The purpose of this study is to explore the effects of school-wide positive behavior interventions and supports (SWPBIS) on student academic performance. The participants in the study are eight middle schools from an urban Southern California school district where the implementation of SWPBIS was mandated. Using archival data collected by the…

An instructional vision is the discourse that teachers or others currently employ to characterize the kind of "ideal classroom practice" to which they aspire but have not yet necessarily mastered. In mathematics education, prior work has demonstrated relations between teachers' instructional vision and a variety of aspects of their…

Identifying factors that help or hinder the implementation of school environment interventions such as the Olweus Bullying Prevention Program (OBPP) is needed to inform strategies that bolster implementation quality in low-income urban middle school settings. We used qualitative methods to identify supports and barriers for OBPP implementation…

Implementing Social and Emotional Learning (SEL) in an urban school is beneficial to students, parents, administrators, schools, districts, and policymakers. Previous studies have emphasized that teachers and other staff members need proper professional development to promote social and emotional learning. They interact with students in situations…

Restorative justice practices are an increasingly popular approach to behavioral management, rooted in relationships rather than the behaviorist approach of many traditional forms of schooling. Research on restorative practice implementation demonstrates that schools rarely have time to consider cultural change, as they rush to reduce suspensions…

This study examined factors that impact Black middle and high school students' academic and psychosocial well-being. Qualitative analysis of focus group data using grounded methodological approach on 51 middle and high school students in a predominantly White urban school district. Findings show Black students are constantly exposed to racial…

According to recent research, secondary disciplinary teachers'(DTs) role in increasing disciplinary literacy skills is vital. The problem in this urban school district in the Southern United States was that middle school DTs acknowledge they struggle to integrate literacy strategies in their specific disciplines to improve reading outcomes on…

This qualitative study examined what middle school and high school suburban and urban principals learned about equity and educating low socioeconomic status students during and after the COVID-19 pandemic. As such, this study asked: What issues of equity were revealed, exacerbated, diminished, or resolved as a result of the pandemic? What key…

This study investigates the perceptions of multicultural awareness and inclusivity among teachers across various urban middle schools, aiming to understand the impact of school leadership on promoting an educational environment that values diversity. Employing a quantitative analysis of survey data collected from 217 teachers in 16 schools, the…

This study addresses teacher retention in Title 1 urban middle schools, focusing on why veteran teachers remain despite the challenges. Anchored in self-determination theory, the study explores how fulfilling the psychological needs for autonomy, competence, and relatedness impacts teachers' decisions to stay. Employing a qualitative descriptive…

The Critical Literacy (CritLit) project promotes using critical texts to engage readers in examining their lived experiences and understanding of social justice issues. This study used a qualitative participatory approach with a narrative design to research the students' engagement in a book club using critical texts. Participants were fourth- and…

Despite calls for both research and curricular implementations that support underrepresented students' exploration of STEM topics, curricula that apply principles of embodied cognition, such as the use of sports to teach science, are still needed. Further research may also serve to clarify how underrepresented students construct knowledge over…

Given the growing evidence of academic language demands embodied in science practices, this study aimed to design and evaluate the effectiveness of a literacy-science integrated program that emphasized the incorporation of academic vocabulary instruction and collaborative discussion of a socio-scientific issue in sixth-grade science classrooms in…

The goal in this qualitative phenomenological study was to discover the experiences of middle school teachers as they pertain to culturally responsive pedagogy, student engagement, and student growth. Participants who taught culturally diverse students in Grades 6-8 were recruited from public charter middle schools in an urban district in the…

The purpose of this quantitative research was to examine parents, students, and staff perceptions of school climate in urban middle schools and explore if relationships exist between perceived school climate, perceived reading instruction, and reading performance as measured by the State of Texas Assessment of Academic Readiness (STAAR). The…