Search

This paper highlights findings from two aspects of a case study on the partnership between one mid-size California public school district and a private university sponsored literacy project to cultivate teacher efficacy and reignite early student literacy during and after COVID-19 contexts. Grounded in teacher efficacy in literacy instruction and transformational coaching for equity, a longitudinal pre-mid-post cohort mixed methods self-report survey and an intervention-inactive control single-phase mixed-methods survey were used to understand how supporting teacher-leader coaches could benefit teacher efficacy in foundational reading instruction as well as impact transformational coaching overtime for increased student foundational reading success for school improvement.

Student absenteeism is a persistent concern in K-12 education. Not only are the negative academic and social consequences of excessive absenteeism well documented, but states, districts, and schools are increasingly being held accountable for student attendance. As research indicates that disruptions in students' learning contexts may exacerbate absenteeism, peer consistency shows promise as a force for improving student attendance. This article examines whether having familiar faces, or consistent classmates from one year to the next, influences student attendance. Using four years of administrative data from a small, urban high school district in California, we find that familiar faces are associated with reduced rates of overall absences, chronic absenteeism, and chronic truancy.

Enacting equitable teaching practices and sustaining those practices continue to be challenges in most high schools (National Council of Teachers of Mathematics, 2018), particularly in an era of high-stakes testing. Just one year after Boaler and Staples (2008) reported on the successes of "Railside High," where equitable teaching practices resulted in improved mathematics achievement, those signature practices had all but disappeared (Louie & Nasir, 2014). This paper discusses the outcomes and implications of enacting equitable teaching practices at a school demographically similar to Railside. Unlike Railside, however, equitable practices were adopted as an explicit strategy for improving student achievement, demonstrating through this process how university consultants and school personnel can collaborate to make mathematics accessible and equitable for all students.

Science achievement gaps exhibit racial disparities starting in primary grades and attitudes toward science have been shown to affect academic achievement and motivation. Leveraging the immersive nature of Virtual Reality 360 videos, we present a Design-based Research iteration testing how a novel technological-learning experience influenced our urban elementary students' attitudes toward science. Using a Two-Way MANCOVA analysis, the data support that our design iteration emphasizing "context-specific learning" can prime students that do not see science as relevant to them to change these attitudes. Implications are discussed related to relationality, technology use in urban schools, and local contexts as learning resources.

This study reports findings of ten urban California educational leaders' views about their perceived emotional, psychological, and cognitive skillsets to mitigate the Dunning-Kruger Effect and maximize equity in student learning in ten of the state's highest performing, low socioeconomic status schools. Psychologists David Dunning and Justin Kruger (1999) investigated cognitive biases of university students as they were first tested then subsequently asked to report their estimates of how well they scored. Those most competent reported a reasonable confidence level whereas those least competent expressed the highest confidence. This study seeks to report California school leaders' perceptions regarding their skillsets to mitigate the Dunning-Kruger Effect and maximize equity in student learning within ten of the state's highest performing, low SES schools.

This paper presents findings from a two-year qualitative case study of a new, break-the-mold public elementary school. This school focused on reforming traditional models of instruction with student-centered learning in order to engage and better address the needs of all students. Using a constructivist perspective to understand the dynamics of reform implementation this paper provides a close examination of reform within the school context. While in many ways succeeding in their implementation of a novel approach to schooling, a close examination of stakeholder and policy tensions expose the reasons behind the intractability of traditional models of education and the challenges to student-centered learning specifically and education reform more generally.

This paper reports on a longitudinal study of 30 university-prepared math and science teachers from their pre-service program into their teaching positions to better understand the conditions that attract and retain them in high-need schools. The paper uses the framework of job preview and information-rich hiring to highlight the influence of the job search process and school selection on teacher retention. Findings indicate that even highly-sought and well-qualified beginning math and science teachers are choosing their first teaching positions with limited information about the school as a workplace and this decision has profound consequences. Retention differences exist between teachers who choose their schools with robust information and those with very limited information. Further, how and why teachers choose schools has profound consequences for their professional success, their persistence in high-need schools, and their retention in the profession.

This paper discusses the implementation and evaluation of an innovative professional development program that supported 8th grade mathematics teachers in designing learning activities that assisted students in developing a conceptual understanding of mathematics. Funded by an Investing in Innovation (i3) grant from the U.S. Department of Education, the Collaboration Resulting in Educators Applying Technology Effectively (CREATE) Project assembled teams of teachers to work with their coaches to create dynamic and interactive learning aimed at helping students make sense of mathematics rather than simply practice procedures. As a result, student achievement was positively affected while participating teachers developed their capacity to address the learning needs of their students. Coaching was also examined in a parallel study to explore how the role of trust affected the work of the participating teachers.

The negative impacts of high teacher turnover are widely documented, with particular impact on low-income, high-minority schools. Turnover can be especially widespread in science education, where teachers are in high demand. Although teacher retention is predicated on job satisfaction, which is in turn fostered by opportunities for professional growth, little research has been conducted on the relationship between professional development and retention. In order to investigate this relationship, we conducted a mixed methods study to first quantitatively determine the relationship between professional development and retention, and then qualitatively investigate the nature of the relationship. The results demonstrate a complex relationship, in which professional identity, professional development, and agency contribute iteratively to teachers remaining in middle school science teaching.

Education research focused on Pacific Islanders over the past 30 years has overwhelmingly concluded that U.S. systems of education are failing these students, but the global movement towards culturally relevant and inclusive education has had an indelible impact on the number and types of support available for Pacific Islander students in the continental United States. The purpose of this project is to explore how culturally relevant leadership development shapes the growth and development of Pacific Islander American college students. We examine quantitative and qualitative data from students who are enrolled in a culturally relevant leadership development program for Pacific Islanders in Southern California. We examine how students' identity, relationships, and leadership is related to their identity and histories.

This paper presents findings from analysis of two learning sites, a classroom and a community-based youth organizing group for Latino adolescents where adult "educators" attempted to promote both critical and civic development for the participating learners. By examining the two unique learning spaces with similar youth development goals, this paper highlights how the structural characteristics of learning settings influence engagement and critical civic development processes. Specifically, the paper highlights how these two locations provided different affordances and challenges for promoting engagement that led to critical civic development.

This paper aims to address cultural education as a method for creating a cooperative learning environment for Latino youth participants of a school-based gang and violence intervention program (GVIP). The data for this paper was collected during a 5-year longitudinal ethnographic research study conducted between 2009-2015 in California. In the spring of 2009 a school-based gang and violence intervention program was adopted by the school district of a town located in the central coast. The charge of the program was to assist with lowering the gang involvement of Latino male youth. This paper will examine how culture was (/is) used in this GVI program to help establish cooperative learning environments to help deter youth from the school-to-prison pipeline.

This paper summarizes a qualitative study conducted to better understand the experiences of men of color in peer-to-peer anti-violence college organizations. Male privilege benefits all men, yet this privilege is mitigated and/or augmented by sociopolitical factors that whitestream curriculums rarely take into account. How then, do men of color understand their experiences, and actualize their racialized identities, within anti-violence spaces that assume white, straight, middle class subjectivities? Focusing on the narratives of men of color in a Northern California Men Can Stop Rape chapter, this paper highlights the "unique knowledge systems and knowledge bases" (Pizarro, 2005) cultivated by men of color doing anti-violence work. Ideally the emergent concept map provides curricular and programmatic insights for educators invested in similar struggles.

Many barriers have prevented women from advancing in academic STEM careers, especially women of color. Few studies have focused on the career paths of Latina STEM scholars and challenges they face as both women and as members of an ethnic minority group. We are investigating the career paths of former Latina UC President Postdoctoral fellows in various STEM disciplines by conducting in-depth, semi-structured interviews. The interviews are designed to identify the social, familial, and institutional barriers scholars have faced, their experiences of gender, class, and ethnic/racial discrimination, and the impact of the fellowship on their career success. Our paper highlights the importance of the creation of a scientist identity among Latinas through the use of culturally appropriate and sensitive mentoring.

This paper discusses the result of a statewide research effort in California to improve the accuracy of student placement in math and English in the California Community College system. We apply decision tree methods to high school and college transcript data to identify key measures of high school achievement that predict success in ten levels of community college math courses (four developmental and six college level) and five levels of community college English courses (four developmental and one college level). We use our results to develop placement rule sets that allow community colleges to directly apply our results to their placement processes.

This paper offers a new way of understanding critical multicultural education through the lens of bi-directional assimilation (Alba & Nee, 2003), which better captures the connection between the pedagogical strategy of multiculturalism, and nation-building in a pluralist society. Bi-directional assimilation is a process of ethnic change experienced by "both" mainstream institutions (e.g., schools) "and" immigrant communities, whereby the ethnic distance between them is reduced. I argue that critical multicultural education can be reframed as a mechanism of bi-directional assimilation in schools, as it allows for ethnic change at the institutional and group level. In order to illustrate the relationship between bi-directional assimilation, multicultural education, and nation-making, I draw on findings from an ethnographic study of Castro Middle School -- a socially and culturally diverse school in California. My analysis shows how critical multicultural education can produce a model of Americanness that is more ethnically similar to minority students and more pluralist in nature. By contrast, hegemonic multiculturalism has the effect of distancing ethnic minority students from the national core group.

According to the US Department of Education, adult learners make up 45% of all part-time enrollment in community colleges, compared to only 27% of full-time students. As the enrollment of adult learners in post-secondary education increases across the US, accountability efforts among higher education institutions has prioritized full-time enrollment as a means to increase degree completion. Utilizing a quasi-experimental research design and regression analysis, this paper isolates the impact of tuition deregulation on adult learners at community colleges. Net of other factors, regression results indicate that tuition deregulation significantly and dramatically reduced the share of adult learners who enrolled full-time, and that this effect persisted for at least five years after the implementation of tuition deregulation in 2003.

This paper examines the narratives/oral histories of three Latina teachers to help us understand how they negotiated and navigated their identity formation. We explore how they consciously constructed (Lee, 2013, p. 7) their professional identities, which are inextricably linked to their personal identities and their life stories or the "set of reifying, significant, endorsable stories" (Sfard & Prusak, 2005, p. 14) they tell about themselves. We further examine how those identities are linked to their repertoires of knowledge as "situated in practice and as an integrated, complex system embedded in the structures, histories, and cultures of schools" (Battey & Franke, 2008, p. 127).

In March 2017, the U.S. Supreme Court decided "Friedrichs v. California Teachers Association," a case addressing the constitutionality of "agency fees" for non-union teachers in California. Although the Court's 4-4 decision in the wake of Justice Scalia's death upheld the constitutionality of agency fees, several similar lawsuits have been filed since then, with the hope that a nine-member Supreme Court will issue a different decision. Using legal, historical, and empirical analyses, we examine "Friedrichs" as part of the broad-based effort to weaken public sector unions generally and teachers unions in particular, and we assess the likely effectiveness of cases like "Friedrichs," both in the legal arena and as part of a strategy for improving teacher effectiveness.

Despite ongoing efforts to improve retention and engagement of Black Males in postsecondary education, there remain significant differences in academic achievement compared to other racial demographics. This qualitative research study examines the effectiveness of a "Culturally Strategic Mentoring" (CSM) approach that provides Black Males with better tools for academic retention and engagement at public institutions. Twenty-four black male undergraduate students were selected to participate in this pilot mentoring program at three different college campuses utilizing nine professionally trained mentors as a means of providing ongoing support for two consecutive semesters. Preliminary results indicated that engagement, retention and grades were improved, as well as developing coping strategies specifically aimed at challenges facing Black males in public postsecondary education in California.

This paper describes outcomes of a series of teacher professional development grants that put teachers in the driver's seat of their own professional learning. Teachers used grant funds to build a team, select a focus for their teams' professional growth, and take actions that they felt would be most effective in helping them improve their practice. Grant funding also included additional supports for teams related to larger systems level change, capacity building and using local resources, as well as encouragement to include administrators and/or district leaders on their teams. The idea was that developing a shared leadership model that promoted teachers and administrators learning side by side would help sustain the professional learning process over time.

This paper aims to unstick domination narratives embedded in Disneyland by using creative imagination and futurecast cultural imaginaries in which the earth system reinhabits agentic powers. I seek to open up alternative understandings of non-dominated, regenerative creativities in order to begin to heal the colonized imagination of Disneyland and the colonized notions of childhood it otherwise proliferates. I explore the underbelly of the pervading land of childhood creativity to reclaim the roots of magic, animistic co-affiliation, trans-species collaborative creativity, and matrixial embedment within the generative living systems of the planetary. Focusing on the actual, physical genesis place of Disney, the Disneyland theme park in Anaheim California, I consider, through three disruptions, what is possible in a future imaginary. Here, Gaia breaks through Disneyland and the imagination of the Earth liberates the curriculum of consumption and the domestication of magic toward a notion of childhood education that is creative, collaborative, and connective.

In this paper, we report on teachers' use of curricula and other instructional resources to address Common Core State Standards (CCSS), as well as how use of instructional materials is related to instructional practice. We draw on data from the American Teacher Panel, a nationally representative sample of teachers who periodically provide perspectives on implementation of major education policies in classrooms and schools. Preliminary findings suggest that teachers are relying mainly on district- and teacher-developed materials to help students meet CCSS. Teachers also indicated using a range of online educational resources to support their instruction. This data will provide a preliminary picture about how CCSS is changing instructional materials and teaching in K-12 classrooms.

Utilizing longitudinal data from the national Schools to Watch (STW) program, this paper examines school demographic characteristics and teacher ratings of the implementation of STW criteria in STW schools and schools that have applied but have not yet been designated as a STW. The STW program was established by the National Forum to Accelerate Middle-Grades Reform in 1999; currently 18 states participate in the program and nearly 400 schools have been designated as STW schools. Univariate and bivariate statistical analyses were used to examine relationships between the school demographic variables and the rating scores on the STW Rating Rubric, across the four domains of academic excellence, social equity, developmental responsiveness, and organizational structures and processes.

Although research on racial identity in relation to educational outcomes has expanded in recent years, little is known how it interacts with other constructs that influence achievement. The present study examined the relationship among the components of racial identity (centrality, private regard, and public regard) and sense of belonging on the academic motivation of African American high school students. This paper presents a quantitative study which consisted of a survey of 105 African American students from large public high school in Southern California.

This paper presents findings from a yearlong exploratory mixed-methods research study that investigates a national sample of six (6) intentionally diverse charter organizations. Intentionally diverse charter schools work against national public schooling trends to deliberately promote socioeconomically and racially integrated schooling spaces. Data sources include 2069 survey responses from students, parents, teachers and administrators across twenty-one (21) schools; interviews with charter leaders; and document analyses. The authors, first, map the national policy landscape around the diverse charter model; second, they describe the various rationales that underwrite the diverse charter missions; third, they describe the strategies and practices schools employ to attract and retain a diverse student population; finally, survey analyses interpret stakeholder perceptions around the diversity in schools.

Young women benefited from a network of "social cohesion and peer support," a form of social capital, which emerged from participation in a well-known high school robotics program. This factor was part of a larger grounded theory qualitative study using a foundation in career theories that explored the influences of the robotics program on young women's career decisions, with a particular interest in STEM careers. This paper explores one part of the nascent model, sharing young women's stories from which the category of social cohesion and peer support arose.

Recent educational programs and initiatives hinge on effective collaboration between education professionals, such as school social workers, school psychologists, teachers, and principals. Our inquiry seeks to build on prior conceptual work to unpack the collaborative stance of school social workers by examining how they conceptualize their role in relationship to other school professionals, and better understand the actual work school social workers describe doing with other adults in school settings. Drawing on the theoretical frame put forth by Little (1990) that maps the terrain of teachers' professional relations, this study adapts that frame to look more deeply at how school social workers (n=39) report collaborating with other professionals. To triangulate our findings, we also draw on responses by 14 teachers, 5 school psychologists, and 4 principals. These professionals responded to a hypothetical case study designed to elicit collaborative practices. We identified five collaboration types. Implications for theory and practice are discussed.

Sociologists of education have documented community college students' high postsecondary aspirations and low completion rates. Recent research suggests that community colleges can improve student outcomes by developing structural reforms, but this emphasis overlooks the ways in which students are constrained from benefiting from these reforms. Using in-depth interviews with community college students in California, I examine the factors that inhibit students' persistence and college completion. I argue that the interplay of different levels of precarity--institutional precarity, income precarity, and precarity of care work--combine to keep students one event away from stop-out, drop-out, or failure. This article contributes to theories of student persistence by arguing that the framework of precarity complements structural explanations for student outcomes. [This article was published in "Teachers College Record" (EJ1188688).]

Pedagogical approaches to teaching about race in a teacher education program were studied in order to identify which approaches were effective in cultivating a strong understanding of race and privilege. The study aimed to understand a) the types of pedagogies used to advance racial discourse in teacher education courses needed for bilingual and traditional certification and b) evaluate which of these approaches effectively engaged White teacher candidates in conversations about race and racism. Findings suggest that while presenting the history of racial construction along with the history of racism in the United States helped candidates conceptualize institutionalized racism, classroom discourse where teacher educators identified their positionality yielded richer participation and conversation about the impacts of racism in today's schools.

The displacement of a majority Latinx community in Echo Park, Los Angeles, California, is happening now. Young Latinx student filmmakers are resisting and reframing gentrification by turning a lens onto the issue, posting their films on YouTube, and giving voice to Latinx residents facing displacement. Four films were studied in depth. By providing evidence of the whitening of Echo Park and the results of a permanent gang injunction, and focusing attention on the contested space of the major public park in the area, these student filmmakers provide a context for understanding the impact of gentrification on the longstanding Latinx community. These films provide evidence of the experiences of those most affected by gentrification.

This study seeks explores how Latina student mothers mediate their educational success by understanding how students balance their educational responsibilities with motherhood. This qualitative study utilizes funds of knowledge (Moll, Amanti, Neff, & González, 1992) as a theoretical framework to identify and document the wealth of knowledge, skills, and cultural resources Latino families contain.

There are few examples of NGSS specific projects at the high school level, particularly those linking chemistry and engineering practices. Further, there are few studies that provide concrete examples of how such projects can support students' submicrorepresentations (SMRs). This study reports on the implementation of an NGSS-aligned technology-supported desalinator project to improve the SMRs of 173 high school chemistry students from underrepresented backgrounds. Research methods included pre/post tests, student questionnaires, and observations. The use of the technology-supported project produced significant student learning gains for a number of pre/post items, but also illustrated areas for improvement in the design of the project. Findings on students' views of project-based learning and the use of technology to support their learning are also presented.

In 2013, the California legislature passed AB 97, or the Local Control Funding Formula (LCFF), a sweeping bill designed to reform its school funding system. This study's purpose is to determine the early impact of the LCFF on African American high school students and their families. Student data was collected via surveys and focus groups using three of the LCFF's eight priority areas: achievement, engagement, and climate. Results of 96 African American high school students are presented using correlational analysis and thematic coding for this preliminary mixed methods study. The output from this study is expected to assist districts with formulating effective educational policies and designing services to address issues pertinent to the education of African American students.

To better prepare preservice science teachers to work with English language learners (ELLs), teacher education programs must devote more time and attention to best instructional practices for ELLs, broadening their focus beyond general approaches to include disciplinary-specific ones as well. In the context of such a teacher education program, we investigated seven secondary science teacher candidates' understanding of academic language (AL) and the ways they utilized their understanding of AL in their classroom practices. From qualitative analysis of data collected, we identified both strengths and limitations in these candidates' understanding of and practices in teaching AL to ELLs. We also determined how aspects of their teacher education program supported and constrained their learning of AL. We close with discussion of how teacher candidates can build their understanding of the role of AL in practice and with implications for teacher education courses and field experiences.

Differences in family background and culture contribute to belonging concerns for first-generation students during their transition to college (Stephens et al., 2012; Harackiewicz et al., 2016). We investigated whether variability in students' on-campus experience, in particular perceived faculty support, in the first semester of college predicts changes in belonging and science interest. Results from a longitudinal study of freshman science majors (N = 546) revealed that, controlling for baseline expected faculty support and belonging, perceiving science faculty as more supportive after their first semester predicted greater belonging for first-generation (but not continuing-generation) students. Additionally, greater belonging mediated effects on greater science career interest at the end of second semester.

This qualitative study examined the complexities of mutually engaging across differing positionalities (students and students, students and teacher) while intentionally working in spaces of distress (e.g. push and pull between oppression and liberation). The findings demonstrated the ways in which building a beloved community while situated within an oppressive U.S. schooling system, supported students and teacher toward cultivating pedagogy rooted in love and agency, with a collective commitment toward social justice. As a result, this study contributed toward expanding the possibilities for utilizing the process of teacher and student participatory action research (tsPAR) (Author, 2015) and Critical Race Praxis for Educational Research (CRP-Ed) (Jayakumar & Author, 2015) that honors students and teachers' relationships while working in constricting institutional contexts.

This study focused on the use of a standardized reading assessment to examine reading comprehension among English language learners (ELLs) and English fluent middle school students, focusing on two text genres: informational and narrative. The Common Core State Standards require students to develop skills in both genres. However, ELLs may not receive adequate support to meet the requirements of the CCSS and may therefore fall behind their English fluent peers (Gabig & Zaretsky, 2013). The findings of this study indicate that ELLs have lower reading comprehension scores than English fluent peers in both genres, with the lowest scores in informational text. This demonstrates the need for using assessments in selecting specialized genre-based reading comprehension interventions to support improved ELL outcomes.

Undergraduate programs for teachers often do not satisfy future teacher needs. The goal of this project was to improve the undergraduate experiences of future teachers at a California State University in two areas: the quality of pedagogy in content courses and creating cohorts for better scheduling and on-time graduation. Students participated in 11 focus groups to explore the impact of changes on their experiences in courses, their own pedagogical beliefs, and their connections within cohorts. Themes centered on growth in awareness of the importance of pedagogy, feelings that practical needs of future teachers were better addressed, and newly formed cohorts benefited from a stronger sense of community and improved scheduling.

Given the necessary attention required to ensure that every K-12 learner has access to quality Visual and Performing Arts (VAPA), equally important is the assurance that their teachers are effectively prepared to provide excellent art education experiences. Unfortunately, the literature indicates that many are unprepared in this area (Oreck, 2004; Trent; 2002)). Thus, a three-part statewide study using a macro (survey), meso (interview), and micro (document) lens to examine the role of the visual and performing arts in California was conducted. Findings indicate that arts education experiences increase candidate confidence and understanding of varied learning approaches. However, inconsistent requirements among approved programs within institutions of higher learning contribute to a lack of cohesion in art preparation throughout the state.

This study examines 40 teachers' perspectives on the use of video-recordings of their own mathematics lessons over two years of mathematics professional development. Data sources included an end of program survey and focus groups transcripts. Findings from this study support the use of personal video-recorded lessons in professional development. Benefits of using personal video included positive influences on teacher planning, instruction, beliefs, and collaboration. Moreover, findings indicate that using teachers' personal video in MPD promotes shifts in teachers' practice. Results suggest that personal video may be a catalyst for promoting shifts in teaching practice by heightening teachers' attention to student thinking, instructional choices, and increasing accountability for learning.

The purpose of this study was to evaluate the effectiveness of supplemental instruction (SI) as a high-impact intervention for Organic Chemistry at a newly designated Hispanic Serving Institute. Results indicated a significant correlation between SI and academic outcomes, measured by the American Chemical Society (ACS) standardized assessment. Survey data indicated significant positive perceived outcomes from the intervention and a positive assessment of the peer-leader as a facilitator and mentor. Hispanic students saw a 19% normalized gain in performance as a result of SI. Results at this point cannot reveal a causal link between SI and academic outcomes, however there is significant promise.

Obstacles faced by African-American Males' present barriers to their academic success. The Advancement Via Individual Determination (AVID) program is successful in helping African-American Male students transcend barriers. Studies reveal that AVID's success is based on its ability to form successful relationships among participants. African-American males remain to have significant rates of attrition from the AVID program. This study used a strengths-based model to address this problem. Participants will receive a deeper knowledge of the positive attributes of the African-American male that assist in successful completion of the AVID program, and college enrollment.

This study explored the ways in which our classroom community (students and teacher) engaged with humanizing pedagogy in a seventh grade science classroom, toward the full development of our classroom community, and the dismantling of inequitable practices and unjust policies that we recognized in our science classroom, school and/or community while utilizing the process of teacher and student participatory action research (tsPAR) (Author, 2015) and Critical Race Praxis for Educational Research (CRP-Ed) (Jayakumar & Author, 2015). Cultivating pedagogy is a new praxis-based framework that emerged from this study. As a result, this study contributed toward expanding the possibilities for abolishing neoliberal thinking and practices rooted in "accumulation by dispossession" (Harvey, 2003), by engaging with cultivating pedagogy.

Many K-12 teachers struggle to meet the needs of diverse learners as school reforms promote new disciplinary literacy requirements. In response, language education scholars have argued that teachers must develop "disciplinary linguistic knowledge" (DLK), or an understanding of language in their content area and an ability to design curriculum and instruction that is responsive to their professional contexts and students' disciplinary literacy needs. This literature review explores recent uses of systemic functional linguistics (SFL) as a basis for teachers' development of DLK and the implications of SFL-based professional development for teachers' classroom practice. Findings indicate the potential of SFL for this purpose and have implications for the design of future professional development and research in the area of language education.

This study examined the intersections of race, class, gender, and exclusionary discipline in the lives of urban, middle school, Black girls. The lived experience of being Black, female, in an urban environment can not be understood from a lens of mutual exclusivity; Therefore, one must also include the interactions with institutions that frequently reinforce structural inequities (Crenshaw, 1991; Collins, 2002). The study aimed to answer: What impact does race, class, gender, and strain (e.g. exposure to violence, complex trauma, perceived racism) have on the schooling experiences of Black girls attending urban middle schools?

This study investigated the learning process of preservice elementary teachers (PSTs) through lesson study in a mathematics teaching methods course. Lesson study meeting data of kindergarten PSTs were analyzed to examine the shifting focus on (1) student collaboration in classroom (vision), (2) teaching practices (making content accessible), and (3) understanding of student thinking of mathematics, in teachers' talks. The four learning phases were identified in which the PSTs' vision guided sense-making process, and lesson study provided the structure for the process. Visions can support or distract PSTs' learning, and learning experiences should guide PSTs to understand how to enact their visions in relationship to classroom practices.

We developed the Draw-A-Computer-Scientist-Test (DACST) to better understand elementary school students' conceptions of computer scientists and the nature of their work. By understanding how young children perceive computer scientists, we can broaden their ideas about the activities and images of computer scientists. We administered the DACST to 185, fourth through sixth grade students (aged 8-11). We found that students most often drew male computer scientists working alone. Students had a basic understanding of what computer scientists do, but the DACST did not always capture the nuances involved in this work. Commonly drawn actions included programming websites, games, and animations. Some students drew positive expressions of excitement around programming. A small percentage of students confused "computer scientist" and "scientist."

Inquiry science instruction is especially challenging in elementary grades where teachers are constrained by crowded curricula and time. Professional development (PD) may provide an opportunity to support elementary teacher development of inquiry science instruction. The study examines the inquiry practice of two teachers who participated in an inquiry science PD and the relationship between their enactment of inquiry and PD experience. Classroom observations, teacher interviews and surveys, lesson plans, teacher presentations, and videos from the PD were analyzed. Teachers' inquiry enactment assessed through discourse analysis revealed teacher controlled discourse, low level questioning, and limited discussion. Analysis of the PD revealed limited teacher opportunities to experience inquiry, and a disconnect between lesson content and inquiry practice. Implications for PD are discussed.

A growing body of research has indicated the importance of motivation and engagement in predicting academic achievement, particularly among Latino/a adolescents. The present study examined the role of cognitive and emotional engagement in a sample of Latino/a and European American junior high school students. Results indicated that while grades did not appreciably differ between the two groups, the role of cognitive and emotional engagement in predicting achievement between Latina/o and European students did. Findings are discussed in regards to the promotion of Latina/o adolescent achievement through increased levels of academic engagement.