bluuebunny/crossref_metadata_2025_split huggingface dataset:
Learning from and About Elite Online Teacherpreneurs: A Qualitative Examination of Key Characteristics, School Environments, Practices, and Impacts
Authors: Shelton Catharyn C. , Archambault Leanna M. 
Published: November 2021

Background Today's teachers are turning to online educational marketplaces, such as TeachersPayTeachers.com (TpT), where they purchase teacher-created classroom materials for a small fee. Meanwhile, teachers who sell resources in these spaces, online teacherpreneurs, stand to benefit financially and may experience other affordances as well as challenges associated with the practice. Purpose of Study This study is one of the first empirical investigations of online teacherpre-neurship. We interviewed highly experienced and successful online teacherpreneurs to understand who they are, what they do, and the impacts they encounter. Research Design Ten one-hour semistructured interviews were conducted with online teacherpreneurs who were ranked in the top 1% of sellers on TpT and had sold materials on TpT for at least four years. Interviews addressed the areas of online teacherpreneur experiences, personal characteristics, work environments, and opinions regarding online teacherpreneur controversies. Responses were analyzed to identify salient and/or repeated themes across the interviews, using the constant comparative method. Findings Online teacherpreneurs described themselves as helpful, hardworking, organized, creative, and risk-taking. Whereas some worked in supportive school environments, others worked in ambivalent schools, where they kept their teacherpreneur work separate and/or secret. They indicated that the practice of online teacherpreneurship involved creating resources, collaborating with teachers and online teacherpreneurs, and engaging in entrepreneurship. Online teacherpreneurs experienced positive impacts relating to teaching practice, teacher leadership, and their careers. They also experienced some professional stressors. Conclusions Online teacherpreneurs are emerging as virtual teacher leaders and educational influencers. They carry the responsibility to share high-quality resources, and they need the support of their schools and connections with colleagues to thrive.
Institutional Ambiguity and De Facto Tracking in STEM
Authors: Puckett Cassidy , Gravel Brian E. 
Published: November 2021

Background/Context Many schools no longer track classes to increase access to courses at all levels, including science, technology, engineering, and mathematics (STEM) subjects. However, informal processes can “de facto” track students, placing them at the same level across subjects. Research shows that de facto tracking is prevalent in STEM, especially between mathematics and science course placements. Less is known about the relationship between mathematics and engineering—the focus of this study. Purpose/Objective/Research Question/Focus of Study Mathematics placement is likely to shape participation in engineering given its position under the STEM umbrella. Yet, de facto tracking does not occur all the time. This may depend on the categorization of courses as “academic” or “vocational,” but there is little research about this aspect of course-to-student matching. Therefore, we investigate an unexpected case of equitable participation where mathematics placement does not de facto track students in engineering. We ask: How do institutional and organizational factors shape the absence of de facto tracking? Research Design We used qualitative data drawn from a two-year mixed-methods study in a public high school district with one large comprehensive high school. The school is in the lower third of per pupil spending in the state of Massachusetts, yet has significant engineering-related course offerings. Located near Boston, it serves an economically and racially diverse student body of ∼1,800 students. For this article, we analyzed 998 hours of observations during and after school, in engineering-related elective courses and extracurricular activities, and interviews with 29 students, 31 teachers, six guidance counselors, two district administrators, and the principal. Findings/Results We find competing vocational and academic logics equally frame engineering, which we call “institutional ambiguity.” This dual framing is present at the institutional level and is supported at the school level by three organizational factors: 1) courses and activities that occur in both vocational and academic spaces, 2) teachers who link vocational and academic fields, and 3) an organizational commitment to support the integration of vocational activities. Conclusions/Recommendations Overall, this article contributes to educational and organizational research by identifying the institutional factors and organizational processes that shape the categorization of courses and student-to-course matching. Our research reveals the conditions under which schools and the actors within them have greater agency, where ambiguity in the broader environment allows for contestation and renegotiation of status hierarchies. We argue that by leveraging ambiguity, schools may avoid contributing to inequity in STEM.
In Pursuit of Engaged Learning with Latinx Students: Expanding Learning beyond Classrooms through Performance-Based Engagements
Authors: Curry Marnie W. , Athanases Steven Z. 
Published: November 2021

Background/Context Urban public high schools serving low-SES communities historically have underserved nondominant culturally and linguistically diverse students by divesting them of social and cultural resources and delivering impoverished curriculum and instruction. Associated with such subtractive schooling, many Latinx youth have suffered from academic disengagement and limited academic success and futures. Focus of Study This study investigates one school's efforts to promote Latinx students’ academic and intellectual engagement through a schoolwide system of performance-based assessments (PBAs) that featured meaningful, embodied, discourse-rich activities, many of which occurred beyond classrooms during after-school hours. We examine the scope of PBA opportunity across the school and the ways educators enacted PBAs to optimize nondominant students’ engagement. We also report the organizational structures that enabled the PBA system and some implementation challenges/tensions. Setting This study features Mario Molina High, a small urban Title 1 public California school serving 262 students, of whom 90% received free/reduced-price lunches, 76% were Latinx, and 33% were emergent bilinguals. MHS emphasized an explicit social justice mission and had a record of some success with Latinx students, as measured by graduation and college-going rates, course completion for admission to California universities, and standardized achievement tests. Research Design We treat MHS as a “critical case,” holding strategic importance to the problem on which the study focuses. Using qualitative methods, we employed a bi-level design to uncover links between school organization and instruction. Data Collection and Analysis We drew on 240 hours of school observations, with special attention to PBA enactments. We also drew on 45 interviews with key stakeholders; faculty survey responses; school documents; student work; and email list communications. Our analysis involved thematic coding, memos, metamatrices, and situated/discourse analyses. Findings/Results MHS's PBAs drew school actors out of the spatial/temporal boundaries of classrooms and fostered serious, spirited, interactive spaces for learning. Three aspects of PBAs—authentic audiences, embodied action, and dialogic argumentation—transformed these assessments into what we call performance-based engagements (PBEs). This shift enhanced students’ engagement and contributed to a schoolwide culture of engaged learning. We argue that sustained participation in PBEs encouraged students to experiment with and adopt expanded practice-based identities as critical thinkers and change agents. Conclusions/Recommendations Our study suggests how the schoolwide implementation of dynamic, innovative, and culturally sustaining forms of assessment can expand and revivify traditional school learning in ways that promote the academic and intellectual engagement of historically underserved students.
“There Isn't an Easy Way for Me to Talk About This”: A Historical and Contemporary Examination of Emotional Rules for Teachers
Authors: Dunn Alyssa Hadley , Moore Ashley E. , Neville Mary L. 
Published: November 2021

Background/Context As grounding for our work, we consider the creation and development of the teaching profession as a particularly “feminine” role. We then briefly describe the contemporary context of schooling, particularly related to neoliberal accountability and its impact on teachers’ experiences. This comparison shows that the historical claims pertaining to women in the teaching workforce have modern-day equivalents, suggesting that the workforce and emotions pertaining to it are still heavily regulated and monitored. Purpose of Study The purpose of this study is to explore how teachers’ emotions are or are not supported and nurtured in an urban high school, contextualized by an exploration of what it means to work in a “feminized” profession that is increasingly subject to regulations that limit teachers’ autonomy and agency. Research Design Drawing on portraiture methodology and using interview and field note data from a case study on teacher morale in an urban high school, we advance a theory about the emotional rules of teaching in a neoliberal era. Findings We argue that teachers have been socialized into the emotional rules of the profession in ways that inhibit their expressions of so-called outlaw emotions, or negative emotions that certain groups have been taught not to exhibit. For some teachers, these emotions may manifest as vulnerability, shame, or burnout. Conclusions/Recommendations We conclude that emotional rules are embodied and that there are material consequences to the ways teachers are required to regulate their emotions. Teachers’ expressions of outlaw emotions should be viewed as courageous. Teachers’ vulnerability should be nurtured at both individual and institutional levels in order to build teacher community, reduce feelings of burnout and isolation, and ultimately (hopefully) reduce teacher attrition. Valuing the humanity and emotions of teachers is a critical step in ensuring humanity for all of our children.
Guiding Principals: Middle-Manager Coaching and Human-Capital Reform
Authors: Bush-Mecenas Susan , Marsh Julie A. , Strunk Katharine O. 
Published: November 2021

Background/Context School leaders are central to state and district human-capital reforms (HCRs), yet they are rarely equipped with the skills to implement new evaluation, professional development, and personnel data systems. Although districts increasingly offer principals coaching and training, there has been limited empirical work on how these supports influence principals’ HCR-related practices. Purpose Drawing on a two-year, mixed-methods study in the Los Angeles Unified School District (LAUSD), this article examines the role of principal supervisors in HCRs. We ask: What role did principal supervisors (Instructional Directors [IDs]) play in the implementation of human-capital reforms? What did high-quality coaching on the part of IDs look like in this context? Research Design Our two-part analysis draws upon survey and interview data. First, we conducted descriptive analyses and significance testing using principal and ID survey data to examine the correlations among principals’ ratings of ID coaching quality, ID coaching practices, and principals’ implementation of HCRs. Second, we conducted in-depth interviews, using a think-aloud protocol, with two sets of IDs—those consistently highly-rated and those with mixed ratings—who were identified using principals’ reports of coaching quality. Following interview coding, we created various case-ordered metamatrix displays to analyze our qualitative data in order to identify patterns in coaching strategy and approach across IDs, content, and contexts. Findings First, our survey data indicate that receiving high-quality coaching from IDs is correlated with stronger principal support for and implementation of HCRs. Our survey findings further illustrate that IDs support a wide range of principals’ HCR activities. Second, our think-aloud interviews with case IDs demonstrate that coaching strategy and approach vary between consistently highly-rated and mixed-rated coaches: Consistently highly-rated IDs emphasize the importance of engaging in, or defining HCR problems as, joint work alongside principals, while mixed-rated IDs often emphasize the use of tools to guide principal improvement. We find that, on the whole, the consistently highly-rated IDs in our sample employ a nondirective approach to coaching more often than mixed-rated coaches. Conclusions These findings contribute to a growing literature on the crucial role of principal supervisors as coaches to improve principals’ instructional leadership and policy implementation. While exploratory, this study offers the first steps toward building greater evidence of the connections between high-quality coaching and policy implementation, and it may have implications for the design and implementation of professional development for principal supervisors and the selection and placement of supervisors with principals.
Coaching and Districtwide Improvement: Exploring the Systemic Leadership Practices of Instructional Coaches
Authors: Hashim Ayesha K. 
Published: November 2021

Background Many school districts are relying on instructional coaches to improve teaching and learning under the Common Core State Standards (CCSS). Yet we know very little about how coaches exercise systemic leadership to support districtwide improvements in instruction. Purpose In this study, I broadly define systemic leadership as efforts to coordinate multiple reform goals with school improvement strategies and classroom instruction, and to build institutional knowledge and collaborative structures for scaling up instructional change. I used social-network theory and the concept of brokering to study the systemic leadership practices of Digital Learning Coaches (DLCs) in the Peterson Unified School District (PUSD, a pseudonym), a midsized urban district that distributed iPads and laptops to schools in the 2014–15 school year for CCSS instruction. Research Design I used an explanatory sequential research design to examine how DLCs engaged educators at all organizational levels of PUSD to support systemic change. I collected social-network data to map communication networks in the district and how DLCs brokered information in these networks. I then conducted a multiple case study of three DLCs in six elementary schools to characterize the quality of systemic leadership exercised by DLCs through their brokering exchanges and the organizational factors informing their leadership. Findings I find that DLCs brokered information in a siloed, top-down manner from the central office into schools, guiding teachers on how to integrate technology with instruction but failing to coordinate this support with other CCSS resources popular among school leaders and teachers. Consequently, DLCs struggled to build coherence around the use of technology with school goals for improvement, provide instructional support to a broad footprint of teachers, and discover and share novel uses of technology developed by teachers. The organizational context of the central office and its schools informed DLC brokering, with top-down hierarchies, organizational silos, principal leadership, and the experience, goals, and training of DLCs influencing how these coaches engaged educators. Conclusions My findings suggest that district leaders should provide explicit guidance, resources, and more time for instructional coaches to demonstrate leadership in support of systemic change. I also show that instructional coaching is dependent on the organizational context of schools, suggesting that there will be local variation in the leadership outcomes that coaches achieve in practice and that district leaders should account for pertinent factors such as principal leadership, school structures for teacher collaboration, and school-reform readiness when developing coaching programs.
Thriving, Surviving, or Striving? A Part-Time Non-Tenure-Track Faculty Typology for the New Era of Faculty Work
Authors: Pryor Kim Nelson 
Published: November 2021

Context As instructional part-time, non-tenure-track faculty (NTTF) come to constitute an increasing proportion of all teaching faculty in the United States, significant research has investigated the experiences and perspectives of these essential higher education workers. In past decades, a subset of this work has sought to typologize this heterogenous group by various characteristics including their professional attributes and motivations for teaching part-time. Yet these typologies evidence limited usefulness to the robust and current scholarly debate surrounding NTTF in higher education. Purpose This article presents a novel typology of part-time NTTF for the new era of faculty work—an era marked by financial inequality. Thus, the proposed typology sorts these faculty, within the context of structural inequality, by their motivation to teach part-time and their financial dependence on this work. Research Design This analytic essay synthesizes literature on the attributes, work experiences, perspectives, and motivations of part-time NTTF in order to critique existing part-time faculty typologies and present a novel classification system. Conclusions The proposed typology advances three types of part-time NTTF: “thrivers”— those who work as teachers predominantly by preference; “survivors” —those who work as teachers predominantly out of financial need; and “strivers” —those who work as teachers because of a combination of preference and financial need. As proposed, the new typology enables a more complex understanding of part-time faculty's work experiences and better differentiates lines of future inquiry and practice for these essential professionals, many of whom are indispensable to, yet face inequitable working conditions within, the field of higher education.
“Losing One African American Preservice Teacher is One Too Many”: A Critical Race Analysis of Support for Praxis Core as African American Students Speak Out
Authors: Wynter-Hoyte Kamania , Long Susi , Mcadoo Terrance M. , Strickland Jennifer D. 
Published: November 2021

Background/Context Praxis Core, an ETS general knowledge examination, is required for teaching licensure in many states. However, it exists within a history of racist testing from time of the first IQ and SAT tests. Because of Praxis Core, Preservice Teachers of Color are regularly denied entry into the teaching profession, a reality incongruent with the call for a more diverse teaching population. Purpose/Research Question While recognizing the need to eliminate racist gatekeepers to the profession, this study focused on providing Praxis Core support so that no more African American preservice teachers are lost to the test while working to dethrone it. To understand effective support, this study asked: What can we learn through the experiences of 10 African American preservice teachers at a Predominately White Institution (PWI) about characteristics of effective support as they prepare for the Praxis Core examination? Research Design Data were collected and analyzed using qualitative critical race methods and a framework grounded in culturally relevant, responsive, and sustaining pedagogies. Data included student interviews and questionnaires, lesson plans, and emails among the researchers/instructors and students. Results The study identified characteristics of effective support as grounded instructors’ culturally responsive caring defined by: a commitment to student success and empowering students’ belief in their success; knowing each student well to understand strengths, fears, needs; establishing relationships considered by students to be trusting and comfortable; countering messages of ineptness by teaching students about the racist nature of the test and validating them as knowledgeable and capable; recognizing the linguistic dexterity of African American Language speakers and helping them use their linguistic abilities to conquer the tests; and emancipating students by making them aware of the sociopolitical intent as well as structure of the tests. Conclusions/Recommendations We offer recommendations recognizing that they are merely Band-aids when biased tests play a role in sustaining a predominantly White teaching force. While we work to change that, our study suggests the development of support systems by faculty who (a) do not settle for deflections from the need for this work; (b) can develop relationships deemed comfortable from students’ perspectives; (c) believe and can help students recognize that they are not broken but whole, intelligent, knowledgeable; (d) understand the biased nature of Praxis Core and can help students examine test items and strategize accordingly; and (e) can help students use their cultural and linguistic knowledge and dexterity to beat the testing game.
A Model of Co-Construction for Curriculum and Professional Development in Head Start: The Readiness through Integrative Science and Engineering (RISE) Approach
Authors: Mcwayne Christine M. , Mistry Jayanthi , Brenneman Kimberly , Zan Betty , Greenfield Daryl B. 
Published: November 2021

Background/Context In the context of increasing accountability mandates in the preK–12 education system, the importance of professional development (PD) supports for early childhood educators is recognized. Education leaders emphasize the importance of partnering with teachers to inform the development of effective PD approaches. This partnering process is often referred to as co-construction. Co-construction with teachers is thought to be an essential element for ensuring that the learnings gained from any PD program are maintained once intensive supports are removed. However, guidance is scant concerning specific aspects of effective co-construction. Purpose of Study In this article, we document the process of co-construction within the Readiness through Integrative Science and Engineering (RISE) curriculum and PD approach. In so doing, we hope to illuminate processes potentially at work within the “black box” of PD. Setting/Participants The RISE project was implemented at two Head Start program sites that served a high proportion of dual language learning children and immigrant families in a large city in the northeastern United States. Participants were teachers and parent volunteers from these two programs. Research Design Using grounded theory methods, qualitative data on implementation across key RISE contexts were analyzed. Data collected across three years included digital audio- and video-recorded interactions among participants, written documentation of meeting agendas, planning notes, and meeting notes. Results Analyses resulted in the articulation of a three-step process: (1) setting the conditions for co-construction (establishing mutual respect and trust among partners, leveling roles and authority, and validating/naming partners’ expertise); (2) establishing joint activities as the core process (setting shared goals and agenda, building relationships, and validating co-constructed products); and (3) observing outcomes of co-construction (shifts in attitudes and interactional roles, appropriation of RISE concepts, and integration of RISE components). Conclusions/Recommendations The RISE model of co-construction comports with what others in the field have proposed about the importance of teacher input into their own professional learning, adding further dimensionality through systematic documentation and grounded theory analysis. We discuss how the RISE co-construction approach is similar to and distinct from other such efforts in the field of early childhood education, and we suggest future directions for research to document and test effective PD processes.