The Local Education Development Fund was established by the Kaohsiung City Government according to the Compilation and Administration of Education Expenditures Act in 2003 and was operated as affiliated unit budget. Affiliated unit budget, which has the autonomy of distribution and flexibility of the execution, tallying with school-based management which are influenced by the educational reform trend, therefore was generally approved by educational administrators. However, according to the research¡¦s analysis, there was no significance on the encouragement of raising funds and there was difference between deposition of the accumulated surplus into the normal cost and the general financial concept. What kind of system on earth is the implementation of Kaohsiung Local Education Development Fund at the school managers, the principals¡¦ points of view? Furthermore, are their opinions changing with time? Has the affiliated unit budget exerted any influence on school management¡HHow can the merits of the affiliated unit budget be used to coping with the shortening of educational budgets after the combining of Kaohsiung City and Kaohsiung County and to exalt the spirit of school-based management and to promote civils¡¦ education. These are issues worth those people¡¦s discussion who care about civils¡¦ education and these are also the concerns of the research. The research adopted nature research and grounded theory to interview seven principals in primary schools and junior high schools in Kaohsiung City. The research explored interviewees¡¦ cognitions and opinions on Local Education Development Fund and their strategies and measures based on their experiences, and inquired the influence of Local Education Development Fund (which is based on affiliated unit budget), on school managements by means of Atlas.ti techniques. According to the research¡¦ analysis, though Kaohsiung Local Education Development Fund possesses the meaning of school-based budgeting. The practice can help the municipal avoid invest excessive capital in schools which has surplus of budget with the aid of controlling the cumulation on surplus budgets. Furthermore, in the interaction of administrative departments, there are strategic changes in financial execution which are less related to the types of budgeting, but more related to School Budget Evaluation implemented by the Educational Bureau. Besides, the budgeting has little effect on encouragements to increasing income and decreasing expenditure but enlarges gaps among schools and causes disadvantages to remote small schools. To sum up, the distribution of educational budget is more important than budgeting.

The purposes of this study, through the researcher¡¦s action research, explore the topics including the concept of the principal¡¦s curriculum leadership, the correlative factors that affect the principal¡¦s curriculum leadership, and how to advance curriculum leadership in nine-year coherence curriculum. The research methods are interview, secondarily document analysis, and participant observation to investigate and analyze the problems and the solution of the problems on curriculum leadership of the junior high school principal. Be based on the results, the conclusions of the study are as follows : ¢¹. The concept of the junior high school principal 1. The ideas of the principal¡¦s student-based curriculum leadership affect the courses of school curriculum development. 2. Unite the principal¡¦s curriculum leadership with the activities on teachers¡¦ professional growth. 3. Adopt expedient leadership to promote the effect in the principal¡¦s curriculum leadership ¢º. The factors that affect the researcher¡¦s curriculum leadership According to the situation at our school, the principal¡¦s curriculum leadership is affected by some factors, for example, the principal, teachers, the organization, the chief of the education administration agency, and community ; however the factors show various influential degree. ¢». How does the researcher advance curriculum leadership in nine-year coherence curriculum 1. The researcher¡¦s curriculum leadership has four stages ¡V organization, design, implementation, and feedback to develop school-based curriculum. 2. School vision should be formed by the democratized mechanism, and fused into curriculum design. 3. Hold teaching demonstration to promote teachers¡¦ teaching effectiveness to be beneficial to develop the principal¡¦s curriculum leadership. 4. Investigating and developing the objective curriculum evaluation system is the theme that requires efforts in our school principal¡¦s curriculum leadership. 5. Associating community resources to establish the connection of coexistence and mutual benefit between community and the school is the problem that has to be faced fearlessly to principal¡¦s curriculum leadership. Finally according to the conclusion, the study takes one step ahead to propose some suggestions separatly focusing on the general junior high school principal, the education administation organizations, and the latter researches in the future.

Thesis (M.Ed.), Memorial University of Newfoundland, 2000. / Includes bibliographical references.

Most school based initiatives are not implemented long-term and do not reach sustainability (McDermott, 2000; Mirel, 1994; Rice & Malen, 2003). Schools are implementing School-Wide Positive Behavior Support (SWPBS) as an initiative to target social emotional development and behavior. Schools that have implemented SWPBS have experienced decreases in rate of Office Discipline Referrals (ODR), In-School Suspension (ISS) and Out-of-School Suspension (OSS) (e.g. Bohanon et al., 2006; Childs et al., 2009; Lassen et al., 2006). Research has also shown that schools that implement with a higher degree of fidelity have better outcomes (Childs et al., 2009; Florida's Positive Behavior Support Project, 2009). However, it is not known what mediating factor(s) assist with schools with implementation of Tier 1 PBS at a higher degree of fidelity. This study examined action plans that schools developed during their initial training of Tier 1 PBS, to determine if the action plans are one of the possible mediating factor(s). There are differences between the quality of action plans developed by schools implementing with a higher degree of fidelity compared to schools implementing with a lower degree of fidelity. Based on a path analysis, the action plans are not a mediating factor between fidelity of implementation and student outcomes (i.e. office discipline referrals, In-School Suspension, and Out-of-School Suspension).

Prevent-Teach-Reinforce (PTR) is a collaborative, standardized process that was developed as a way to address identified barriers to completing effective functional behavior assessments (FBAs) in public schools. Current research literature documents the effectiveness of the PTR process in decreasing problematic behaviors and increasing social skills and academic engaged time for students in kindergarten through 8th grade. In addition, PTR demonstrates high acceptability by school personnel implementing the process. While PTR has demonstrated success in schools, questions still exist regarding variables that impact the effectiveness of this process. Therefore, the current study investigated the moderating effect of prior teacher training in managing challenging behavior on the effectiveness of the Prevent-Teach-Reinforce (PTR) process. Data regarding students' social skills, behavior problems, and academic engagement were analyzed through a series of mixed factorial analyses in order to determine the effectiveness of the PTR process. Results indicate that teachers' previous preparation in dealing with behavioral problems did not moderate the effectiveness of PTR, thus indicating that the process is equally beneficial to all teachers. However, time and the implementation of PTR were found to be significant in altering trends in student outcomes. Academic engaged time was found to be significantly altered more frequently than social skills or behavior problems. Implications of the findings for using the PTR process to address problematic student behavior in schools are discussed.

The deleterious manifold of juvenile delinquency for victims, offenders, and the general public necessitate effective prevention strategies. Researchers have asserted that one of the most effective ways in which delinquency is prevented is through school-based intervention. Specifically, much attention has been given to identifying the most efficacious evidence-based treatments (EBTs) through an evidence-based practice (EBP) approach. Critics, however, argue that several limitations exist in the EBP process and suggest that a practice-based evidence (PBE) approach may be more sufficient to meet the needs of youth who are at-risk of delinquency. Guided by the Social Development Model, it is broadly the aim of this three-article dissertation to explore the most effective school-based delinquency prevention approaches. Drawing from the EBP approach, the first article mimics a process that practitioners are encouraged to employ. Multiple EBT websites were systematically searched for the most efficacious school-based delinquency prevention interventions. Four interventions met inclusion criteria. These interventions highlighted both strengths and limitations. Out of the limitations from the first article, the second article investigated the extent to which a PBE approach may be an alternative option for youth most at-risk of a delinquent trajectory: being male, from a lower socioeconomic urban community, and primarily minority youth. The article offers the results of a pretest/posttest design with a sustaining school-based intervention that was developed by social workers. The final article reports on the results of a randomized controlled trial that investigated the effectiveness of the first year of the XY-Zone on protective factors among youth at-risk for delinquency. The second and third article revealed promising results and provide preliminary evidence for important next steps. Additional research, with a longitudinal design and larger sample size, is needed. This dissertation suggests that both approaches can inform the other. As globalization and advanced resources continue to springboard awareness of both the problems and solutions to delinquency prevention in schools, it is likely that advancements in the EBP and PBE approaches will give way to the ever-debated research and practice gap growing much nearer than ever before. / text

published_or_final_version / Politics and Public Administration / Master / Master of Public Administration

This study examined the effectiveness of a school-based intervention process known as Prevent-Teach-Reinforce for children with a combination of externalizing and internalizing behaviors compared to children with only externalizing behaviors. The dependent variables examined were social skills, problem behaviors, and academic engaged time. Data for the current study were taken from archival data collected by the Florida Mental Health Institute that included students in kindergarten through 8th grade. A series of repeated-measures analysis of variance (ANOVA) was used to identify differences in improvement on the dependent variables for the two groups of students. Research questions focused on the main effects as well as interaction effects between the type(s) of behavioral problems displayed (i.e., externalizing only, combination of externalizing and internalizing). Behavior problem classification was determined by calculating students' individual subscale scores on the Social Skills Rating Scale. The current study found support for the use of the Prevent-Teach-Reinforce intervention for children with varying behavioral profiles. Significant improvements were found in social skills, behavioral problems, and academic engaged time for students. Additionally, results of this study indicate that internalizing behaviors did not serve as a moderator to treatment effectiveness for students with externalizing behavior problems who received the PTR intervention. That is, improvements were similar for both groups, demonstrating that PTR is a process that can be used in an equally-effective way for both populations.

published_or_final_version / Education / Master / Master of Education

published_or_final_version / Public Administration / Master / Master of Public Administration