Children from low-income families face many social and economic disadvantages, and high-quality preschool can help to alleviate some of them. Is "preschool for all" the best way to extend preschool subsidies to unserved disadvantaged children? Fully funding such a policy would be costly, and it is likely that a significant minority of…

The purpose of this hermeneutical phenomenological study was to understand the experiences of diversity and ethical principles in educational leadership for teachers, administrators, and classified licensed professionals within minority school districts. Downton's (2016) theory on transformational leadership guided this study's theoretical…

E-learning can be particularly challenging for emergent bilingual students or English learners (ELs). Emergent bilingual students rely on readily accessible supports in the classroom such as body language, word walls, gestures, and collaborative work with a partner or group (August et al., 2014). Face-to-face exchanges are critical for these…

Efforts to bridge educational achievement gaps and address inequities remain a central challenge across the United States. The multitiered system of supports has emerged as a prominent intervention framework with which to equip educators for this task. Given its growing adoption across school districts, a deeper understanding of teacher…

Mathematics teaching usually occurs in a "public space"--e.g., a classroom is a public space with rules defining student and teacher roles that cultivate hierarchic relationships. Working in prison with young inmates (18-23 years old) from marginalized populations, we promoted alternative "common spaces" (physical and symbolic)…

Elite colleges are boasting unprecedented numbers with respect to diversity, with some schools admitting their first majority-minority classes. But when the twin pandemics of COVID-19 and racial unrest gripped the world, schools scrambled to figure out what to do with the diversity they so fervently recruited. And disadvantaged students suffered.…

Over the last 25 years, cultural competence education has gained prominence in various helping professions (Kaihlanen et al., 2019; Shepherd et al., 2019; Stubbe, 2020). Interestingly, there are opposing perspectives regarding whether cultural competence training is necessary and/or relevant in such fields. Examples of such divisions are captured…

This dissertation examined educational inequities exacerbated by disparities in technology and internet access in Title I schools. The global influence of information communication technologies on educational delivery, especially during the COVID-19 pandemic, has highlighted critical issues in technology access. The shift to remote learning…

Public policies targeting individuals based on need often impose disproportionate burden on communities that lack the resources to implement these policies effectively. In an elementary school setting, I examine whether community-level interventions focusing on similar needs and providing resources to build capacity in these communities could…

In this article, we report on a study that explored how young people in Scotland understand and define peace. A total of 59 young people aged 12-18, from three schools (independent, state Roman Catholic, and state non-denominational) participated in this study. The young people were asked to participate in a peace data walk and, after that, to…

The COVID-19 pandemic of 2020-2021 was a life altering phenomenon for educators across the United States. Schools and teachers had to transform their teaching practices practically overnight. Education in most schools across the country conducted distance learning in some capacity. A demographic group that was affected was economically…

Grade placement of newcomer immigrants into U.S. High schools continues to challenge many educators. This becomes even more significant when newcomer immigrants come from countries where education systems are different; or in some cases, their educational development is completely disrupted. Also, curriculum analyses have suggested math concepts…

Background/Context: The "college-for-all" movement has guided education reform efforts over the last few decades. Of college-for-all adopters, the "no-excuses" charter school model is arguably the most successful and controversial. Schools that use this model produce high standardized test scores and four-year college…

The need for a new measure of social-emotional wellbeing for children 6--12 years emerged in our collaboration with schools and community agencies in a disadvantaged region of Brisbane, Australia. Our search for an age-appropriate medium led us to develop "Clowning Around", a computer game generating data which was assessed for validity…

In this dissertation, the researcher examined the effective implementation of Tier I strategies at One Team Central School District within the broader framework of Response to Intervention (RTI) and Multi-tiered System of Support (MTSS), addressing the urgent issue of Tier 1 instructional quality, particularly targeted at economically…