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1
Onderwyzer, Susan. "Vermont Incarcerated Womens’ Initiative Drug Education." ScholarWorks @ UVM, 2011. http://scholarworks.uvm.edu/graddis/173.
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The Vermont Agency of Human Services Incarcerated Women’s Initiative (IWI), constituted in April of 2005, was instrumental in supporting the development and implementation of a pilot project, which encompassed three communities in Vermont. The Pilot programs aimed to reduce and prevent incarceration of women whose criminogenic problems were related to their substance use and abuse. These innovative projects are the subject of this mixed methods evaluative study – to determine the extent to which involvement in this project changed the behaviors leading to incarceration and in effect, succeeded in reducing incarceration and further involvement with the criminal justice system. Qualitative data was gathered through semi-structured interviews with former program participants and staff of the projects. Descriptive data was collected through quarterly reports from the project managers to the Vermont Department of Health, Division of Alcohol and Drug Abuse Programs, the funding agency, and the Vermont Department of Corrections. Each of the sites were compared and contrasted to tell the stories of the women who participated, and to gather the wisdom of the people who worked with them. The outcomes of the study supported the continued utilization of the key strategies of the Drug Education, Treatment, Enforcement and Rehabilitation (DETER) projects in facilitating greater engagement and retention in treatment, and reducing further incarceration in the study subjects. Recommendations for policy change include greater access statewide to Dedicated Case Management, Collaborative Inter-disciplinary Team Planning, and Wrap-Around Services for women offenders.
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Welch, Catherine E. "Factors Affecting Postsecondary Enrollment among Vermont High School Graduates| A Logistic Regression Analysis." Thesis, New England College, 2019. http://pqdtopen.proquest.com/#viewpdf?dispub=13859163.
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The State of Vermont has long had one of the highest high school graduation rates in New England, hovering around 87.8% with a lagging college enrollment rate of 52.3% at any 2- or 4-year postsecondary institution in the country (New England Secondary School Consortium, 2015). This research explored the factors that have the greatest effect on the college enrollment patterns of Vermont high school graduates. Specifically, this study explored the relationship between the following factors and 2- and 4-year college enrollment: (a) academic preparation, (b) access to college information, (c) early career exploration and education planning, (d) gender, (e) grade point average, (f) parent educational attainment, (g) parental expectations, (h) student location, and (i) student perception of affordability.
This descriptive, correlational quantitative study used binomial logistic regression to determine which of the factors listed in the preceding section had the greatest impact on the college enrollment patterns of Vermont high school graduates. The dataset for this research was the Class of 2014 Senior Survey from the Vermont Student Assistance Corporation, administered to all students graduating from Vermont high schools in 2014. This research looks to inform work currently being done at the state level to raise the number of adults living in Vermont with a postsecondary credential to 70% by the year 2025
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Woods, Barbara A. "The perceived efficacy of an empowerment model of youth development among Vermont educational leaders." Columbus, Ohio : Ohio State University, 2006. http://rave.ohiolink.edu/etdc/view?acc%5Fnum=osu1141236451.
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McNamara, Tristan James. "Services For Youth With Autism Spectrum Disorders: A Study Of Educational Practices In Vermont." ScholarWorks @ UVM, 2016. http://scholarworks.uvm.edu/graddis/465.
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Autism Spectrum Disorder (ASD) continues to receive increasing degrees of national attention in parallel with increasing rates of occurrence (Baio, 2012; Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, 2014; Rice, 2009). The disorder's growing prevalence has been accompanied by controversies regarding the source of the disorder (Baker & Stokes, 2007), how it is diagnosed (Mandell et al., 2009; Wing, Gould, & Gillberg, 2011), and what treatments are applicable and effective (National Autism Center, 2009).
This qualitative research study utilizes survey data provided by Special Education Directors to explore the question of what types of treatments are implemented and supported by school districts for students with an ASD in Vermont. This exploration is provided in order to help develop an understanding of the degree to which research-based interventions are being supported by special education administrators throughout the state.
Data analysis consisted of a process of content analysis utilizing coding and cross-case analysis to identify themes such as: the gap between education, experience, literature, and practice; the role of data in intervention and treatment design; and the role that professional development, staffing, and available resources play in ASD treatment. By exploring available research regarding the clinical effectiveness of various treatments and by analyzing survey data, this study identifies areas of strength and challenge conveyed in participants' responses, and makes suggestions regarding potential areas of future growth.
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Toland, Catherine K. "Implementing Proficiency-Based Learning: Perspectives Of Three Vermont High School Social Studies Teachers." ScholarWorks @ UVM, 2017. http://scholarworks.uvm.edu/graddis/673.
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The passage of Act 77 in June 2013 and the Educational Quality Standards passed in April 2014 are significantly changing the way education is being conceptualized in Vermont. These two policy mandates called for all Vermont high schools to shift to proficiency-based learning (PBL), also known as standards-based, competency-based or mastery-based learning, by 2020. Yet scant research exists on how to implement PBL. This qualitative study addresses this need by examining the perspectives of three exemplary high school social studies teachers who were early adopters of proficiency- based instruction and learning in their classrooms. The research centered on questions about the teachers' perspectives on the curricular, instructional, and assessment shifts accompanying and supporting the implementation of PBL. The theoretical framework that informed this study was constructivist theory and the notion that knowledge is socially constructed through the learner's interaction with the world (Brooks & Brooks, 1999). The study focused on teachers' perspectives on and understandings of these shifts in order to capture innovative tools, strategies, and instructional approaches they developed as they implemented PBL. The findings may inform the thinking of social studies educators, administrators, policy makers, students, and other stakeholders interested in implementing PBL.
The major findings that emerged in this study included several key components the teachers identified as vital to PBL implementation in a classroom including the need to: 1) identify key skills and concepts required to meet proficiencies, 2) use targeted and ongoing feedback with learners, 3) enact a curricular design that situates proficiencies in authentic experiences that provide multiple opportunities for practice, 4) support the emergence of new structures in high schools such as larger chunks of time with students, high school teaming, and flexible grouping of students, and 5) teach students explicitly about the learning process.
The study also identified several broader policy considerations related to the implementation of PBL including a need for: 1) targeted professional development, 2) restructured school schedules to accommodate collaborative learning conversations among educators, administrators, and students, 3) collaboratively designed (including student voice) learning proficiencies that create a coherent experience from grades 9 to 12 (Fullan, 2016), and 4) redesigned preservice teacher training so that newly credentialed teachers are prepared to teach in proficiency-based centered learning environments.
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French, Daniel McNeil. "Voices of Leadership: A Narrative Study of Four Vermont Superintendents and Their Experience with Policy Governance." ScholarWorks @ UVM, 2014. http://scholarworks.uvm.edu/graddis/296.
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In 2006, the Vermont School Board's Association launched a pilot implementation of Policy Governance® in four Vermont school districts. Policy Governance is a coherent governance model that requires boards to establish policy in four policy quadrants (Carver, 2006). Key features of Policy Governance include the clear delineation of roles and responsibilities between a board and its CEO and the articulation of Ends policies which describe the desired outcomes for the organization from a future-oriented perspective (Carver, 2006). These characteristics of Policy Governance are in many ways antithetical to traditional Vermont public school governance practices which are grounded in a long-standing tradition of local control (Cate, 2006). This study focused on the experiences of the four superintendents involved in the 2006 pilot implementation of Policy Governance in Vermont as they attempted to reconcile the coherence of Policy Governance with local school board practices. The purpose of the study was to understand the beliefs and perceptions of these superintendents about Policy Governance, and to understand to what extent Policy Governance implementation created ethical dilemmas for their leadership. A series of in-depth interviews was conducted with the superintendents, and data from the interviews were analyzed using a narrative inquiry approach. The findings of this study suggest superintendent beliefs and perceptions about Policy Governance can be categorized into three themes: responsibility, trust, and vision. Using a theoretical ethical framework based on the work of Starratt (2003, 2004), a further analysis of the findings suggested a series of ethical dilemmas were confronted by the superintendents when implementing Policy Governance. These dilemmas included: developing an organizational vision through ends policies which transfer control over vision from the superintendent to the school board, assisting school boards with engaging their communities in the development of ends policies while at the same time ensuring those ends meet the moral purposes of schooling in serving the needs of all students and the larger public good, enforcing a clear delineation of roles and responsibilities while also serving a school board in its work, and assuming responsibility for transforming school systems to meet the future needs of students while at the same time supporting the success of students and educators in the current organizational structures. This study concluded that Policy Governance can provide an intellectual and practical framework for educational leaders to engage in the necessary ethical action to ensure the success of public schooling in postmodern society.
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Jones, Andrew. "Implementing Proficiency-Based Learning In Vermont High Schools: How Administrators Support Teacher Sensemaking Of Education Reform." ScholarWorks @ UVM, 2019. https://scholarworks.uvm.edu/graddis/1030.
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The Vermont Educational Quality Standards, passed in 2014, require students to graduate high school based on proficiency not merely by the accrual of course credits. The deadline to implement this policy is 2020, and thus, high schools across Vermont are feverishly revamping their systems and structures to support this change. Like many reforms, teachers are at the forefront of putting this policy into practice. The purpose of this study is to understand how teachers experience the shift to implement proficiency-based learning practices in their classrooms and how administrators support teachers in making this transition.
Two Vermont high schools were selected for this study. Both were well underway with formal implementation efforts. An online questionnaire was provided to all teachers at both schools. The district curriculum coordinators and all school administrators, in addition to any instructional coaches, were interviewed on a one-on-one basis. Four teachers from each site, representing a variety of subject areas (math, science, ELA, and social studies) were also interviewed on an individual basis. Furthermore, a variety of documents were analyzed from each site, including grading policies, teacher handbooks, and other artifacts related to the implementation of proficiency-based learning.
Findings suggest that teachers were actively engaged in implementation efforts within their classrooms but found the process challenging. Certain aspects of proficiency-based learning prove to be more difficult than other elements to put into practice. Engaging in a “pedagogical triage”, teachers were selective with regard to which aspects of proficiency-based learning they attempted to implement. Given a lack of time and resources and the complex nature of the reform, teachers generally implemented those elements that were easier to put into practice. Furthermore, school and district administrators provided a variety of supports and resources to assist teachers’ sensemaking of proficiency-based learning practices. Intentional educational infrastructure that included instructional coaches, assessment cycles, professional learning communities, and curriculum materials, were evident at both the high schools in this study. Overall, the changes teachers discussed were more evolutionary than revolutionary.
This study illuminates the specific challenges with implementing proficiency-based learning in a high school setting and how teachers experience putting proficiency-based learning into practice in the classroom. Additionally, the role of instructional coaches emerged as a key element of a coherent educational infrastructure in supporting teacher sensemaking of policy messages. Proficiency-based learning holds promise as an education reform but will only work with a coordinated educational infrastructure and a timeline that allows teachers to full comprehend all aspects of the policy.
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Stainton, Jennifer. "High School Principal Leadership For The Implementation Of A Personalized Proficiency Education Paradigm In The State Of Vermont." ScholarWorks @ UVM, 2017. http://scholarworks.uvm.edu/graddis/818.
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As of 2014, the State of Vermont adopted a policy package directing schools to implement a new way of educating and graduating students. Vermont’s Act 77 and Education Quality Standards require schools to identify specific skills and knowledge students must be proficient in to graduate and ensure each student has a personalized experience. Vermont’s tradition of local control means high school principals are leading change in their schools. How high school principals are understanding, valuing, and acting to lead the implementation of Vermont’s policies for personalized, proficiency-based education therefore varies by location. The purpose of this multiple case study was to explore high school principal leadership at a critical juncture of implementing Vermont’s personalized proficiency education paradigm. Principals’ understanding was analyzed using an accountability vs. flexibility framework influenced by Sturgis (2016) and Labaree (1997). Principals’ action steps were considered through the lens of Frontier and Rickabaugh’s (2014) five levers for school change. Principals’ leadership style was analyzed using transformational leadership practices (Leithwood & Sun, 2012). The findings from five high school principals suggest that Vermont’s policies were valued for their potential to improve student outcomes, student engagement, and future career opportunities. Principals’ understanding of the policies varied, suggesting a lack of cohesive understanding of policy goals across the state. They leveraged school structures and education standards to enact policy implementation, suggesting a focus on proficiency over personalization at the time of this study. Principals in this study were leading school change by building teacher capacity and enabling teacher collaboration, suggesting they were accessing key transformational leadership practices to enable school change. The principals also identified sticking points to implementation, including: a lack of appropriate computer software for proficiency-based grading, a limited timeframe for implementation, limited leadership resources and supports from the state, and worries about a lack of equity of opportunity for all students. This study has implications for education policy developers, state-level education agencies, and other high school principals. The findings suggest school-based implementation of state-level education policy, even in local control states, can be facilitated by supports for growing leader understanding of policy intentions and facilitating policy implementation with suggested timelines and key steps. The findings also suggest high school principals access transformational leadership practices when engaging their schools in a change process. By increasing the breadth of these practices, they can facilitate the whole-school change in a personalized proficiency paradigm.
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Skiff, Robert Austin. "Challenges To Building An Open Learning Organization In Higher Education: A Scholarly Personal Narrative." ScholarWorks @ UVM, 2016. http://scholarworks.uvm.edu/graddis/585.
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Higher education is undergoing rapid changes brought about by the ongoing financial crisis, globalization, and the rapid advancement of information technology. This scholarly personal narrative will apply assemblage theory and system dynamics to analyze the financial, cultural, and political constraints hampering change processes at traditional institutions of higher learning. Using this analysis as a starting point, the author will describe an open learning organization that addresses these issues, and how these principles have been applied to create Oplerno, LLC.–a new kind of higher educational institution.
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Reidel, Jon. "An Examination of the College Decision-Making Process of High School Students in Rural Vermont: A Cross-Case Analysis." ScholarWorks @ UVM, 2018. https://scholarworks.uvm.edu/graddis/908.
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Earning a college degree has been shown to have a number of positive socioeconomic impacts on individuals and society as a whole. Although researchers acknowledge that the decision to attend college is a complex process involving multiple factors, studies have focused primarily on individual reasons as part of a linear college choice paradigm. Individual obstacles to college attendance that consistently emerge in this strand of research include academic preparation, socioeconomic status, cost, family background, parental influence, motivation, and guidance counselor support (Harris & Halpin, 2002).
College attendance rates are particularly low among students living in rural areas. Nationwide, only 59 percent of students from rural America choose to attend college, compared to 62 percent of their urban counterparts and 67 percent of students from suburban areas. (National Student Clearinghouse, 2015). The purpose of this study was to examine the college decision-making process of high school students in rural Vermont to better understand why fewer than 61 percent choose to attend college, despite more than 90 percent aspiring to do so at some point during their K-12 academic career (VSAC, 2016). A qualitative ethnographic case study approach was used to provide a unique student-focused perspective on the complexities of the college-decision making process as they go through it during their senior year of high school. A series of in-depth interviews were conducted with 10 students at two rural high schools throughout their senior year as they wrestled with an influx of information from multiple sources creating a series of pushes and pulls from guidance counselors, family members and friends with varying motives.
Individual case study analyses were conducted on the following three groups of students based on their level of commitment to attend college at the start of their senior year: College Confident, College Considering and College Conflicted. A cross-case analysis of those three groups was also conducted. The result is a detailed account of how students in each group internalized and acted upon new information about their post-secondary plans, which depended heavily on when they received it, who they received it from and its quality. In most cases, the experience proved to be a frustrating, convoluted process that waxed and waned with each new piece of information. Ultimately, students made final college-going decisions based heavily on a combination of information that was not always accurate, sometimes misleading, and on the advice of at least one parent they perceived as having their best interest in mind.
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De, Freitas Xavier. "How Cultural Capital, Habitus, And Social Capital Impacts Pell-Eligible Vermont Students In Navigating The Financial Systems Of Higher Education." ScholarWorks @ UVM, 2017. https://scholarworks.uvm.edu/graddis/721.
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With the US recovering from a recession, a college diploma has become more valuable to avoid unemployment. Despite a college degree's importance, the access to higher education is a challenge for lower income Pell-Eligible Vermont students. For the past three decades, higher education continues to rise in cost faster than family income. Cost is not only an inhibitor for Pell-Eligible Vermont students. The complexities of navigating the financial systems of higher education to acquire aid in order to make college obtainable is also an issue for Pell-Eligible students. In order to successfully navigate these systems, a Pell-Eligible student's habitus, cultural capital, and social capital, greatly influence their decisions about applying to college and being able to successfully participate once accepted.
To help understand the experience of Pell-Eligible Vermont students as they navigate the financial system of higher education institutions, I utilized a qualitative case-study phenomenological approach. The study was guided by the following research questions:
(1) What are the specific challenges for Pell-Eligible students during their navigation of the financial systems of college?
(2) What messages/information/support and from where do Pell-Eligible students receive about financing a college education?
(3) How does cultural and social capital, and habitus influence a Pell-Eligible student in navigating the financial systems of higher education?
(4) What are the implications for high schools, states, and colleges in providing information for Pell-Eligible students in navigating the college process?
The study looked at the experiences of Pell-Eligible students who applied to and were accepted at Green Mountain University (GMU), a public four-year university in the Northeast region of the US. I interviewed undergraduates of GMU, the financial-aid officers of GMU, and professionals from the Vermont Higher Education Agency (VHEA). The goal of the study was to find areas where higher education institutions, high schools, and government agencies, can provide better support, more transparency, and ease the navigation process for Pell-Eligible Vermont students as they make decision and navigate the financial aid process in order to enroll into college after high school graduation.
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Kitsos, Anthony. "Examining Vermont Agricultural Producers’ Willingness To Pay For Extension One-On-One Business Planning Services And Future Programming Considerations." ScholarWorks @ UVM, 2020. https://scholarworks.uvm.edu/graddis/1182.
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Extension agricultural business programs have provided enhanced individualized services to Vermont’s agricultural producers by using a variety of external funding sources combined with base departmental funds. These farm business programs are uniquely positioned to deliver one-on-one outreach education and information that not only has a direct benefit to private farm business owners but indirectly serves the public good by enhancing farm business viability. Meanwhile, there is an ongoing cultural shift among Extension professionals and farm owners who acknowledge that Extension programs cannot be sustained at low or no cost to participants. Funding for Extension programming has been declining for several years. Traditional funding sources, such as university base funding and state legislature appropriations, have been significantly reduced, and as a result, faculty positions in Extension nationwide have been reduced or eliminated altogether. New ways to support Extension programming must be developed in order to continue to deliver high quality business outreach education to Vermont agricultural producers. This research addresses this need in the following two ways. First, Farm Viability (now Agricultural Business) program participants were surveyed to gauge their understanding of declining funding from traditional sources to determine whether or not a fee-based structure for future programming is acceptable them. Next, a reflective essay proposes solutions for supplementing funding for Extension programming with a fee-for-service model for advanced and extended one-on-one programming. Survey results showed that those respondents likely to engage in programming beyond the initial 2-year period were willing to pay for extended services at a rate higher than the original application fee. Of those who were willing to pay for future services, 80% of respondents said that they would use a plan that included 1-3 visits at a cost of $250 - $499. The reflective essay defines program areas in need of funding enhancement, such as using facilitated management teams, succession planning and grant application assistance. The essay discusses programming opportunities that exist to serve at least some past program participants with additional one-on-one services, thereby sharing the increasing financial burden experienced by Extension educators in the presence of shrinking internal capacity to fund this type of outreach education. This research also raises awareness in areas of program costs, dwindling funding sources, and how participants can help share the financial burden. Important points for farmers weighing the merits of paying for program participation and future programing opportunities are discussed. These results can guide the efforts of program administrators seeking to improve the cost-effectiveness of Extension outreach education in Vermont agriculture.
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Ellis, Alexander Hampton. "Early Undergraduate Publishing At The University Of Vermont: Literary And Debating Societies & Their Publications, 1803-1865." ScholarWorks @ UVM, 2019. https://scholarworks.uvm.edu/graddis/1057.
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Since the foundation of the University of Vermont’s (UVM) first official extracurricular organization in 1803—the literary and debating society, Phi Sigma Nu—undergraduates have continuously produced extracurricular publications for differing purposes, made possible by the changing varieties of undergraduate organizations that developed concomitantly with the university over time. Several historical monographs have been written that utilize these various types of materials to describe undergraduate student life, yet none have focused their efforts upon these printed sources in and of themselves, nor has the subject of undergraduate publications merited a full historical monograph to this day. This thesis seeks to address this historiographical deficiency.
In the first half of the nineteenth century, UVM’s early extracurricular organizations acted as a supplement to the official classical curriculum, facilitating much of these early students’ interactions with the English language in a period prior to the professionalization and departmentalization of English literature within the formal university. Undergraduates of the early national and antebellum eras employed the literary and debating society as an organization to connect ideas located in their classical course work with the vernacular, English-speaking world that surrounded them, and their publications exist as one of the mechanisms that these students utilized to marry their early neohumanistic curriculum with the changing necessities of life in Burlington, the state of Vermont, and the nation on a whole. These undergraduates—immersed in the oratorical culture of the classical college—published transcripts from important speeches, discourses, and poems that they had heard spoken at events such as commencement or the anniversary celebrations of the societies and later desired to preserve for future reading or sharing with others. Such publications represent the earliest form of undergraduate publishing at UVM and can provide historians with not only the means to describe undergraduates’ earliest relationships with the rising medium of print in the new national and antebellum periods, but also an important clue into the boundaries and interests of their own intellects.
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Morgan, Annabelle. "Student Mobility in Vermont Schools:." ScholarWorks @ UVM, 2008. http://scholarworks.uvm.edu/graddis/156.
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This dissertation project researched sudent mobility-- school changes not due to customary promotion-- and its educational correlates, for students and schools in Vermont. Student mobility research in other states has found that the majority of these students are disadvantaged youth from low-income families, and they lag behind their peers academically. Academic consequences of student mobility affect not only students, but also their schools since NCLBA implementation sanctions influence school enrollments by increasing student transfers. The need for information about rural student mobility during early NCLBA implementation is significant in predominantly rural Vermont. This was the first statewide study of outcomes of mobility for students and schools in a rural state. Three basic research questions were: (a) What is the incidence of mobility among Vermont students and schools? (b) What is the impact of mobility, i.e., how does the incidence of mobility vary according to educational correlates for students and schools? (c) What do multilevel analytical models reveal about variation in mobility from student and school perspectives that may be useful for educational policy and practice? To address these questions, the study analyzed data for Vermont public school students, grades 1 through 12, during school years 1999-2004. Data sources included: (a) the Vermont Department of Education Student Census and Demographic Update; (b) student New Standards Reference Examination English Language Arts and Mathematics tests, grades 4, 8, and 10; (c) Vermont School Report indicators, and (d) NCES-US Census public school location information. In-depth cross-sectional and longitudinal analyses of mobility, performance, sociodemographic, and educational correlates revealed significant and disturbing relationships that merit policy and prevention follow-up programming. School-level mobility incidence indicated that while in-migration was 20% on average, over 30% of the schools experienced much higher rates, mirroring urban-based mobility incidence. Academically, mobile students performed 3-10 percentile ranks lower than their stable counterparts did across grade levels and content areas on standardized tests, for longitudinal cohorts as well as cross-sectional grade groups. Risk factor analyses revealed that mobile students, relative to their stable peers, were (a) more likely to participate in free or reduced lunch programs at school, (b) less likely to have a 504 plan in place, (c) more likely to have kept a writing portfolio for 0-1 years (versus 2-5 years), (d) more likely to have kept a mathematics portfolio 0-1 years (versus 2-5 years), and (e) more likely to not meet the standard on mathematics performance tests. Hierarchical generalized nonlinear modeling analyses indicated that between 8% and 32% of the variation in student mobility was attributable to school-level composition and resources. This project aimed to benefit the Vermont educational community in several ways. Analytical methodology will provide the framework for developing a longitudinal monitoring system with mobility incidence, impact, and relevant educational information. Information from analytical results will inform a case study during spring 2005 to address student mobility by raising public awareness of associated issues that affect not only the students and their families, but also classrooms, schools and communities.
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Lloyd, Sara H. "An exploratory study of the relationship between in-training examination percentiles of anesthesiology residents and the vermunt inventory of learning styles." Diss., Manhattan, Kan. : Kansas State University, 2007. http://hdl.handle.net/2097/443.
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Martin, Michael Steven. "Vermont's Sacred Cow: A Case Study of Local Control of Schools." ScholarWorks @ UVM, 2017. http://scholarworks.uvm.edu/graddis/737.
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ABSTRACT
When it comes to school governance, the concept of "local control" endures as a powerful social construct in some regions of the United States. In New England states, where traditional town meetings and small school districts still exist as important local institutions, the idea of local control is still an important element of policy considerations, despite increasing state and federal regulation of education in recent years.
With its small school districts and myriad governance structures, Vermont represents an extreme case example of the intersection between participatory democracy and the local control of schools. With nearly 285 school boards composed of over 1,400 school board members for a statewide k-12 population of just over 88,000 students, Vermont has the most board members per pupil in the nation. In addition, the state's patchwork of local districts, supervisory unions, unified districts, and other governance entities make up the most complex school governance system in the country. Following the passage of Act 46 in 2015, Vermont school districts began new voluntary merger negotiations and restructuring through the process known as "unification".
This qualitative case study of Vermont school governance examined the question of local control as a social construct across four school districts which, taken together, represent a range of attributes as defined by geography, demographics, and governance structures. Extended structured interviews comprised of image-based prompts and open-ended questions with 19 school board members provided the principal source of data. A review of state and local documents and interviews with 11 superintendents and policymakers allowed for triangulation of the data.
Results suggested these principal findings: 1) multiple meanings of local control coexist, 2) statutory requirements and limited local resources curtail the exercise of local control in practice, and 3) school boards are starting to take a broader view of governance by emphasizing stewardship over micromanagement and redefining local communities beyond town boundaries.
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Rucker, Frank D. "What is the cost of an adequate Vermont high school education?" 2010. https://scholarworks.umass.edu/dissertations/AAI3397742.
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Access to an adequate education has been widely considered an undeniable right since Chief Justice Warren stated in his landmark decision that “Today, education is perhaps the most important function of state and local governments…it is doubtful that any child may reasonably be expected to succeed in life if he is denied the opportunity of an education” (Brown vs. Board of Education, 1954). State constitutions establish rights to public education. State legislatures define expected outcomes and funding mechanisms to operate schools. Over the past sixteen years, plaintiffs have overwhelmingly prevailed in court cases where they have claimed that children have been denied access to an adequate education. Close scrutiny of state education finance systems revealed that few states had seriously attempted to determine objectively the amount of resources actually required to meet children’s learning requirements (Rebell, 2006). The purpose of this study is to assist policy makers in efforts to link resources with expected and mandated outcomes. The central question addressed is “what is the cost of an adequate high school education?” Recommendations focus on: (1) how an adequate education should be defined; (2) understanding conditions that affect student outcomes; (3) using successful school smart practices to allocate resources; and (4) the cost of adequacy. Findings from this study identified three spending thresholds. Vermont high schools that spent below $10,006/pupil in total “current expense,” below $685/pupil in student support services, or below $595/pupil in administrative services, were very unlikely to have provided an adequate education. The statewide cost of adequacy requires an additional 4.2% in spending per pupil if all schools spend at the threshold level (based on 4 year averages 2002-2005). Recommendations articulate the need for policy makers to accept responsibility for setting student-outcome standards within a framework that considers student needs and the resources they are willing to appropriate to achieve mandated results. State funding incentives for allocating resources to schools must be reconsidered to address the inequitable system presently in place. Further research which articulates smart practices related to governance systems, school leadership, experiential learning opportunities, and instructional methods is necessary.
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Jain, Pushpam. "Explaining non-incremental changes in state policy : the case of Vermont /." 2000. http://gateway.proquest.com/openurl?url_ver=Z39.88-2004&res_dat=xri:pqdiss&rft_val_fmt=info:ofi/fmt:kev:mtx:dissertation&rft_dat=xri:pqdiss:9965096.
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Bickford, Tyler. "Children's Music, MP3 Players, and Expressive Practices at a Vermont Elementary School: Media Consumption as Social Organization among Schoolchildren." Thesis, 2011. https://doi.org/10.7916/D800081S.
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Over the last generation changes in the social structure of the family and children's command of an increasing share of family spending have led marketers to cultivate children as an important consumer demographic. The designation "tween," which one marketer refers to as kids "too old for Elmo but too young for Eminem," has become a catchall category that includes kids as young as four and as old as fifteen. Music marketed to children--led by the Disney juggernaut, which promotes superstar acts such as the Jonas Brothers and Hannah Montana/Miley Cyrus across television, radio, film, DVDs and CDs, and branded toys, clothing, and electronics--represents a rare "healthy" area of the music industry, whose growth has paralleled the expansion of portable media technologies throughout U.S. consumer culture. The increasing availability of portable media devices, along with the widespread installation of Internet terminals in schools and educators' turn toward corporate-produced "edutainment" for lessons, has reconfigured schools as central sites of children's media consumption. Off-brand MP3 players packaged with cheap and brightly colored earbuds have become more and more affordable, and marketers increasingly target kids with celebrity-branded music devices and innovations like Hasbro's iDog series of toy portable speakers, which fit naturally among children's colorful and interactive collections of toys. At the forefront of the "digital revolution, children are now active--even iconic--users of digital music technologies. This dissertation argues that tweens, as prominent consumers of ascendant music genres and media devices, represent a burgeoning counterpublic, whose expressions of solidarity and group affiliation are increasingly deferred to by mainstream artists and the entertainment industry. We appear to be witnessing the culmination of a process set in motion almost seventy years ago, when during the postwar period marketers experimented with promoting products directly to children, beginning to articulate children as a demographic identity group who might eventually claim independence and public autonomy for themselves. Through long-term ethnographic research at one small community of children at an elementary school in southern Vermont, this dissertation examines how these transformations in the commercial children's music and entertainment industry are revolutionizing they way children, their peers, and adults relate to one another in school. Headphones mediate face-to-face peer relationships, as children share their earbuds with friends and listen to music together while still participating in the dense overlap of talk, touch, and gesture in groups of peers. Kids treat MP3 players less like "technology" and more like "toys," domesticating them within traditional childhood material cultures already characterized by playful physical interaction and portable objects such as toys, trading cards, and dolls that can be shared, manipulated, and held close. And kids use digital music devices to expand their repertoires of communicative practices--like passing notes or whispering--that allow them to create and maintain connections with intimate friends beyond the reach of adults. Kids position the connections and interactions afforded by digital music listening as a direct challenge to the overarching goals around language and literacy that structure their experience of classroom education. Innovations in digital media and the new children's music industry furnish channels and repertoires through which kids express solidarity with other kids, with potentially transformative implications for the role and status of children's in their schools and communities.
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John, Steven B. "Teaching teams and student achievement in Vermont's middle schools." 2008. https://scholarworks.umass.edu/dissertations/AAI3325121.
Full textAbstract:
In the 1990s many educators asserted that interdisciplinary teams of teachers working with students in middle grades 5–8 were more effective than traditional instruction in isolated disciplines. Research reported elements of team teaching positively affect student learning, behavior, and achievement (Arhar, 1990, 1994; Arhar & Irvin, 1995; Dickinson & Erb, 1997; Flowers, Mertens & Mulhall, 1999, 2000; Mertens, Flowers & Mulhall, 1999). This study identifies the characteristics and practices of teaching teams that correlate with higher student performance in mathematics, reading and writing in the eighth grade. Student performance as measured by the New England Comprehensive Assessment Program (NECAP) was compared across teams teaching 7th graders in Vermont. The NECAP scores were adjusted to control for household income within each school district. The independent variables of teaching team characteristics and practices were measured by a team self-assessment survey developed using dimensions of teaching teams identified by the Connecticut Association of Schools (CAS), an individual questionnaire completed confidentially about how team members work together, and a survey for principals to identify demographic characteristics of each teaching team. This study found: (1) teaching teams giving students greater roles in decision-making correlate positively with student performance in reading and mathematics; (2) teaching teams communicating with parents via email or website correlate positively with student performance in mathematics; and (3) three descriptors of internal teaching team dynamics are associated positively with student performance. The study also found elements of teaching teams that correlate negatively with student performance. These include: (1) team identity including, motto, logo or mascot, mission, song, apparel, and team awards for students; (2) the extent of control teaching teams have over instruction; and (3) the use of student advisory groups. Finally, the study explored the impact of how teaching teams are formed (careful consideration does not impact effectiveness), the integration of a special education teacher on teams (negative impact on student achievement), and overall school size (schools with larger enrollments performed better).