This phenomenological study on experiential learning, specifically studying abroad, examined the evolution of education in the United States, including the rise of standardized testing and the increased focus on whole child and democratic teaching and learning. The participants found a positive correlation between their study abroad experience and…

The education of young people is a vital task in a democracy with significant implications for both for young people themselves and for the state. How authority over schooling should be shared and organized is, therefore, a vital question in a democracy. This dissertation takes on that question and ultimately defends a broadly democratic account…

In recent literature, K-12 public schooling is cited as a driver of a post-truth phenomenon referred to as truth decay. Truth decay is attributed as contributing to the rise of post-factual politics and the deterioration of civil discourse in the United States. The rise of post-factual politics and the deterioration of civil discourse is perceived…

In this dissertation, the researcher examined teachers' and students' discourses through a social constructionist framing of democratic education to understand how they disrupted or maintained traditional schooling discourses. Data were generated during four consecutive days of video and audio recording of teachers' and students' discourses. Other…

The relations between macro and micro democratic political socialization agents and youth civic participation were examined to foster understanding of the changing conceptualization of youth political socialization in modern society. Extant research on youth political socialization has failed to adequately examine the effects of broader political…

The purpose of this case study was to seek insight into the evolution of the Delran School District, within the New Jersey Public School Labor-Management Collaborative. The Labor-Management Collaborative brings together leaders from New Jersey School Boards Association (NJSBA), the New Jersey Education Association (NJEA), the American Federation…

The purpose of this qualitative study was to explore and describe the perceptions of participants of PeaceJam towards personal and collective power, service learning, social justice and democratic education as examined through participant observations, interviews, focus groups, artifacts, and documents of individuals engaging with the non-profit…

What should the core purpose of educational wind bands in the United States be? Many music students may not pursue the activity in college (or may not even play a band instrument again after their formal schooling). Musical and artistic values, however, can be applied in creative practice throughout one's life. This dissertation explores what it…

Philanthropy does not exist without democracy in civil society in America. Higher education is a major builder of a civil society. The central research question is: What do university presidents need to know about philanthropy to provide relational leadership supportive of the advancement of democracy in American civil society? The study…

This dissertation reviews current policies regarding Teacher Preparation Program (TPP) evaluation and addresses "accountability era" influences which often minimize factors related to equity and promote a limited view of teacher and school "effectiveness." Integrated concept mapping is proposed as an alternative method of…

Presidents exercise influence over policy discussion and options in America by the frequency and language they use to describe the current conditions, the perceived problems, and the solutions. The ability for presidents to articulate problems and solutions assumes an underlying purpose exists. This study examines how presidents frame the policy…

Through the use of the Program for International Student Assessment's (PISA) Global Competence results, the Economic Intelligence Unit's (EIU) Democracy Index ratings, and centralization-decentralization spectrum rubrics, this dissertation shows the association between level of democracy and education system, and the association of these variables…

Human resource development (HRD) is no longer about simply acquiring the skills needed to perform a task and is now a tool which can shape society and the ways in which we interact with one another. At the forefront of this transition are new ways of imagining HRD, including critical human resource development (CHRD) and critical management…

Historically, social studies teaching (and teacher education) discourses have focused on the cognitive registers, both in how teachers teach--their inquiries, objectives, and aims--and in how social studies teaching lives are imagined to be lived (and felt). This study departs from these discourses to focus on the affective registers, aiming to…

This dissertation examines what professional organizations, specifically the American Teachers Association (ATA) and the National Education Association (NEA), communicated with their members about participatory democracy in the Civil Rights Era, 1954-1968. Major publications of the ATA and the NEA as well as archival records of the NEA-ATA Joint…