Identifying the Supports and Challenges of High School Latino English Language Learners

Two out of three English Language Learners (ELLs) graduate from secondary schools nationwide. Of the nearly five million ELLs in public schools, more than 70% of these students’ first language is Spanish. In order to understand and resolve this phenomena and in an effort to increase the number of graduates, this research examined what high school Latino ELLs identified as the major external and internal factors that support or challenge them on the graduation pathway. The study utilized a 32 quantitative and qualitative question student survey, as well as student focus groups. Both the survey and the focus groups were conducted in English and Spanish. The questions considered the following factors: 1) value of education; 2) expectations in achieving their long-term goals; 3) current education levels; 4) expectations before coming to the United States; 5) family obligations; and 6) future aspirations. The survey was administered to 159 Latino ELLs enrolled in grades 9-12. Research took place at three high schools that provide English for Speakers of Other Languages (ESOL) classes in a large school system in the Mid-Atlantic region. The three schools involved in the study have more than 1,500 ELLs. Two of the schools had large ESOL instructional programs, and one school had a comparatively smaller ESOL program. The majority of students surveyed were from El Salvador (72%) and Guatemala (12.6%). Using Qualtrics, an independent facilitator and a bilingual translator administered the online survey tool to the students during their ESOL classes. Two weeks later, the researcher hosted three follow-up focus groups, totaling 37 students from those students who took the survey. Each focus group was conducted at the three schools by the lead researcher and the translator. The purpose of the focus group was to obtain deeper insight on how secondary age Latino ELLs defined success in school, what they identified to be their support factors, and how previous and present experiences helped or hindered their goals. From the research findings, ten recommendations range from suggested policy updates to cross-cultural/equity training for students and staff; they were developed, stemming from the findings and what the students identified.

Ledroit Park, A Portrait In Black And White: A Study Of Historic Districts, Social Change, And The Process Of Neighborhood Placemaking

This research examines the process of placemaking in LeDroit Park, a residential Washington, DC, neighborhood with a historic district at its core. Unpacking the entwined physical and social evolution of the small community within the context of the Nation’s Capital, this analysis provides insight into the role of urban design and development as well as historic designation on shaping collective identity. Initially planned and designed in 1873 as a gated suburb just beyond the formal L’Enfant-designed city boundary, LeDroit Park was intended as a retreat for middle and upper-class European Americans from the growing density and social diversity of the city. With a mixture of large romantic revival mansions and smaller frame cottages set on grassy plots evocative of an idealized rural village, the physical design was intentionally inwardly-focused. This feeling of refuge was underscored with a physical fence that surrounded the development, intended to prevent African Americans from nearby Howard University and the surrounding neighborhood, from using the community’s private streets to access the City of Washington. Within two decades of its founding, LeDroit Park was incorporated into the District of Columbia, the surrounding fence was demolished, and the neighborhood was racially integrated. Due to increasingly stringent segregation laws and customs in the city, this period of integration lasted less than twenty years, and LeDroit Park developed into an elite African American enclave, using the urban design as a bulwark against the indignities of a segregated city. Throughout the 20th century housing infill and construction increased density, yet the neighborhood never lost the feeling of security derived from the neighborhood plan. Highlighting the architecture and street design, neighbors successfully received historic district designation in 1974 in order to halt campus expansion. After a stalemate that lasted two decades, the neighborhood began another period of transformation, both racial and socio-economic, catalyzed by a multi-pronged investment program led by Howard University. Through interviews with long-term and new community members, this investigation asserts that the 140-year development history, including recent physical interventions, is integral to placemaking, shaping the material character as well as the social identity of residents.

Sonic Movie Memories: Sound, Childhood, and American Cinema

Though the trend rarely receives attention, since the 1970s many American filmmakers have been taking sound and music tropes from children’s films, television shows, and other forms of media and incorporating those sounds into films intended for adult audiences. Initially, these references might seem like regressive attempts at targeting some nostalgic desire to relive childhood. However, this dissertation asserts that these children’s sounds are instead designed to reconnect audience members with the multi-faceted fantasies and coping mechanisms that once, through children’s media, helped these audience members manage life’s anxieties. Because sound is the sense that Western audiences most associate with emotion and memory, it offers audiences immediate connection with these barely conscious longings. The first chapter turns to children’s media itself and analyzes Disney’s 1950s forays into television. The chapter argues that by selectively repurposing the gentlest sonic devices from the studio’s films, television shows like Disneyland created the studio’s signature sentimental “Disney sound.” As a result, a generation of baby boomers like Steven Spielberg comes of age and longs to recreate that comforting sound world. The second chapter thus focuses on Spielberg, who incorporates Disney music in films like Close Encounters of the Third Kind (1977). Rather than recreate Disney’s sound world, Spielberg uses this music as a springboard into a new realm I refer to as “sublime refuge” - an acoustic haven that combines overpowering sublimity and soothing comfort into one fantastical experience. The second half of the dissertation pivots into more experimental children’s cartoons like Gerald McBoing-Boing (1951) - cartoons that embrace audio-visual dissonance in ways that soothe even as they create tension through a phenomenon I call “comfortable discord.” In the final chapter, director Wes Anderson reveals that these sonic tensions have just as much appeal to adults. In films like The Royal Tenenbaums (2001), Anderson demonstrates that comfortable discord can simultaneously provide a balm for anxiety and create an open-ended space that makes empathetic connections between characters possible. The dissertation closes with a call to rethink nostalgia, not as a romanticization of the past, but rather as a reconnection with forgotten affective channels.