental involvement was secured from Board of Education minutes outlining the number of parents who join the PTA and the number of parents who volunteer in the school. Analysis of the data was made by using the Pearson (r) to determine if a relationship existed between the variables. Table values were used to determine the significance of the Pearson r. The statistical tools were utilized to test the 14 null hypothesis in the study. The following significant findings of the study are that: 1.There were significant relationships found between the variables of climate and reading and mathematics, community relations and reading and mathematics, communications and reading and mathematics, PTA and reading and mathematics, volunteers and reading and mathematics. 2. The relationships found crossed focus boundaries. 3. There were non-significant relationships found between discipline and reading and instructional leadership and mathematics. 4. The relationships for non-significant relationships cross focus boundaries. 5. The study revealed that focus status was neither an issue in teachers' perceptions of the principal's behavior, nor was it an issue in the variable of parental involvement.

<p> Committed elementary teachers of science and engineering, members of a professional learning community called Collaborative Conversations in STEM, were studied to elicit their perceptions of experiences that influenced their commitment to, and their pedagogical content knowledge of, STEM teaching and learning. The hermeneutic phenomenological interviews enabled the teachers to express their beliefs in their own words. Data analysis employed a theoretical framework that investigated teacher epistemology and knowledge in light of their experiences. Findings revealed a web of lifelong experiences unique to each individual, and evidential of the committed elementary scientist-teachers&rsquo; present day values, teaching epistemology, lifelong learning, and emotional and intellectual engagement. Scientist-teachers are individuals whose teaching and learning characteristics reflect those of scientists and engineers.</p><p> Evidence indicated that no single transformative learning experience resulted in those elementary teachers&rsquo; commitment to STEM teaching and learning, but recent professional development activities were influential. Formal K-16 STEM learning was not uniformly or positively influential to the teachers&rsquo; commitment to, or knowledge of, STEM.</p><p> Findings suggest that ongoing professional development for STEM teaching and learning can influence elementary teachers to become committed to actively teaching STEM. The Collaborative Conversations in STEM provided intellectual and emotional engagement that empowered the teachers to provide STEM teaching and learning for their students and their colleagues overcoming impediments encountered in a literacy-focused curriculum. Elementary teachers actively committed to teaching science and engineering can undergo further transformation and emerge as leaders.</p>

<p> This quantitative study of summer learning for Maine students in grades three through grades eight analyzed changes in academic achievement level in mathematics and reading that occurred during the summer recess of 2009. </p><p> For mathematics, it appeared that when school was not in session, students showed a cumulative loss of nearly 11 percent of a standard deviation. Although small, the change in performance over the summer was not uniform across all grades studied. For the youngest students in this study, the summer recess represented a time where children collectively lost nearly 40 percent of a standard deviation in mathematics. While gender did not show a statistically significant affect on a child&rsquo;s mathematics achievement over the summer, a child&rsquo;s socioeconomic status (SES) did. Taken cumulatively over the course of this study, high-SES children made a cumulative gain of just over one third of a performance level in mathematics as compared to their low-SES classmates. </p><p> For reading achievement, it appeared that when school was not in session, students showed a slight gain in reading of just about 2 percent of a standard deviation. Again the change was not uniform: children in the youngest grades of the study appeared to gain in achievement level during the summer, while the oldest children in this study lost nearly 32 percent of a standard deviation. Both gender and SES had a statistically significant impact on a child&rsquo;s summer learning. Over the five grade spans of this study, high-SES children gained nearly 25 percent of a performance level over their low-SES classmates while female students gained nearly 40 percent of an achievement level over their male classmates. </p><p> The patterns of learning exposed in this study for different categories of students during the summertime have meaningful implications for policymakers attempting to close the achievement gap. First, it suggests that efforts to close the achievement gap must include efforts to address out-of-school learning factors. Second, by including the summer learning in their calculations accountability measures that use an annual assessment to measure the effectiveness of teachers and schools at closing the achievement gap contain a substantial error.</p>

<p> Due to narrowly defined quality measures, teacher preparation in Montessori, Waldorf, Reggio and LifeWays pedagogies is not recognized in many state ECE professional development systems. The problem is compounded by Quality Rating and Improvement System&rsquo;s child care program ratings, which rely on teacher qualifications as a component of program ratings. Limitations, due to philosophical dissimilarities pertaining to the spirit of the child, ill-fitting measurements of quality, and policy exclusion make it difficult for alternative pedagogy communities to meet qualifications or to obtain scores that count. This is exacerbated by narrow definitions regarding national versus regional accreditation in teacher preparation programs. U</p><p> sing a transformative, mixed-methods approach, this study asks, &ldquo;What is the role and relevance of alternative pedagogy teacher preparation to the professional development system, and where does it fit in the current policy landscape nationwide?&rdquo; As a follow up question, the study seeks to answer, &ldquo;What is the process for change?&rdquo; Through the use of surveys, interviews, and a cultural context model, a way forward is mapped. </p><p> Registry policy makers in 28 states and 46 teacher preparation directors, across three types of alternative-pedagogy teacher preparation programs, assisted in data collection, resulting in a recognition baseline. Public sources were used to triangulate a composite snapshot of this national policy situation, demonstrating appropriate policy inclusion in six out of 17 states&rsquo; career pathways and/or data collection in ECE workforce registries. Cumulative data revealed alternative pedagogy teacher recognition levels across the country and revealed how relevant policies evolved to become system inclusive. The study concludes by inviting community representatives to respond and to share their experiences and thoughts. Actionable study outcomes, community-developed recommendations, and an advocacy map were circulated in three of four alternative pedagogy communities. </p><p> Using a cultural equity paradigm, the study elucidates power relationships between alternative pedagogy teacher preparation and national/state efforts towards ECE professional development and quality improvement policy systems, illuminating where federal and state policy/initiatives are shaping, responding to, and limiting the alternative-pedagogy teacher preparation pipeline in the United States. Recommended courses of action encourage policy collaboration and a cultural shift from policy power over, to power with policy.</p>

<p> This research paper presents existing literature on intrinsic motivation and applies it to teachers in an environment of high-stakes education reform efforts. It seeks to acknowledge that there has been an increase in level of external control placed on teachers in New York State, and to discuss potential impacts of these efforts on teachers&rsquo; intrinsic motivation according to Self-Determination Theory (SDT). This paper presents survey research designed to examine teachers&rsquo; perception of the impact education reform efforts have had on their role in various work tasks, related to the extent to which they perceive their needs for autonomy, competence, and relatedness are met at work. Confirmatory factor analysis and structural equation modeling was used to examine the relationships between participant responses and the theoretical variables at hand. T-tests, ANOVA, and Pearson&rsquo;s correlations were also examined to obtain a greater understanding of the variable relationships. The results of this research indicate that teachers have felt a negative impact on some of their teaching-related tasks; the SDT framework of autonomy, relatedness, and competence needs maintained integrity in this sample; autonomy-support was significantly related to perceived impact of high stakes education reform efforts. The implications of low intrinsic motivation among teachers on students and the educational environment, and implications for future reform efforts are discussed.</p>