Not enough attention is paid to the instructional design decisions that define students' experiences. Lisa Dover Kingsley and Jennifer Perry Cheatham contend that while quality teaching is crucial, the structural decisions supporting meaningful engagement often go unexamined. Using innovations in North Kansas City, Missouri, as a throughline, they…

Inclusion is not merely a placement; it is a human right. This qualitative study examined the organizational structures and systems that support the development and sustained implementation of inclusive practices within a large urban school district that has prioritized the transformation from a siloed approach to educating students with…

Across the country, district-community teams are tackling pressing and complex educational challenges with Inclusive Innovation, an education R&D model that starts with centering the needs of those most impacted by these challenges. This paper shares the stories, solutions, outcomes, and learnings from years of deep collaboration in the words…

This individual case study is part of a larger group study examining how principals benefit from and shape professional capital to improve schools. Specifically, this study sought to understand what organizational and individual factors contributed to principals' decision-making about implementing diversity, equity, and inclusion (DEI) policies in…

This article examines the role that Equity Directors play in K-12 schools to understand how these roles are structured in districts, the supports and challenges directors experience, and whether and how they integrate gender and sexual diversity topics into district diversity, equity and inclusion efforts. We conducted semi-structured interviews…

The path to an excellent, high-quality education can be complex for students who have been historically and systemically excluded, including students of color, students experiencing poverty, students with learning differences, and multi-language learners. In 2020, Digital Promise launched the Equitable School Systems Transformation (ESST)…

Purpose: The purpose of this study is to identify key school leadership practices that center social justice and are evidenced across multiple school and district contexts. Design/methodology/approach: A qualitative, multidistrict research design is used within this study. Sampled across seven US school districts, 24 school leaders were…

The Torrance Test of Creative Thinking (TTCT) is the most widely used norm-referenced creativity test used in gifted identification. Although commonly used for identifying talent, little is known about how creativity tests, like the TTCT-Figural, contribute to the probability of being identified as gifted especially with underrepresented…

This dissertation research aimed to examine the processes and practices of inclusive education for students with diverse disabilities in a school district in northern California. The first part is a theoretical articulation of a conceptual framework that school districts and local education agencies can use to design, implement, and sustain…

This is the third whitepaper in the National Comprehensive Center's series on designing curricula for diversity. It provides state and local education leaders recommendations on the use of the Equity and Inclusion Framework for Curriculum Development in the design and adaptation of STEM+CS [science, technology, engineering, mathematics, and…

This report profiles five public PreK-12 learning education agencies across the U.S. that participated in the Digital Promise Center for Inclusive Innovation Teacher of Color Recruitment and Retention cohort and utilized the Inclusive Innovation model to create and launch locally contextualized programs designed by teachers of color.

Attrition among educators is a continuing concern in the area of special education. Job satisfaction has been associated with teacher burnout and teacher attrition. Many times, multiple educators work in a close environment creating a need for community in special education. The purpose of this study is to identify differences in job satisfaction…

The American education system systematically and persistently excludes students from the general education setting based on (dis)ability. Disproportionate segregation of students with Intellectual Disability (ID) is a form of prejudice that is acceptable today and allowable by current laws. Fully segregated education settings for students with ID…

This paper draws from a critical race multicase study of Black parents' school engagement experiences in a liberal U.S. public school district, focusing here on 12 mothers and fathers who participated in Parent Teacher Organizations (PTOs) and/or African American parent groups. I apply Critical Race Theory, particularly Crenshaw's notions of…

This single case study explored K-12 school leaders' perceptions of their district's structure for implementing diversity and creating inclusion as a framework (Getzels & Guba, 1957). Previous research that highlighted the views and perceptions of school leaders with respect to diversity and inclusion in schools as social systems focused on…