This qualitative study examined California community colleges' holistic, campus-wide compliance with the Americans with Disabilities Act and related laws and regulations, looking beyond individual academic adjustments. After considering the history of disability law, the research used officially reported legal decisions involving California…

Problem-based learning (PBL) is an instructional approach that formed in medical school and holds students responsible for their learning as they solve a hypothetical real-world problem. Research on this instructional approach in K-12 settings is emerging, with most of the existing literature utilizing high school students and science. Few studies…

This dissertation examines the effects of safety culture, including operational climate and practices, as well as the adoption and use of information systems for delivering high quality healthcare and improved patient experience. Chapter 2 studies the influence of both general and outcome-specific hospital climate and quality practices on process…

Green building and design is an emerging trend in institutions of higher education. It is important to consider the practices and expectations of the users of green buildings. The attitudes of faculty, staff, and students play a key role in the overall successful performance of green buildings. This study offers direction for the intentional…

Purpose: The purpose of this study was to determine the degree of importance that DuFour's nine characteristics of highly effective schools have on closing the academic achievement gap on the California High School Exit Exam, as perceived by high school principals. The study also examined the strategies believed to be most important in…

Purpose: The purpose of this study was to describe, measure, compare, and contrast the perceptions of elementary teachers and principals regarding the degree to which the schools in which they are employed have implemented learning organizations conforming to Senge's (1990) 5 disciplines: mental models, personal mastery, shared vision, team…

This research study is a case study of the development of an African-centered school over a 20-year period. The study describes how the kindergarten-through-eighth-grade institution was established. Interview questions focused on: 1. Establishment of an African-centered institution 2. Challenges of setting up an African-centered institution 3.…

The study explored the different kinds of instructional structures used in elementary schools in Virginia and why they were used according to principals. The findings and implications of this study are important to the field of school leadership and instructional structures. No study in the past has provided a rich description of how and why…

Purpose: The purpose of this study was to determine the most necessary and the most feasibly practicable future leadership behaviors of the educational leader of a California Schools to Watch-Taking Center Stage middle school necessary to lead a school organization toward continued survival. Methodology: The participants in the present study were…

The current context of education, with an emphasis on high stakes testing and curricular mandates, is affecting motivation in schools (Au, 2007; Barksdale-Ladd & Thomas, 2000; Ryan & Brown, 2004; Supovitz, 2009). It is important to study the relations between teaching in such contexts and teacher and student motivation. The purpose of this…

The intent of this qualitative phenomenological research study was to explore the influence of financial knowledge application and financial debts or freedom of traditional Texas college students. The study identified how financial knowledge application influenced whether traditional Texas college students do or do not accumulate debt. The study…

Purpose: The purpose of this study was to determine if there was a significant difference between first-generation college students' and non-first-generation college students' persistence from freshman year to sophomore year of college. The study investigated if race/ethnicity, family income, gender, and fathers' and mothers'…

The current quantitative study measured the perceptions of students towards online-only learning and towards blended-hybrid learning. Descriptive statistics were implemented to analyze the data from a Likert-type survey, administered to students in degree-seeking programs at an institution of higher learning. A "t"-test and…

According to Department of Education reports on public high school dropout rates for 2009, a national average of 44.3% of dropouts left their secondary school education in the 11th and 12th grades. The majority of school dropouts attributed the reason for dropping out of school to boredom. High social and economic costs associated with dropping…

This dissertation presents a formal theory of Serbo-Croatian grammar. The theory predicts acceptable form/meaning pairs for a substantial chunk of Serbo-Croatian. In particular, we analyze Serbo-Croatian declarative and interrogative main clauses, embedded clauses, a couple of different types of nominal modification, control and predication, as…