Becoming a STEM-Focused School District: Administrators’ Roles and Experiences

Science, technology, engineering, and mathematics (STEM) schools and districts continue to emerge, and while some research highlights critical components to be included in STEM schools, there is a need to learn more about the process of becoming a STEM school or district. In this study, we investigated a rural United States school district’s development and expansion of its STEM education focus, which started in the years leading up to the district’s first STEM school opening in 2012. We addressed the research question: How is a district-wide STEM education vision developed, enacted, and sustained by various administrative stakeholders? We interviewed 11 participants, all of whom had some level of administrative responsibility related to the district’s STEM mission, coded interviews based on the critical components of STEM schools, and used narrative inquiry methods to describe the district’s STEM transition from these administrators’ perspectives. Our analysis revealed that several key critical components were central to this district’s STEM mission. These components included elements related to leadership, reform-based instructional strategies, and teachers’ professional learning. By focusing on different elements at different times and prioritizing several key components throughout, this district was able to achieve its goal of providing STEM instruction to all of the elementary and middle school students.

An Examination of Principal Professional Development and its Alignment to Professional Standards and Professional Development Constructs

Principals need and require specific professional development that is rigorous, effective, and aligned to professional leadership standards and effective professional development constructs. This case study examined the professional development strategies, and practices, used by school districts and their alignment to the California Professional Standards for Educational Leaders (CPSEL) and effective professional development constructs. School district administrators and principals representing the Southern San Joaquin Valley, a predominantly rural area of California, participated in this research via interviews and focus groups. This research is critical as rural areas are often underrepresented in educational research. The findings indicate a lack of intentional alignment of principal professional development with professional standards and professional development constructs. The findings call for districts to take an intentional approach to principal development that is aligned with these frameworks to ensure principals are provided with effective and rigorous support for their educational leadership, growth, and development.

National strategy for supporting school principal’s instructional leadership

Purpose A number of empirical studies and evaluations in Norway and Sweden shows variabilities in the degree to which the municipalities succeed in their endeavors to support school principals’ instructional leadership practices. In response to this situation, the Norwegian and Swedish directorates of education have developed a joint collaborative design for practice learning of instructional leadership. Based on findings from two separate studies, the purpose of this paper is to contribute to theory development and improved practice for school district administrators and their subordinated school leaders. Design/methodology/approach The study draws on the data from participants who completed the program in June 2015, June 2016 and June 2017, respectively. The data are based on individual reflection documents from students on their learning and new leadership practices 4 months, 16 months and 28 months after the end of the program. Findings The project subjected to this study, labeled “Benchlearning,” involved learning from experiences of others, observational learning, dialogic group learning and in the final round translating what is learnt into the social and cultural context in which the individual school principal’s school is situated. When participating school principals experience observation-based learning together with trusted colleagues, followed by vicarious learning from these experiences in their schools, the authors see some facilitating factors to be of particular importance: learning infrastructure, digital tools, compulsory tasks associated with preparation and subsequent experiments with their teachers. Emerging from the analysis was a systematic balancing act of autonomy and structure running through the various learning activities. Finally, a strong evidence was found that developing core competence in digital learning and formative assessment among teaching staff required enhanced distributed leadership across the whole school organization. By sharing leadership tasks on instructional issues with teachers and other non-leaders, principals succeeded in leveling up instructional leadership significantly. Research limitations/implications The implications of the study can be summed up in the following four principles. First, policy makers should take into accounts the fact that principals’ motivation and willingness to initiate change processes can be created in a synergy between structured school visits and engagement in learning groups based on a sound theoretical foundation. Second, within a socially contracted practice in a well-designed learning group, it is possible to raise principals’ level of self-efficacy. Third, a systematic reflection process on authentic practice is an example of how principals can develop their metacognitive capacity and how knowledge can be transformed into new practice. Finally, educators should be trained to be process leaders in order to create a balance between demand and support in promoting principals’ learning of new instructional leadership practices. Practical implications School district administrators should take into accounts the fact that changing practices will be supported by sense-making processes involving discussions about how new instructional practices are justified. Specifically, shifts in talk and actions will also involve shifts in the ways people relate to each other and how they relate to their internal context. Further, leadership programs should include trying out new practices as the focal learning mode, accompanied by individual and collective reflective activities. Originality/value The findings of the study underscore the mutual interdependence of distributed leadership and student-centered focus accompanied with the school’s learning capacity as enabling conditions for principals’ practice learning in the field of instructional leadership.

A mixed-methods study: Districts’ implementation of language classification policies and the implications for male, Hispanic, and low-income middle school students

California state policy requires English language learners (ELL) to pass the California English Language Development Test and the California Standards Test in English Language Arts to be Reclassified Fluent English Proficient (RFEP). However, most districts make it more difficult for ELL students to reclassify by setting reclassification requirements that are more stringent than the state-mandated requirement. In this paper, we examine the reclassification process for two California school districts. In Manzanita Unified School District, administrators describe a system that explicitly provides a role for parents and teachers to influence reassignment decisions. In Granada Unified School District, administrators describe a system that is exclusively test-driven. Nevertheless, these two approaches yield similar reclassification outcomes. In both districts, male, Hispanic, and low-income ELL students are less likely to take or pass the required assessments. Even among students who do pass the assessments male, Hispanic, and low-income students are still less likely to be reclassified. We draw upon the notion of tight- and loose-coupling in educational organizations to make sense of this disconnect between ELL reclassification policies and reclassification outcomes in these two districts. We recommend administrators and teachers work together to establish but also implement their district’sobjec language classification policies.

K–12 ONLINE LEARNING: A SURVEY OF U.S. SCHOOL DISTRICT ADMINISTRATORS

The research literature on online learning has grown significantly in the past decade. Many studies have been published that examine the extent, nature, policies, learning outcomes, and other issues associated with online instruction. While much of this literature focuses specifically on postsecondary education with approximately three million students presently enrolled in fully online courses [1], not as much has been published about students enrolled in fully online and blended courses in primary and secondary schools. This is one of the first studies to collect data on and to compare fully online and blended learning in K–12 schools. The purpose of this study was to explore the nature of online learning in K–12 schools and to establish base data for more extensive future studies. Issues related to planning, operational difficulties, and online learning providers were also examined. This study does not necessarily answer all of the issues raised but hopefully will promote further discussion and study of them.

Technology for Gifted Students in Mixed-Ability Classrooms

This chapter focuses on technology toolsets for the secondary classroom—with an additional focus on accelerative options for gifted and talented education (GATE) students. It identifies top instructional practices being used by various online resources. It attempts to generalize the current types of educators and gives input on professional development for new educators' integration of technology in the classroom. It is relevant for professors of teacher education, elementary and secondary educators in any setting of education including, online, hybrid, blended, and traditional classrooms. It informs school district administrators, pre-service teacher support providers, and developers of online educational platforms.

The Multiple Meanings of (In)Equity: Remaking School District Tracking Policy in an Era of Budget Cuts and Accountability

How do school district administrators make sense of educational equity as they undertake reform? This study examines tracking policymaking in two urban school districts. Using case studies and an interpretive approach, the study highlights school district leaders’ shifting ways of making sense of tracking and (in)equity while facing achievement gaps, accountability pressures, budgets cuts, and support for tracking. Even after the emergence of powerful opposition, we find that district administrators continued to rethink the meaning of equity in relation to tracking and they pursued policies that expanded access to high-track classes and gifted education. While potentially widening educational opportunity, these moves fundamentally reinscribed the inequity of tracking in their schools.