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GO-GRASS demonstration results show the importance of supportive business environments that foster innovative, grass-based business. The four business cases havethe potential to deliver improved policies for rural development and rural jobs. The White Paper shows that readiness level of some of these initiatives is above technologyreadiness level (TRL) 7 and that significant market breakthrough requires adequate funding, rules and regulations that do not hinder opportunities, and mechanisms thatvalorise additional benefits such as carbon sequestration.Policy makers can stimulate grassland valorisation and foster new opportunities for farmers and rural businesses by securing grasslands functions as a sustainable sourceof raw materials, a space for social, organisation and business innovations, and an important contributor to carbon removal and climate change mitigation.

This descriptive action research study uses Transformative Learning Theory as a lens to view incarcerated education from the perspective of incarcerated individuals (I/Is). Data was collected from 19 participants using individual and focus group semi-structured interviews. The data analysis captured the voices and viewpoints of I/Is regarding education and learning, along with their reflections on themselves as they participated in prison education programs. The research process yielded a description of detailed affordances and constraints of the prison education system. Given that I/Is are not allowed access to the open Internet in any setting while in prison, this study examined I/Is impressions of the digital world and documented their knowledge, misconceptions, and fears about it. Data analysis captured the learners’ desire to learn digital literacies to support job searching, information seeking, communication, health management, and other necessities managed entirely online. By examining I/Is’ identities and navigation through prison education using a persona analysis, this research identified three persona types that detail how I/Is navigate prison education programs. A deeper dive into the persona analysis revealed how the design of education programs can motivate learning and lead to the evolution of I/Is’ future goals for themselves. The thematic analysis offered nine themes and a nine-part action plan with specific recommendations drawn from the research. In line with action research, these action plans will be shared with the community college that oversees the education programming along with prison leadership where data was collected to advocate for and encourage critical reflection and transformative change.

In our increasingly digitized society, where technology use is ubiquitous, nearly all activities require access to and proficiency using digital tools. Proficient internet use may lead to the pursuit of higher education, launching a fulfilling career, or part of habits and healthy lifestyles where education is lifelong and life-wide. This study documented two school districts’ progress toward digital equity and inclusion. Promoting digital equity and inclusion in schools are important and complex issues that are not yet fully understood. Given federal legislation such as the National Educational Technology Plan and competitive grants tied to the Digital Equity Act, school districts and community based organizations are faced with developing and executing plans that consider the needs of vulnerable families, students, and communities. Through collaboration with school district personnel and openly discussing digital equity as a critical issue facing school districts nationwide, this research explored how two school districts are thinking about their digital equity and inclusion needs across their schools. Completed surveys captured multiple perspectives collected across the two school districts. Participants included district administrators, school principals, classroom teachers, and parents. Semi-structured interviews captured personal experiences from participants about digital equity and inclusion. Multiple barriers to digital equity and inclusion for students in schools, were documented in both surveys and interviews. Through a thematic analysis of the data collected, the study’s findings indicate a lack of coordinated efforts across schools within a district and classrooms, despite acknowledging the significance of digital equity. Through the analysis of data, the study yielded themes, cross-cutting concepts, and suggested actions aimed at lasting transformative change.

Utilizing a two-study approach, this dissertation provided an integrative understanding of the longitudinal and day-to-day effects of racial discrimination, examined the various contexts in which Latinx youth encounter racial discrimination, and recognized the nuanced factors that moderate the impact of racial discrimination on various facets of health. Study 1 explored the prevalence of experiences of racial discrimination within online contexts among Latinx adolescents, examined the concurrent and longitudinal relations between online racial discrimination and mental health outcomes, and examined the protective role of ERI affirmation and self-compassion on the relations between online racial discrimination and mental health outcomes during the COVID-19 pandemic. Study 2 explored the prevalence of the day-to-day post-pandemic experiences of racial discrimination and coping strategies among Latinx adolescents, examined the within-person relationship between racial discrimination and diurnal cortisol, and the interactive effect of coping on the relations between racial discrimination and diurnal cortisol slope. Together, both studies provided evidence that racial discrimination experiences are common and multifaceted, being encountered by Latinx youth online and within offline daily contexts. Digital contexts, especially during the COVID-19 pandemic, have emerged as another environment where youth encounter and observe racial discrimination with real-life consequences. Youth also exhibit aspects of resilience and utilize a range of resources to overcome experiences of racial discrimination – offering distinct perspectives on how adolescents overcome experiences of racial discrimination by drawing upon cultural identity, aspects of self, and coping strategies. This work also shows that racial discrimination remains a threat to Latinx adolescents’ health. Racism-related stress during adolescence has been evidenced to have psychological and physiological implications.

According to Mahoney, Lillie, Rolstad, MacSwan, DuBois & Haladyna (2022), the Structured English Immersion (SEI) program failed to improve the achievement rate of English language learners (ELLs) when Proposition 203 replaced the bilingual program in Arizona. This qualitative study examined how three teachers and two administrators successfully reclassified Arizona ELLs. The author investigated why these educators were successful, using AZELLA scores and other teaching pedagogies to find what they were doing right. The author also employed three theoretical frameworks, Critical Race Theory (CRT), Critical Language and Race Theory (LangCrit), and Latina/o Critical Theory (LatCrit), to understand how students learn in the classroom and how race and racism are intertwined and embedded in society. In addition, the author made policy analyses using federal and state laws and court cases to understand how children of color were affected in the classroom. At the end of the study, the author found that the teachers and administrators of color who treated children with culturally relevant categories were effective at making progress with English Language Learners, allowing them to be reclassified as proficient. On the other hand, teachers who did not make accommodations for English language learners in the classroom hindered the children’s progress. In the concluding Chapter, the author gave recommendations to schools and policymakers.

Prior research has explored the complex issue of how future teachers learn to engage in socially just and antiracist teaching practices. This research revealed reasons why pre-service teachers do not engage in racialized conversations, including not believing that it is appropriate to talk about race with young children, and exhibiting resistance through emotions of guilt and fragility. Nevertheless, scholars must fully understand how pre-service teachers think about race and where they learn about race. Using Mezirow's Transformative Learning Theory as a lens to understand this phenomenon and Critical Whiteness Studies as an analytical frame, I first examined the experiences that participants had in which they obtained knowledge about race and police. I then considered how the Whiteness connected to these experiences shaped participants' frames of reference or ways of thinking about race and police. I then offered intentional experiences to the participants in the form of classroom scenarios, and videos to better understand participant frames of reference and the influence of Whiteness on those frames of reference. My findings suggested that participants drew from multiple knowledge sources when thinking about race and police. These knowledge sources included future teachers' families, interactions with children, and university coursework. Conceptualizing participant frames of reference was complicated by discourses of Whiteness that were intertwined throughout experiences thus influencing frames of references. Implications for practice and research include continuing to investigate emotions associated with racialized events and considering the effects of Whiteness as a discourse on students of color.

Data permeates our digital world. As data and data visualizations become more ubiquitous in our everyday lives, individuals are required to use it as a resource for meaning making, and we as literacy researchers need to understand the ways that our literacy practices are changing because of data collection, storage, analysis, and transmission. Most work in data literacy has been focused on using data to achieve a desired outcome rather than helping individuals see themselves as capable of using data for multiple purposes and understanding data as a socially situated resource for meaning-making (Stornaiuolo, 2019). This mixed methods study investigated learners’ evolving understandings and thought processes as they used data for meaning making, including how they located, critically evaluated, synthesized, and communicated data in a graduate level, New Media and Learning course. Using a social constructivist theoretical framework, the New Literacies Theory of Change (Leu, et al., 2017) was used as a lens to understand the impacts of the Internet and technology on data literacies development. Experiential learning theory (Kolb 1984) was used to explore the impacts of the learners’ digital experiences with data on their developing understandings of data. Proudman’s (1992) conceptualization of Experiential Learning as an array of critical relationships 1) learner-to-self, 2) learner-to-others, and 3) learner-to-the world at large provided a framework for analyzing these experiences. Qualitative data sources included observational field notes, D2L discussion posts, learners’ multimodal work product, retrospective think alouds, and semi-structured interviews. Data were analyzed deductively using theoretical thematic analysis (Braun & Clark, 2006) and inductively using pattern codes (Miles et al., 2020) that emerged from the deductive analysis. Quantitative data was gathered using a pre-post course survey, and descriptive statistics were used to describe the characteristic

Finding the Balance: Equity and Competition Among High School Music Programs in Texas Cecil M. Crabtree-SpringUniversity of Arizona This comparative case study examines two school districts with similar student population sizes and schools in Texas. The two school districts are located on different sides of Texas: Texas/Mexico border and an East Texas suburban area. Looking through the lens of financial equity, race and racism, standardized testing, and neoliberalism, this study explains how these specific components affect music education in Texas/Mexico ISD (pseudonym name) for predominantly Hispanic students. This study triangulates qualitative research, interviews, and a comparative case study framework to inform the researcher of deficiencies among Texas/Mexico border school districts. Interview participants are current or former high school band directors within the respected areas, while the anonymous survey encompasses all high school band directors in Texas. The data demonstrated overwhelming concerns about the lack of financial equity in Texas/Mexico border schools compared to those in East Texas. Race and racism were not direct influencers in the data collected, however, race and racism still permeate the overall decision-making process in some music competition outcomes. The data collected speaks volumes of neoliberalism and market-based education theory with its direct links to standardized testing.

Archetype analysis is a promising approach in sustainability science to identify patterns and explain mechanisms shaping the sustainability of social-ecological systems. Although considerable efforts have been devoted to developing quality standards and methodological advances for archetype analysis, archetype validation remains a major challenge. Drawing on the insights from two international workshops on archetype analysis and on broader literature on validity, we propose a framework that identifies and describes six dimensions of validity: conceptual; construct; internal; external; empirical; and application validity. We first discuss the six dimensions in relation to different methodological approaches and purposes of archetype analysis. We then present an operational use of the framework for researchers to assess the validity of archetype analysis and to support sound archetype identification and policy-relevant applications. Finally, we apply our assessment to 18 published archetype analyses, which we use to describe the challenges and insights in validating the different dimensions and suggest ways to holistically improve the validity of identified archetypes. With this, we contribute to more rigorous archetype analyses, helping to develop the potential of the approach for guiding sustainability solutions.

Grasslands cover almost half of the total European agricultural area and are the source of a wide range of public goods and services. Yet, their potential to produce innovative bio-based products, such as paper and plastic, remains widely untapped. We employ a multiple case study approach and implement the Business Environment Framework by Adamseged and Grundmann (2020) on eighteen alternative grass-based businesses to investigate the interdependencies between these successful business models and their business environments. The subsequent analysis reveals that the deployment of funds and policies to support alternative grass-based products remains low in most regions of Europe. Our findings highlight that aligned funding mechanisms that incorporate and promote the specific benefits generated by grass-producing and grass-processing businesses are key to overcoming the barriers related to the competition of bio-based products with the established fossil-fuels-based economic system. To make alternative grass-based markets more dynamic, increasing consumer awareness through adequate marketing is perceived as an important aspect. Capacity building and alignment efforts need to be strengthened and coordinated at local and higher levels to enable the replication and scale-up of novel grass-based businesses in Europe and beyond.

The purpose of this study is to explore the presence and function of interest convergence (Bell, 1980) in the Tucson Unified School District (TUSD) Unitary Status Plan (USP), and to understand the impact of the plan on district educational policy and practice. In 2018, U.S District Court granted partial unitary status to Tucson Unified School District #1 from the 40-year old Fisher & Mendoza v. TUSD (1978) desegregation case. Drawing from the literature on school desegregation and critical race theory, this case study applies a counterstorytelling methodology and interview data to analyze court orders, district responses, local media regarding the Fisher-Mendoza case and the USP. Orfield and Eaton (1996) postulate that Unitary Status plans are being defined by recent Supreme Court cases and have led to the erosion of judicial support for school desegregation.

This study investigates how teacher phenotype (skin color) influences perceptions of teachers amongst US-born Mexican origin high school students, including what, if anything, students ascribe to their teachers based on teacher skin color. There is a significant paucity in the literature with regards to student perceptions of teacher skin color; the few extant studies investigate student perceptions of teacher race, but not specifically teacher skin color. Critical Race Theory (CRT) and Critical Whiteness Studies (CWS) served as the theoretical framework for this project. This study takes place at a large comprehensive high school in the southwestern United States. Data for this study was collected through two methods: (1) an online student survey administered to roughly 100 students in 12th grade, and (2) a one-hour focus group with nine (9) students. The data from this study suggest that teacher skin color does influence student perceptions of teachers. The students that participated in this study ascribed varying expectations to their teachers based on the skin color of the teacher. While their perceptions of teachers are influenced by teacher skin color, these students also engaged in colorblind and color-evasive discourses. In essence, students in this study often expressed competing viewpoints of (1) being influenced by teacher skin color, and (2) believing that skin color was irrelevant and insignificant. These results suggest that additional research is needed in this area. Due to the small number of participants in this study, these results are not generalizable.

This study aims to generate interest in matters regarding executive functions in children in primary education, and to increase our understanding as to whether the development of these functions in pupils in their third year of primary school can be improved using rhythm and body percussion through the BAPNE method. The study was based on a research protocol with a total of n=51 subjects, divided between an experimental group and a control group in the province of Valencia (Spain). The two groups were similar in nature and were of average sociocultural and economic levels. The methodology used was experimental and used measurements and collection of pre- and post-test sample measurements, before and after the BAPNE method was used with the experimental group. Subsequently, statistical analysis was carried out which was factorial in design and analysed the measurements taken before and after the intervention. The results obtained show that BAPNE sessions has a significant positive effects on the executive functions.

This case study explores how high school teachers view their students in relation to social class backgrounds and ability to engage with pedagogy and curriculum within their schooling experience. I observed how social class affects teacher to student engagement through a reproduction of consciousness within the structure of schooling experience. Often, teachers from the majority group struggle to create constructive dialogues with students from diverse backgrounds that have historically been marginalized in their ability to engage in schooling. This often is embedded in their social class position which creates defensiveness on their part when confronting issues around race and class. Racial and class caste systems continue to serve as barriers in which social mobility is impeded through the high school experience. Discourses around normative teaching practices continue to invoke the otherness of students through a surveillance enacted by social class Keywords: social class; social reproduction; high school education; surveillance

This is a case study of school improvement factors at a Southwestern Middle School where the researcher examined the demographics of the Southwest Unified School District and Southwest Middle School, the school's academic performance history, school leadership, teachers and the school improvement process it was mandated to follow for five years. Also, there included a discussion of the reasons Southwest Middle School moved into school improvement, the number of years it remained in school improvement, the leadership during these years, and the mandates imposed on the school from the No Child Left Behind (NCLB) federal legislation and the Arizona Department of Education state mandates. The mandates were determined by the school's level of improvement. In this case study Southwest Middle School had been at a serious level of improvement for the previous five years 2008 - 2013. Therefore, a visit from a team of Arizona Department of Education school improvement experts called the Solutions Team was initiated. This initiated visit was to be an evidenced based inquiry that generated four school improvement recommendations to be followed as a framework for continuous school improvement. Also, the researcher examined the documentation generated through the Solutions Team visit and the impact it made on the Southwest Middle School improvement process. Quantitative outcomes in the area of student achievement are presented in this case study that shown continuous decreases in the standardized test results generated from the State mandated test known as the Arizona Instrument to Measure Standards (AIMS Test) results until the school remained open till spring, 2013. Interviews with personnel involved in the school improvement efforts showed differing perceptions of success in efforts before the school closure. There was some evidence that test scores had begun to improve at Southwest Middle School but, it was too little, too late and the school closed in Spring, 2013. Unfortuna

Through analysis of written texts produced by school districts and high schools with predominantly Mexican American populations, beliefs about Mexican American students that mediate attitudes and expectations can be exposed. In this work, I conduct comparative critical discourse analyses (CDA) of school district and high school mission statements from a total of 35 schools and 20 school districts in the Southwestern United States and Chicago, Illinois. The sites were selected because of their large to predominantly Mexican American students populations. Of the 35 school mission statements I researched, 19 were from predominantly Mexican American high schools and 16 were from predominantly White high schools. Of the 20 school district mission statements I collected, 11 were from largely to predominantly Mexican American school districts and 9 were from largely to predominantly White school districts.Analyses conducted in this study of the mission statements utilizing several `tools' of CDA revealed ideologies, or ideological discursive formations (IDFs), of low expectations and negative attitudes for Mexican American students when compared to White students. These IDFs materialize by way of frames and signs that are (re)created in the district and school mission statements. The IDFs serve to mediate the discourses that are utilized to describe Mexican American students and the districts and schools they attend. These discourses serve to mediate beliefs about Mexican American students that in turn reinforce the IDFs already in place.Understanding the types of discourses that (re)produce low expectations for and negative attitudes about Mexican American students is a first step in changing these schooling discourses that ultimately contribute to low academic achievement.