Special education teachers are subject to difficult working conditions in their provision of quality special education services to their students. Despite the severe working conditions that special education teachers endure, little research has considered the presence and impact of vicarious trauma (VT) in this specific population. The nature of…

Structural equation modeling was used in this exploration of data from the 2018 Teaching and Learning International Survey (TALIS), focusing on gender, the number of hours teachers worked in a typical week, the consequences of their workload, and job-related stress to identify the direct and indirect effects of these predictors on both job…

California Bay Area school districts are experiencing a teacher shortage that threatens to further widen the opportunity gap for schools with the neediest student populations. Financial incentives, administrator support levels, appropriate and consistent professional development, and mentoring are often cited as areas that cause teachers to leave…

This dissertation consists of three papers on education policy. In each paper, I use applied econometric methods and descriptive quantitative analysis to examine topics related to teacher labor markets and postsecondary attainment. The first paper leverages a rich student-teacher-day data set to study the relationship between daily teacher…

This three-article dissertation presents a perspective of K-12 educator advocacy for the education profession within the context of the United States. Each article involves educators' perceptions of advocacy for the education profession. The first article is a systematic scoping review. This article analyzes the literature written on educator…

Despite an understanding amongst scholars for several decades that research must explore the contexts and cultures of institutions and disciplines if efforts to improve faculty teaching are to be successful, much of the interrelationships between these two cultures and faculty identities were little explored. In this exploratory study, I addressed…

Leadership for learning has emerged as a framework that subsumes the core characteristics of instructional, transformational, and distributed leadership. Establishing an empirical measurement model of leadership for learning that simultaneously incorporates the perspectives of individual teachers, collective faculty, and principals has been a…

The "A Nation at Risk" report was released in 1983 and enumerated systemic flaws in the U.S. education system, highlighting science education as an area of concern (Denning, 1983). Over a generation later, a new opportunity has emerged to improve science education for all students, and especially the youngest learners. The Next…

This mixed methods study explored how elementary teachers reported using a commercially published instructional unit to plan and deliver science instruction in their elementary classrooms. Of particular focus is what elements of the program teachers eliminated during planning and instruction, what outside materials teachers added to instruction,…

The observed trend of the United States assessment data displays a grave difference in performance between minoritized student subgroups and the White student subgroup. Low teacher diversity is an additional concern plaguing diverse school districts across the country. Researchers argue that to improve the academic achievement of students of…

The purpose of this study was to determine whether teachers working with students with emotional and behavioral disorders (EBD) are familiar with the resources shown to be most effective at improving student outcomes in this population and to what extent they are utilizing evidence-based practices in their classrooms. It also sought to gather…

Leadership that is intentionally and thoughtfully distributed across many in a school building has the potential to bring about positive change for all students and to empower and engage teachers in such a way that makes them more likely to stay in the classroom. Given the potential of distributed leadership, understanding it more deeply is…

There are currently over five million multilingual learners (MLs) in U.S. schools (National Center for Educational Statistics, 2018). Yet, most teachers have not received adequate or effective professional development and therefore do not possess the knowledge and skills needed to improve student achievement with this population. A lack of…

This study explores the perceptions of teachers regarding the effectiveness of Response to Intervention (RTI[superscript 2]) and Teacher Support Team (TST; also known as Student Support team) frameworks in West Tennessee. The research investigates various facets such as teachers' familiarity with TST and RTI[superscript 2], adequacy of training,…

The quantitative methods study examined and compared the knowledge of phonological awareness between preschool and kindergarten teachers. A multiple-choice knowledge survey was utilized to determine levels of understanding between the two groups of teachers. The knowledge survey consisted of questions pertaining to definitions of phonological…