Two trends have increased the importance of cross-boundary teaming in schools. School educators face more interdisciplinary tasks and problems. They are also further required to include diverse voices derived from students' greater demographic diversity toward creating culturally inclusive school education. In light of this, cross-boundary…

The racial diversity of children in US public schools continues to increase while most teachers and school leaders are White. In addition, systemic racism, whitewashing of curricula, microaggressions, and deficit mindsets persist within schools across the country. These pervasive injustices that plague the student experiences of children of the…

The purpose of this qualitative descriptive study was to explore how public middle school administrators described the special education training they received to engage in social justice leadership to support, lead, and enable successful outcomes of special education programs in their school. The theoretical foundation utilized was the social…

There is limited empirical evidence about educational interventions for students experiencing homelessness, who experience distinct disadvantages compared to their low-income peers. We explore how two school staffing interventions in New York City shaped the attendance outcomes of students experiencing homelessness using administrative records…

Background: School choice models assume that parents and children have varied educational preferences and that catering to those preferences will result in superior educational experiences for all. Yet, we still know relatively little about how parents identify the best school "fit" for their children and families. This question is…

In this article, we examine one teacher's enactment of critical literacy pedagogy in a 7th-grade English language arts classroom in a New York City public school. By conceptualizing critical global literacies in relation to preservice and in-service teaching practices that reflect neoliberal interests, we attend to pedagogy inclusive of…

Design2Learn (D2L) is an afterschool program aimed at increasing science interest, engagement, and achievement among middle school students who historically have been underrepresented in STEM. The D2L model, designed and implemented by ExpandED Schools, uses three core strategies to foster students' interest and engagement in science: (1)…

It is a belief that when parents participate in the transition process of school choice for their children's secondary schooling, parental involvement increases the likelihood of their youngsters graduating from high school, having opportunities for selecting the best colleges, and a trajectory for greater success in the career opportunities of…

Eight years ago, in 2014, the Civil Rights Project issued a report that raised awareness about the dire state of segregation in New York State and, in particular, New York City schools. That report spurred substantial activism, primarily led by student groups, parents, teachers, and administrators, which has been influential in the current…

A common argument leveled against charter schools is that they attract the most motivated and intelligent students from already struggling public schools. Marcus Winters seeks to examine this claim, known as "cream-skimming," by comparing the performance of New York City's (NYC) charter middle schools with a set of traditional selective…

Even highly urban environments are settings for outdoor learning of local biodiversity, for they contain easily accessible street tree diversity that students walk pass daily. This study uses pre/post assessments and a tree observation curriculum grounded in scientific observation practice to understand the everyday and scientific tree observation…

Translanguaging pedagogy is an instructional approach that promotes the use of multiple languages to dismantle linguistic hierarchies in classrooms and embrace bilingual children's language practices and identities. This dissertation examines how bilingual education teachers enact translanguaging pedagogy in public elementary and middle schools to…

There is limited empirical evidence about educational interventions for students experiencing homelessness, who experience distinct disadvantages compared to their low-income peers. We explore how two school staffing interventions in New York City shaped attendance outcomes of students experiencing homelessness using administrative records from…

Having good teachers in the classroom matters, and in recent years better data have helped researchers more accurately measure individual teachers' effects on their pupils. A novel RAND study goes further, finding that teachers' effectiveness (or lack thereof) ripples out beyond their own students and affects the educational experiences of their…

New York City is the nation's largest school system. Once again racial integration of schools in New York has become a hot button issue. It appears that much work needs to be done before enacted changes to middle school admissions policies in two city districts can refer to the present time period as the dawn of a new age of racial justice. Mayor…