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- All Subjects: Educational leadership
- All Subjects: gay
- Creators: Beardsley, Audrey
Description
Given the current focus on high-stakes accountability in America's public schools, this study examined teacher evaluation specific to physical education. This study revealed current teacher evaluation practices used in physical education, perceptions of school administrators related to the value of the physical education evaluation process, and the perceptions of the physical education teachers related to the value of the evaluation process. The first phase of this study was an interpretive document analysis study conducted on four separate teacher evaluation systems commonly used within the public school system to evaluate physical education teachers. Those four systems were: Marzanos teacher evaluation model, Danielson framework for teaching (FFT), Rewarding Excellence in Instruction and Leadership (REIL), and Teacher Advancement Program (TAP). A separate evaluation instrument specific to physical education created by the National Association of Sport and Physical Education (NASPE) was used as a comparative evaluation tool. Evidence suggests that two of the four teacher evaluation systems had a high percentage of alignment with the NASPE instrument (TAP 87.5%, FFT 82.5%). The Marzano teacher evaluation model had the least amount of alignment with the NASPE instrument (62.5%). The second phase of this study was a phenomenological approach to understanding administrators' and physical education teachers' perceptions to teacher evaluation specific to physical education. The participants in this study were administrators and physical education teachers from an urban school district. An informal survey and formal semi-structured interviews were used to reveal perceptions of teacher evaluation specific to physical education. Evidence from the administrator's informal survey and formal semi-structured interviews revealed four common themes: (1) "I value PE, but I live in reality" (administrators value physical education, but practice in reality); (2) "good teaching is good teaching"; (3) "I know my limitations, and I want
eed help" (relative to teacher evaluation in PE); and (4) where's the training beef? Evidence from the physical education teacher's informal survey and formal semi-structured interviews revealed three common themes: (a) physical education is valued, but not prioritized; (b) teacher evaluation in physical education is "greatly needed, yet not transparent; (c) physical educators are not confident in their evaluator.
eed help" (relative to teacher evaluation in PE); and (4) where's the training beef? Evidence from the physical education teacher's informal survey and formal semi-structured interviews revealed three common themes: (a) physical education is valued, but not prioritized; (b) teacher evaluation in physical education is "greatly needed, yet not transparent; (c) physical educators are not confident in their evaluator.
ContributorsNorris, Jason (Author) / Van Der Mars, Hans (Thesis advisor) / Beardsley, Audrey (Thesis advisor) / Kulinna, Pamela (Committee member) / Arizona State University (Publisher)
Created2014
Description
The experiences of lesbian and gay (LG) administrators in school and district-level positions are different than their heterosexual counterparts, not just because their social lenses are different, but because the policies and climates of the communities where they work has a significant impact on their relationships with stakeholder groups in the schools/offices. In this qualitative study I document and analyze the stories of LG educators, how they navigate their professional relationships, how they evolve as leaders, and their understanding of how their choices to be out or not have influenced their careers and professional relationships. The study also explores how performativity and sexuality relate to the professional relationships of the participants. Finally, the leaders' stories provide insight into the experiences of marginalized groups of professionals whose stories are often absent from the professional and research literatures on school administration. These eight school and district administrators live in the Southwestern and Northwest, many of them are out at work and a few are not. They range in age from mid-20s to late 50s, and their experiences as educational leaders spans from just one year to over 25 years. The participants sat for two to three interviews each over the course of approximately four months. The names of the participants, institutions, and specific communities have been changed to maintain confidentiality. I found that all the participants' relationships with stakeholders groups and individuals were impacted to varying degrees by fear - specifically the fear that results from the heteronormative rules, biases, and expectations of the public school system. The heteronormativity of the public education system is often a reflection of its community's belief system, as well as a reflection of the larger, more unconscious heteronormative belief system that shapes schools and educational leadership, a leader's professional capacity, and the relationships that are critical to being an effective leader. Essentially, the heteronormative fear reflected in the policies and practices of a community, an educational institution, and its members has a dramatic effect on the decisions and relationships that educational leaders have with key stakeholder groups on both an unconscious and conscious level.
ContributorsAnderson, Shannon (Author) / Powers, Jeanne (Thesis advisor) / Fischman, Gustavo (Thesis advisor) / Carlson, David Lee (Committee member) / Arizona State University (Publisher)
Created2014
Description
This research is a reversal of the traditional concept of the student-teaching research experiment. Instead of studying the clear and stated goal of an apprenticeship, that of a pupil learning from the tutelage of a master, the focus here is on what a mentor-teacher learns from a student-teacher. During the act of teaching a novice, what can a mentor-teacher learn about her own practice, while demonstrating it to a pre-service teacher? Using the conceptual framework of the National Board for Professional Teaching Standards' Architecture of Accomplished Teaching, and using it within a framework centered around cognitive coaching and reciprocal mentoring, this action research study implemented an intervention that called for series of five cognitive coaching cycles between a mentor- and student-teacher designed to foster dialogue and reflection between them. The ultimate aim of this case study was to help determine what a mentor-teacher learned about her own practice as a result of mentoring a student-teacher. Qualitative data were collected over sixteen weeks in a charter high school. Five findings were identified created after the data were analyzed using a grounded theory approach, and four conclusions were drawn about the intervention's role in the mentor-teacher's reciprocal learning.
ContributorsMcCloy, Daniel (Author) / Beardsley, Audrey (Thesis advisor) / Serafini, Frank (Committee member) / Roen, Duane (Committee member) / Arizona State University (Publisher)
Created2011
Description
ABSTRACT
This dissertation addresses the question of how participation in an arts-based sojourn influences university instructors’ perspectives and understanding as related to working with international female Muslim students (FMS). It also addresses what participation in a social justice oriented arts-based inquiry reveals about transformation of perspectives and practices of FMS in instructors’ long-term trajectories. Social justice oriented arts-based inquiry is a powerful tool to unearth issues and challenges associated with creating and sustaining equitable practices in the classroom. This type of inquiry provided instructor-participants with a platform that facilitated their use of “equity lenses” to examine and reflect on external phenomena which may influence their classroom practices as related to FMS. Participation in the art-based sojourn facilitated multiple opportunities for the instructor-participants to reflect critically on their practices, understanding, and perspectives of FMS. This study revealed that the most significant shifts in understanding and perspectives about FMS followed from long-term events and moments in the instructor-participants’ teaching careers.
This dissertation addresses the question of how participation in an arts-based sojourn influences university instructors’ perspectives and understanding as related to working with international female Muslim students (FMS). It also addresses what participation in a social justice oriented arts-based inquiry reveals about transformation of perspectives and practices of FMS in instructors’ long-term trajectories. Social justice oriented arts-based inquiry is a powerful tool to unearth issues and challenges associated with creating and sustaining equitable practices in the classroom. This type of inquiry provided instructor-participants with a platform that facilitated their use of “equity lenses” to examine and reflect on external phenomena which may influence their classroom practices as related to FMS. Participation in the art-based sojourn facilitated multiple opportunities for the instructor-participants to reflect critically on their practices, understanding, and perspectives of FMS. This study revealed that the most significant shifts in understanding and perspectives about FMS followed from long-term events and moments in the instructor-participants’ teaching careers.
ContributorsHahne, Connie (Author) / Jordan, Michelle (Thesis advisor) / Carlson, David Lee (Thesis advisor) / Dixon, Shane (Committee member) / Arizona State University (Publisher)
Created2017
Description
ABSTRACT There are currently 82,369 teachers nationwide who are National Board Certified Teachers (NBCTs). In Arizona the number of NBCTs is 678. The purpose of this study was to investigate the effect cognitive coaching conversations and participation in a community of practice had on National Board candidates' self-efficacy and their understanding of the National Board Professional Teaching Standards (NBPTS). A mixed methods research approach was used to collect data including: surveys, interviews, researcher observations, and cognitive coaching transcripts. I conducted a case study of five National Board candidates at my school. Drawing on the social cognitive theory, this study was framed by the construct of self-efficacy. Through the use of open-ended questions, cognitive coaching conversations pushed candidates' thinking to a deeper level of understanding. The teachers involved in the National Board certification process represented a community of practice as the expectations and language of the NBPTS standards and portfolio directions also provided a common connection. Findings in this study reveal that cognitive coaching conversations and membership in a community of practice have a positive impact on teachers' self-efficacy during the National Board certification process. In addition, on-going cognitive coaching conversations and participation in a community of practice positively impact National Board candidates' understanding and articulation of the NBPTS standards.
ContributorsRobinson, Jennifer M (Author) / Beardsley, Audrey (Thesis advisor) / Serafini, Frank (Committee member) / Surbeck, Elaine (Committee member) / Arizona State University (Publisher)
Created2011
Description
It is commonly accepted that undergraduate degree attainment rates must improve if postsecondary educational institutions are to meet macroeconomic demands. Involvement in co-curricular activities, such as student clubs and organizations, has been shown to increase students' satisfaction with their college experience and the rates by which they might persist. Yet, strategies that college administrators, faculties, and peer leaders may employ to effectively promote co-curricular engagement opportunities to students are not well developed. In turn, I created the Sky Leaders program, a retention-focused intervention designed to promote commuter student involvement in academically-purposeful activities via faculty- and peer-lead mentoring experiences. Working from an interpretivist research paradigm, this quasi-experimental mixed methods action research study was intended to measure the intervention's impact on participants' re-enrollment and reported engagement rates, as well as the effectiveness of its conceptual and logistical aspects. I used enrollment, survey, interview, observation, and focus group data collection instruments to accommodate an integrated data procurement process, which allowed for the consideration of several perspectives related to the same research questions. I analyzed all of the quantitative data captured from the enrollment and survey instruments using descriptive and inferential statistics to explore statistically and practically significant differences between participant groups. As a result, I identified one significant finding that had a perceived positive effect. Expressly, I found the difference between treatment and control participants' reported levels of engagement within co-curricular activities to be statistically and practically significant. Additionally, consistent with Glaser and Strauss' grounded theory approach, I employed open, axial, and selective coding procedures to analyze all of the qualitative data obtained via open-ended survey items, as well as interview, observation, and focus group instruments. After I reviewed and examined the qualitative data corpus, I constructed six themes reflective of the participants' programmatic experiences as well as conceptual and logistical features of the intervention. In doing so, I found that faculty, staff, and peer leaders may efficaciously serve in specific mentoring roles to promote co-curricular engagement opportunities and advance students' institutional academic and social integration, thereby effectively curbing their potential college departure decisions, which often arise out of mal-integrative experiences.
ContributorsSebold, Brent (Author) / Beardsley, Audrey (Thesis advisor) / Serafini, Frank (Committee member) / Wharton, Christopher (Christopher Mack), 1977- (Committee member) / Arizona State University (Publisher)
Created2011
Description
When discussing gay literature in the French, contemporary sphere, one of the most up
and coming and prominent authors is Édouard Louis. His works’ focus on the realism and
violence of the working class offers a critical and necessary perspective of the gay experience in
modern-day France. While recent in their creation, Louis’ works follow a connecting thread that
is inseparable from other autofiction novels that have a narrator with same sex attractions such as
Annie Ernaux’s Ce qu’ils disent or rien and Didier Eribon’s Retour à Reims. Often commonly
discussed as French LGBT literature, these autofictional works that extend from Gide to Eribon
to now Louis demonstrate how the proposed societal dualities, limitations, and hierarchies
described by philosophers like Michel Foucault and Judith Butler affect homosexual
performativity. Louis’ first novel En finir avec Eddy Bellegueule, published on January 2, 2014,
offers another illustration of this analysis. It specifically describes the metaphysical
(metaphysical being the relationship between the outer stimuli and internal perspective) effects
and constraints of current poverty on homosexual performativity. By analyzing En finir avec
Eddy Bellegueule through this theoretical framework of power and poverty, this thesis adds a
theoretical and intersectional nuance to the narrative voice that current literature focusing on the
novel’s landscape mentions but does not reflect on. I argue that it is important to attach an
autofictional timeline that is necessary to promote and apply future ontological doctrines to this
genre.
ContributorsYanez, Mariano (Author) / Canovas, Frédéric (Thesis director) / Agruss, David (Committee member) / School of International Letters and Cultures (Contributor, Contributor, Contributor, Contributor) / Dean, The College of Liberal Arts and Sciences (Contributor) / Barrett, The Honors College (Contributor)
Created2021-05
Description
For more than 30 years, social science researchers have studied how students in online learning environments interact with each other. This has led to the development of a construct called social presence. Studies have shown that high social presence can lead to improved student retention, engagement, and satisfaction. The literature explores how social presence has been measured by faculty or researchers, but lacks insight on how other university staff can affect social presence in online graduate students. This is an action research mixed-methods study conducted by an academic advisor and attempts to measure social presence through a webpage intervention for an online graduate business program. A pre-and-posttest were conducted in a five month span, as well as semi-structured interviews with students of the program. Results suggest that overall, the intervention did not increase social presence in the program. It also suggests that social presence is developed between students in a variety of ways, and can even be developed between their academic advisor and themselves. Overall, this study acknowledges how academic advisors can explore social presence to improve academic advising techniques and interventions for their programs, while also adding to the literature a different perspective through the eyes of a university staff member.
ContributorsDelgado, Gina Michelle (Author) / Chen, Ying-Chih (Thesis advisor) / Beardsley, Audrey (Committee member) / Tu, Chih-Hsiung (Committee member) / Arizona State University (Publisher)
Created2020
Description
Data use in higher education continues to increase as college and university leaders aim to meet accreditor and governmental expectations to use data to improve student outcomes. However, the steady increase in data use over the past decades has not been accompanied by an increase in employee data literacy in order for employees to use the data effectively. Further, inequitable student outcomes continue to persist in higher education, and more specifically at two-year community colleges, as potentially exacerbated by a lack of employee equity-mindedness. These concurrent problems—inadequate employee data literacy and persistent inequitable student outcomes—provide an opportunity to address both with one intervention. In this critical race, mixed-methods, action research study, I piloted an online professional development course, aimed at community college employees with the purpose to build data literacy and equity-mindedness. I used Bandura’s (1989) Social Cognitive Theory as a guiding theoretical framework paired with a quasi-experimental, delayed-start research design to study the effectiveness of the course in building employee data literacy and equity-mindedness, in addition to better understanding the impacts of environmental factors (i.e., organizational culture) on the implementation of the course. Using pre- and post-intervention surveys, pre- and post-intervention knowledge assessments, and post-intervention participant interviews, I determined that the professional development course contributed to improvements in employee data literacy and equity-mindedness. In particular, the course helped increase employee self-efficacy for data use, increased employee knowledge of data use and equity-mindedness, and increased employee intent to use data in the future. I also found that the organization’s culture related to data and equity to be complex and evolving, both hindering and facilitating data use, in general, and data use specifically, to address inequitable student outcomes.
ContributorsMitchell, Dennis Shane (Author) / Beardsley, Audrey (Thesis advisor) / Ott, Molly (Committee member) / Jacobsen, Craig (Committee member) / Arizona State University (Publisher)
Created2022
Description
With increasing costs of higher education, community college pathways to baccalaureate transfer degrees are attractive student alternatives to starting at a traditional four-year institution. However, disparate student outcomes, particularly for underserved student populations, continue to be a concern when considering equitable four-year degree completion rates. Previous literature demonstrates that student satisfaction and student informational capital play key roles in the success of community college transfer students to persist to four-year institutions and attain their educational and career goals. The role of academic advising in the transfer context provides a uniquely collaborative opportunity to address factors of success and student outcomes. Via this mixed methods action research study, I utilized archival student enrollment data, a student survey, and student and advisor interviews to examine an academic advising model that I created in partnership between Cochise Community College and the University of Arizona (i.e., the Colaborativo Advising for Transfer Success Model, or CATS Advising Model), whereby I assigned a singular academic advisor (i.e., a CATS advisor) a student caseload across the two institutions in a deliberate effort to facilitate successful transfer. I used a combined framework of the Model of Student Departure, Transfer Student Capital, and Appreciative Inquiry to inform the advising intervention. I found that students who received the advising intervention were significantly more likely to a) be satisfied with their transfer advising experience, b) perceive increased transfer knowledge (capital), and c) retain through transfer and university enrollment, in comparison to their peers who received advising via a more traditional transfer advising model. Importantly, the students experiencing the advising intervention were also able to articulate their appreciation and recognition of the impact of their relationship with the CATS advisors on their transfer success.
ContributorsWieland, Sarah (Author) / Beardsley, Audrey (Thesis advisor) / Smith, Stephanie (Committee member) / Urquídez, Kasandra (Committee member) / Arizona State University (Publisher)
Created2022