This study examined homophobic name-calling among 2,161 middle school students in the US and found that those who had experienced homophobic name-calling fared significantly worse than those who had never experienced it, regardless of whether they were called names by rivals, strangers, or friends. While this study also found evidence that the…

Unlike many types of educational crises, the COVID-19 pandemic was a crisis leaders could not have prepared for. But research is only starting to examine how leaders' responses and organisational context have played a role. This mixed-methods study accordingly examines how leaders have mitigated challenges presented by the COVID-19 pandemic, and…

This is a qualitative action research study that examines teacher perceptions of behaviors that foster caring teacher-student relationships that motivate students to learn. The purpose of this research was to examine the range of teacher behaviors that either promoting caring teacher-student relationships or which behaviors are disrupting such…

As schools strive to instill college and career readiness within students, the academic success of students continues to be a priority of educators and administrators alike. The classroom learning environment utilized by students was examined throughout this study. Specifically, this study examined how the spaces within the classroom are utilized…

Limited research attention has been devoted to disparate vulnerabilities to social-ecological risk factors and how these may explain group differences in bullying by race. To address this gap, the present study used data of early adolescent respondents (M[subscript age] = 11.2 years) from 36 public middle schools (N = 2701) to assess the nexus of…

The enactment of Senate Bill 100/Public Act 099-0456 (SB100) in 2016 compelled school districts throughout Illinois to evaluate student discipline policies. This dissertation examines the impact SB100 had on middle and high schools throughout the state and within a large suburban K-12 school district. This dissertation is organized into three…

Teachers' efforts to manage classroom social dynamics are associated with students' social and academic adjustment, but the determinants of teachers' use of social dynamics management strategies have remained unexplored. Multiple potential determinants of strategy use were examined in a study of 164 teachers and their 2986 students in 164 1st,…

The Illinois State Board of Education (ISBE) updates its Comprehensive Strategic Plan for Elementary and Secondary Education each year, as required by Public Act 93-1036 (the Education Reform and Accountability Act of 2004). This annual "Strategic Plan Progress Report" details actions the agency is taking to fulfill the Board's mission,…

The Illinois State Board of Education (ISBE) develops and maintains a continuing five-year comprehensive strategic plan for elementary and secondary education in accordance with Public Act 93-1036. Agency staff members revisit the plan each year to review the agency's accomplishments and to refine the agency's strategies. The State Board amended…

Each year, the Illinois State Board of Education (ISBE) updates its continuing, five-year comprehensive strategic plan for elementary and secondary education, per the Education Reform and Accountability Act of 2004. ISBE's Comprehensive Strategic Plan for Elementary and Secondary Education provides a comprehensive review of how the agency…

The purpose of the current study was to understand the association between bullying experiences (i.e., bullying, victimization, and defending) and social, emotional, and cognitive factors. The social factor was social skills (i.e., empathy, assertion, cooperation, responsibility); the emotional factor was emotional difficulties (i.e., personal…

School counselors help foster student's academic, social, and career development; yet, school counselors are often neglected in research on school climate and student safety. Framed by the theory of planned behavior, this study examined how 206 school counselors' multicultural counseling competence, multicultural self-efficacy, and perceptions of…

Having his mother serve as superintendent of the junior and senior high schools the author attended in Illinois affected how people treated him. He realizes today that people, at times, like to put blame on others when something else is really what's at fault. That makes the children of the school district's top decision maker an easy target. He…

Public Act 93-1036 requires the Illinois State Board of Education (ISBE) to develop and maintain a continuing, five-year strategic plan for elementary and secondary education. The 2016 Comprehensive Strategic Plan is the agency's 12th such report. The first plan focused on ISBE's three primary goal areas: (1) enhancing literacy; (2) improving…

A commonly held belief is that children whose families are struggling with poverty--and the housing, health, safety, and other concerns that often go with it--cannot focus on learning unless their nonacademic needs are met. This belief is supported by research showing that the children of poor parents who receive income supplements and other…