Head Start is a federal program that has provided comprehensive early childhood development services to low-income children and their families since 1965. The comprehensive nature of the program includes educational, health, nutritional, and social services. These services are intended to prepare children to enter kindergarten and to improve the…

Research in the out-of-school time (OST) field confirms a strong connection between professional development for staff and positive experiences and outcomes for youth. In recent years, the OST community has invested significant time and money into researching, creating, implementing, and evaluating professional development activities for OST…

This study examines one professional development program, The Next Educational Wave ("NEW") Teachers' Collaborative, and its effect on a self-selected group of five first-year teachers. Unlike standard induction programs based on traditional professional development models, the "NEW" program assumes that beginning teachers, like more established…

Throughout the United States school systems are aware of the teacher shortage. The projected need to fill 2.2 million positions by 2010 will increase throughout the educational field, especially in areas of high poverty schools and particular content areas. Therefore, it is crucial to provide the best type of mentoring program to retain the best…

This study looked at the relationship of an enabling school structure and mindfulness toward teacher empowerment. An enabling school structure is the perception in which leadership fosters collaboration, innovation, and trust among participants. Its rules and procedures are flexible and promote problem-solving (Hoy & Sweetland, 2000, 2001).…

"Teachers Teaching Teachers" ("T3") focuses on coaches' role in the professional development of teachers, exploring challenges and rewards that teacher leaders encounter. This issue includes: (1) Call to Action: Landmark Study on Professional Learning Calls to Teacher Leaders (Joellen Killion); (2) Tools: Hone Your Understanding of Effective…

Many school districts and alternative certification programs use standardized interviews such as the TeacherInsight developed by the Gallup Organization. The TeacherInsight is a Web-based interview consisting of multiple choice and Likert-style items that produces a score between 0 and 100. The Gallup Organization claims that it helps hire the…

What advice do paraeducators offer regarding the work they do in inclusive classrooms? What barriers and benefits do paraeducators face? In this study, over 200 paraeducators from 38 different states in the USA volunteered to respond to a national survey. Their responses were corroborated in follow-up interviews with 27 different paraeducators at…

High school students spend much of their educational journeys immersed in "old" literacies of paper, pencil, and print books. But outside of the classroom, they are exposed to information and communication technologies--such as blogs, wikis, Internet browsers, multimedia, social networking sites, and a wide range of software--each of which demand…

Using a Web-based survey, this study examined youth workers' professional development participation, preferences, and levels of agency support and the relationships between these variables and youth worker characteristics. Results revealed a positive relationship between participation in professional development opportunities and youth workers'…

This study explores elementary teachers' social understandings and employment of directives and politeness while facilitating inquiry science lessons prior and subsequent to their participation in a summer institute in which they were introduced to the scholarly literature on regulative discourse (directives used by teachers to regulate student…

The goal orientation theory of motivation posits sets of beliefs people hold regarding their goals. The 2 x 2 model of goal orientations has received almost no attention in the domain of educational leadership. The present researchers used a confirmatory factor analysis to test a measure based on the hypothesized 2 x 2 model in educational…

In this paper, we compare teacher and administrator perspectives on multiple dimensions of teacher professionalism. An instrument with a total of 51 professional behaviors and characteristics that operationalize the multiple dimensions of professionalism was developed. Survey participants, including 216 teachers and 89 administrators, were asked…

The Interstate New Teachers Assessment and Support Consortium (INTASC) was created to provide instructional support to new teachers and raise the level of learning in U. S. classrooms. To reach this goal, INTASC created 10 standards. This article reviews each INTASC standard and aligns each with a classroom activity that can be used to help meet…

This paper explores the nature of a critical friendship between two education advisers within a nation-wide New Zealand Ministry of Education (MOE, 2006-2008) research and development project. Over 18 months the relationship developed through evolving phases. This paper identifies and discusses the factors, circumstances, conditions and analytical…