School leaders need effective, affordable approaches to retain their teacher workforce. We investigated a promising, low-cost option for school leaders to encourage teacher retention: subject-area specialization in elementary grades (K-5). Using data on North Carolina elementary grades teachers and schools in the 2011-2012 through 2015-2016…

Teachers today feel pressure to maximize student engagement and learning. With an increased focus on student scores on end of grade test measures and their association with school performance grades, educators are forced to consider how to yield results. Limiting the disruptions and distractions throughout the school day shifts the focus to…

Multilingual learners (MLs) represent a substantial, growing segment of the PreK--12 population, including in rural areas. Several forces contribute to the increase of ML students in rural schools (e.g., immigrant labor, refugee crises). As we undergo a major cultural shift from a society that was (misguidedly) viewed as monolingual to one that is…

The purpose of this mixed methods study was to examine coping strategies for teachers in elementary schools who taught during the COVID-19 pandemic. Teachers experienced mental, physical, and spiritual challenges throughout the pandemic, and this study shared how teachers coped. Through this study, 48 teachers serving in three different elementary…

The Focus of Practice (FoP) of this Participatory Action Research (PAR) project was to develop mentors' knowledge, skills, and dispositions to identify and implement equitable classroom practices through coaching conversations with beginning teachers. The study examined what happens when mentors shift from essential check-ins with beginning…

Lacking a union and having a lower salary rating than most of the nation's states, North Carolina has had an increased number of teacher vacancies over the past decade. The problem addressed by this study was the lack of retention of qualified K-6 teachers across the state of North Carolina. The purpose of this qualitative narrative inquiry study…

The purpose of this mixed methods study was to examine the impact of administrative support on staff mental health. Research questions were created for this research study and were investigated throughout its design and implementation. This research study involved participation from three district-approved schools: one elementary, one middle, and…

Purpose: Our purpose was to gather and evaluate accurate, up-to-date information on physical education (PE) policy implementation across multiple U.S. states and regions. Methods: A U.S. Physical Education and Physical Activity Policy questionnaire was developed and completed by 4,845 public-school PE teachers from 25 U.S. states. The U.S.…

With a focus on the American context, the study investigates a teacher accountability reform as an expanding assemblage of neoliberal governance by providing an account of physical education teachers who were experiencing an accountability reform that required them to document student learning growth for teacher evaluation. Through stratified…

Federal and state legislations continue to mandate high-stakes testing for American students. Consequences of high-stakes testing include but are not limited to, low teacher efficacy, narrow teaching strategies, lack of student motivation, and the feeling of insecurity in classrooms by the students. The purpose of this study was to gain a deeper…

The number of low-performing schools has drastically increased since COVID-19. During the 2018-2019 school year, there were 488 low-performing schools (North Carolina Department of Public Instruction, 2024). The number increased to 736 schools during the 2023- 2024 school year, a 50.8% increase (North Carolina Department of Public Instruction,…

This paper investigates how teachers learn about race in the school context, with a particular focus on teachers' development of racial competency. Using in-depth, semi-structured interviews we find that teachers learn through three sources: from their peers, from years of experience, and from teacher preparation and in-service experiences.…

At the foundation of this research was the supposition that when principals implement positive leadership practices, they create an educational climate that encourages highly qualified teachers to continue to work in economically disadvantaged school districts by increasing teacher morale and perceived teacher efficacy. The purpose of the research…

This case study focused on the perceptions of faculty and staff of mental health services at the elementary level in a rural district. Mental health services provided in elementary school settings can ultimately change the outcome of individuals' lives. Many districts in North Carolina lack the funds to hire mental health counselors, and must rely…

This grounded theory study explored how primary-grade teachers perceive and enact dialogic English Language Arts (ELA) comprehension pedagogy in the novel context of pandemic-induced digital learning. The study involved nine diverse rural primary teachers teaching digitally during the coronavirus disease pandemic. The researchers followed a…