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Description
ABSTRACT
Closing the achievement gap between low-income, marginalized, racially, and linguistically diverse students has proven difficult. Research has outlined the effects of funding on student achievement in a manner that focuses the attention on dollars expended, in order overcome barriers to learning. Arizona has long been recognized for its education funding disparity, and its inability to balance fiscal capacity in a manner that serves to improve educational outcomes.
This dissertation examines how Arizona funds its education system. It measures horizontal inequity in a robust manner by examining those fiscal capacity resources directly related to learning and poverty. Recognizing districts with higher concentrations of special needs students will impact fiscal capacity at the district level, this dissertation applies a non-linear analysis to measure how English language learners/ limited English proficient (ELL/ LEP) student proportionality impacts federal and state revenue per pupil, ELL expenditures per pupil, and total expenditures per pupil.
Using the Gini Ratio, McCloone Index, Coefficient of Variation, and Theil inequality index, this dissertation confirms that significant education funding disparity exists across Arizona’s school districts. This dissertation also shows the proportion of English language learners is negatively related to local revenue per pupil, and ELL expenditures per ELL pupil.
Arizona has characteristically funded the public education system inequitably and positioned its students in a manner that stratifies achievement gaps based on wealth. Targeted funding toward ELLs is in no way meaningfully related to the proportion of ELLs in a district. Conceptually the way in which equity is defined, and measured, may require re-evaluation, beyond correlated inputs and outputs. This conceptual re-evaluation of equity must include the decision making process of administrative leaders which influence the quality of those resources related to student learning.
Closing the achievement gap between low-income, marginalized, racially, and linguistically diverse students has proven difficult. Research has outlined the effects of funding on student achievement in a manner that focuses the attention on dollars expended, in order overcome barriers to learning. Arizona has long been recognized for its education funding disparity, and its inability to balance fiscal capacity in a manner that serves to improve educational outcomes.
This dissertation examines how Arizona funds its education system. It measures horizontal inequity in a robust manner by examining those fiscal capacity resources directly related to learning and poverty. Recognizing districts with higher concentrations of special needs students will impact fiscal capacity at the district level, this dissertation applies a non-linear analysis to measure how English language learners/ limited English proficient (ELL/ LEP) student proportionality impacts federal and state revenue per pupil, ELL expenditures per pupil, and total expenditures per pupil.
Using the Gini Ratio, McCloone Index, Coefficient of Variation, and Theil inequality index, this dissertation confirms that significant education funding disparity exists across Arizona’s school districts. This dissertation also shows the proportion of English language learners is negatively related to local revenue per pupil, and ELL expenditures per ELL pupil.
Arizona has characteristically funded the public education system inequitably and positioned its students in a manner that stratifies achievement gaps based on wealth. Targeted funding toward ELLs is in no way meaningfully related to the proportion of ELLs in a district. Conceptually the way in which equity is defined, and measured, may require re-evaluation, beyond correlated inputs and outputs. This conceptual re-evaluation of equity must include the decision making process of administrative leaders which influence the quality of those resources related to student learning.
ContributorsMartinez, David G (Author) / Pivovarova, Margarita (Thesis advisor) / Berliner, David C. (Thesis advisor) / Dorn, Sherman (Committee member) / Arizona State University (Publisher)
Created2018
Description
The purpose of this study was to determine how I, as a future teacher, can best combat inequities in technological access and fluency in my future classroom. In this study, I explored a range of literature on the role of technology in the classroom, the digital divide in home and school settings, and variance in digital literacy. Additional insight was gained through interviews and observing school faculty in three public school districts in the Phoenix Metropolitan Area. This provided a better understanding of local context in order to gain a sense of the national and local realities of the digital landscape as they relate to educational equity in the educational settings where I aim to serve as a certified teacher.
ContributorsJakubczyk, Nicole Marie (Author) / Foulger, Teresa (Thesis director) / Barnett, Juliet (Committee member) / Division of Teacher Preparation (Contributor) / Barrett, The Honors College (Contributor)
Created2017-05
Description
Institutions, including collegiate schools of music, tell stories about the ways in which they have transformed to include and support diverse students, but what do students say about their institution? Collegiate music students possess powerful and intimate knowledge, and their stories can reveal the lived reality of their experiences of equity and justice within the institution. The purpose of this study was to gain understanding of the ways in which music students experience equity and inequity within their school of music and to learn from them how their institution as a system impacts their experiences. The research puzzle comprised, in part, the following questions: In what ways do music students experience equity and inequity?; What institutionalized systems facilitate or hinder their sense of inclusion?; How do their stories bump up against the stories the institution tells itself about equity?To explore these questions, I engaged in a qualitative study grounded in narrative inquiry that placed the counterstories of music students in dialogue with the story of diversity and inclusion as told by their collegiate institution. Eight university music students who each self-identify as being from a marginalized group participated in conversations and ongoing dialogue with me. As this study was premised on promoting equity, participants collaborated in the writing and selection of their narratives.
Placing the students’ stories and the institution’s story of equity side by side highlighted the misalignment between the institution’s espoused values and the students’ experiences. The stories raised further questions, such as: How and when do students feel silenced or empowered to speak? What makes it possible for them to challenge an institution (or not)? How do students want faculty and administrators to engage with them? In what ways does their engagement in issues of equity and justice make them susceptible to risk, and what is the risk? Through narrative inquiry, I contribute a complex and nuanced understanding of how one institution, including its school of music, perpetuates oppressive practices, opening space for students who live these experiences to lead the interrogation of—and resistance within—this and similar places.
ContributorsAlekna, Mallory A (Author) / Schmidt, Margaret (Thesis advisor) / Stauffer, Sandra (Thesis advisor) / Lerman, Elizabeth (Committee member) / Thompson, Jason (Committee member) / Arizona State University (Publisher)
Created2021