Development of preservice elementary teachers' multicultural education perspectives

The purpose of this study was to examine how elementary preservice teachers developed multicultural education perspectives during their professional studies. This study concentrated on the 18 members of an inquiry team at the UNCG's School of Education Professional Development Schools teacher education program. The three areas of the study were: (1) what were the preservice teachers' perspectives (beliefs, attitudes, and values) toward multicultural education as they completed their final year of professional course work and internships, (2) how did the preservice elementary teachers describe the evolution of their multicultural education perspectives during the two years of professional studies, and (3) how did the preservice elementary teachers connect multicultural education perspectives with classroom practices during their student teaching? The naturalistic paradigm of research was used to study the emerging multicultural education perspectives of the members of the inquiry team during the two years of professional studies. The investigator employed four ethnographic techniques to collect data: archival data, classroom observations, multicultural education inventory, and interviews with the preservice teachers. A two-tier data analysis was conducted. The data were analyzed subject-by-subject and across subjects

An Analysis of High School Transformation Effort from an Outcome Perspective

This study investigates the effectiveness of the Ohio High School Transformation Initiative using several years of state data on attendance, graduation, dropout rates, and performance index scores. Results indicate differences between small schools or small learning communities, and traditional schools that have similar school profiles to small schools in: graduation rates by year; attendance rates among the traditional schools over the years; and the performance index scores. Small schoolsâ performance index scores gradually increased, but traditional schools with similar school profiles outperformed small schools. There was no difference in the dropout rates. Creating a sense of community, rather than simply transforming the school structure, seems to be the key to improving high school education