Youth civic engagement has been an important topic for educators, policy makers, community leaders, and parents with many voicing concerns over a growing decrease in youth civic engagement. Youth civic engagement is often defined by engagement with politics and or the local community through volunteering or service-learning. Youth from…

The accelerated growth of 1:1 educational computing initiatives has challenged digital equity with a three-tiered, socioeconomic digital divide: (a) access, (b) higher order uses, and (c) user empowerment and personalization. As the access gap has been closing, the exponential increase of 1:1 devices threatens to widen the second and third digital…

Due to social and economic forces in Cambodia, marginalized youth rarely experience educational mobility without intervention from external organizations. This study presents the results of a narrative study on the educational mobility of seven Khmer international students pursuing higher education in the United States who share the common…

Head Start is a federally funded program providing comprehensive social and early education services to children from low-income households and their families. Seeking to boost outcomes of Head Start students, in 1998 Congress amended Head Start's statement of purpose, specifying school readiness as the program's top priority. This mission change…

For over four decades, Upward Bound programs have influenced students' aspirations and goals toward attending college, college enrollment, and overall educational achievement, providing a standard for successful college preparation for historically marginalized students. Although Upward Bound has helped many Americans prepare for and earn their…

The problem addressed in the dissertation is the relationship between high poverty and low academic achievement that persists in spite of efforts to change it. In one Western state, a small proportion of the schools that are eligible for Title I funds, a measure of poverty, have achieved recognition for high student achievement. The recognition,…

This study was an investigation of the predictive value of perceived career barriers and career decision self-efficacy on the certainty of initial career choice among Educational Opportunity Fund Program (EOF) pre-freshman college students, an under-studied college population with respect to career development (Winograd & Shick Tryon, 2009).…

In the past several decades the global village has witnessed a rapid decline in the number of indigenous languages. This study was a narrative inquiry within a qualitative methodology. Two research questions were used to analyze the narratives of Choctaw Nation Head Start teachers concerning technology usage for increasing, and revitalizing the…

There is a relative absence of research that specifically uses Texas Assessment of Knowledge and Skills (TAKS) data to investigate the relationship between birthdate of kindergartners and later academic success in third grade. This quantitative study investigated school start age and academic success on the 3rd grade Reading TAKS in a sample of…

This dissertation addresses the question of how suburban school district leaders in one large Midwestern school district respond to increasing student poverty. The purpose of this study was to determine how suburban school district leaders respond to increasing student poverty in their decision making and actions. Data for this study came from one…

The purpose of this study was twofold. First, it sought to add to the body of research and literature on youth leadership development in secondary schools, filling a critical gap in the literature. Second, it aimed to help determine the essential elements of successful youth leadership development programs in the areas of content, pedagogy,…

Although critical to functioning in the workforce, mathematics proficiency is low in the United States compared to other economically-developed countries. Researchers have shown that students begin to demonstrate weaknesses in math skills at the onset of pre-algebraic courses, usually during middle school years. In Alabama, low math scores are…

The purpose of this mixed methods study was to describe the motivation to read of elementary African American and Hispanic boys and explore the possible differences in reading motivation using the constructs of self-perceptions as a reader and value of reading. Educational research has repeatedly shown that students from disadvantaged minority…

There is no question that economic deprivation has an adverse impact on student achievement. In the United States, the gaps in achievement among poor and advantaged students are substantial. Through multiple studies, the United States Department of Education (2006) indicated results that "clearly demonstrated that poverty adversely affected…

Scheduling in any school or organization plays a vital role in the effectiveness that stakeholders' needs are met. The administration at a large comprehensive high school in the Charlotte Mecklenburg School District realized that in order for their school to meet the changing needs of its student body, it had to build a culture and climate that…