In a rural community there is a risk that readers will not find connections to their own lives, which may affect the pleasure gained from reading. The purpose of this qualitative study is to examine the use of literature in a small rural elementary school, focusing on how sociocultural factors affect how students connect to and access literature.…

Today's successful businesses and organizations realize the importance of strong leadership to maintain, grow and sustain long-term business productivity and viability. In a time when the skilled workforce continues to shrink and the competition for top talent increases, many businesses have developed sophisticated succession management practices…

This study's primary purpose was to examine whether or not there were differences in the roles community college boards of trustees and presidents said they currently perform and those they said they should perform. In addition, the study sought to determine whether or not the relationship between trustees and the president impacted the…

Bullying incidents in schools are getting more attention since the Columbine High School shootings on April 20, 1999 in Littleton, Colorado. Many national and state policies have been enacted since that fateful day. In Virginia, legislation passed by the 1999 General Assembly (section 22.1-208.01) required local school boards to establish a…

This teacher research study examines the literary talk and classroom community that emerged during Book Club meetings, fishbowl discussions, and a Retrospective Reflection session which transpired in my fifth grade classroom over the course of two thematic units. Themes of cultural awareness and belonging served to help students flesh out social…

Accountability in education has been expanding for the past twenty years. As standards for curricular areas continued to develop, educational shareholders desired a way to measure student achievement contextualized by the established standards. Since 1964, policies expanded federal involvement with education, and with the No Child Left Behind Act…

This qualitative research study used a phenomenological approach to examine educators' experiences in the virtual world of Second Life[TM]. The rationale for this study's focus on educators using a virtual world stems from an interest in the factors that influence educational practices in virtual worlds. The researcher conducted focus groups…

Despite evidence of widespread reliance on intuition by leaders and evidence that consequences of such reliance can be positive or negative, the effective integration of intuition in leadership is not well understood. This constructivist grounded theory study explored how some leaders in California community colleges (CC) experienced intuition and…

A sizeable percentage of US youth engage in risky behaviors which result in extensive preventable morbidity and mortality. School connectedness is the leading school-based protective factor against youth engagement in risky behaviors including violence, suicide, and substance abuse. A comprehensive review of the literature found no published study…

The church has a great responsibility to minister and provide a place where children can experience the love of God. The spiritual journey of children is often nurtured in the Sunday school room, Bible class, or some other church setting. Under the best of circumstances, this journey is a formable task. One must consider the challenges that arise…

An economics-driven discourse about early literacy (Trudell, 2009) in sub-Saharan African settings often includes a list of reasons for poor levels of literacy that remain mired in deficit thinking or a deficiencies model in which the problem lies within the non-literate people themselves. Meanwhile, the established post-colonial educational…

This investigation is an exploratory study of the use of a metacognitive software tool in a social supportive learning environment. The tool combined metacognitive knowledge and regulation functionality embedded within the content of an eight week online graduate education course. Twenty-three learners, who were practicing teachers, used the tool.…

During 2 decades of debate about teacher preparation education practitioners and policymakers have called for a more skilled professional teaching force (Darling-Hammond, 2010). Of particular concern has been poverty's impact on education--specifically in struggling urban schools--prompting legislation such as the No Child Left Behind Act (NCLB),…

This study investigated the multiple factors affecting English language learners' (ELLs) low reading achievement in standardized tests by exploring the complex, hierarchical relation in student, classroom, and school levels. The data used for this study was from National Center for Educational Statistics (NCES), the reading portion of the National…

Studies on Black males at various types of colleges have been conducted; however, there has been little research on Black males at private, predominantly White institutions of higher education in the Pacific Northwest. Given this, we know little about their status and experiences in these environments. This study focused on the experiences of…