Effect of an inservice on the teachers' knowledge of general school law, Section 504, and the Meta Consent Decree

It is generally assumed by educators that inservice training will make a significant difference in teacher knowledge of topics related to education. This investigation addressed that assumption by examining the effects of various factors, e.g., amount and timing of inservice training, upon teacher knowledge of educational law. Of special interest was teacher knowledge of the law as it pertained to ethnic and other characteristics of students in urban school settings. This study was deliberately designed to determine which factors should be later investigated in a more deterministic form, e.g., an experimental design.^ The investigation built upon that of Ogletree (1985), Osborne (1996) and others who focused on the importance of teacher development as a method to enhance professional abilities. The main question addressed in this study was, "How knowledgeable are teachers of school law, especially with regard to general school law, the Meta Consent Decree and Section 504 of the Rehabilitation Act of 1973."^ The study participants (N = 302) were from the Dade County School System, the fourth largest in the U.S. The survey design (approved by the System), specified participants from all levels and types of schools and geographic representations. A survey instrument was created, pilot tested, revised and approved for use by the district official representatives. After administration of the instrument, the resultant data was treated by several appropriate tests, e.g., multivariate analysis of variance (ANOVA).^ Several findings emerged from the analysis of the data: in general, teachers did not have sufficient knowledge of school law; factors, such as amount and level of education, and status and position were positively correlated with increased knowledge; factors such as years of experience, gender, race and ethnicity were not correlated with higher levels of knowledge. The most significant, however, was that when teachers had participated in several inservice training experiences, typically workshops, and, when combined with other factors noted above, their knowledge of school law was significantly higher. Specific recommendations for future studies were made. ^

Statistical analysis and meta-analysis of microarray data

The microarray technology provides a high-throughput technique to study gene expression. Microarrays can help us diagnose different types of cancers, understand biological processes, assess host responses to drugs and pathogens, find markers for specific diseases, and much more. Microarray experiments generate large amounts of data. Thus, effective data processing and analysis are critical for making reliable inferences from the data. ^ The first part of dissertation addresses the problem of finding an optimal set of genes (biomarkers) to classify a set of samples as diseased or normal. Three statistical gene selection methods (GS, GS-NR, and GS-PCA) were developed to identify a set of genes that best differentiate between samples. A comparative study on different classification tools was performed and the best combinations of gene selection and classifiers for multi-class cancer classification were identified. For most of the benchmarking cancer data sets, the gene selection method proposed in this dissertation, GS, outperformed other gene selection methods. The classifiers based on Random Forests, neural network ensembles, and K-nearest neighbor (KNN) showed consistently god performance. A striking commonality among these classifiers is that they all use a committee-based approach, suggesting that ensemble classification methods are superior. ^ The same biological problem may be studied at different research labs and/or performed using different lab protocols or samples. In such situations, it is important to combine results from these efforts. The second part of the dissertation addresses the problem of pooling the results from different independent experiments to obtain improved results. Four statistical pooling techniques (Fisher inverse chi-square method, Logit method. Stouffer's Z transform method, and Liptak-Stouffer weighted Z-method) were investigated in this dissertation. These pooling techniques were applied to the problem of identifying cell cycle-regulated genes in two different yeast species. As a result, improved sets of cell cycle-regulated genes were identified. The last part of dissertation explores the effectiveness of wavelet data transforms for the task of clustering. Discrete wavelet transforms, with an appropriate choice of wavelet bases, were shown to be effective in producing clusters that were biologically more meaningful. ^

Emotional intelligence and leadership in organizations: A meta-analytic test of process mechanisms

The present study—employing psychometric meta-analysis of 92 independent studies with sample sizes ranging from 26 to 322 leaders—examined the relationship between EI and leadership effectiveness. Overall, the results supported a linkage between leader EI and effectiveness that was moderate in nature (ρ = .25). In addition, the positive manifold of the effect sizes presented in this study, ranging from .10 to .44, indicate that emotional intelligence has meaningful relations with myriad leadership outcomes including effectiveness, transformational leadership, LMX, follower job satisfaction, and others. Furthermore, this paper examined potential process mechanisms that may account for the EI-leadership effectiveness relationship and showed that both transformational leadership and LMX partially mediate this relationship. However, while the predictive validities of EI were moderate in nature, path analysis and hierarchical regression suggests that EI contributes less than or equal to 1% of explained variance in leadership effectiveness once personality and intelligence are accounted for. ^

Content -area teachers' perceptions of the effect of the meta -training on their instructional practices

The purpose of this study was to explore the content-area teachers' perceptions of the effect that compliance with the teacher training for content-area teachers of Limited English Proficient (LEP) students mandated by the Consent Decree had on their instructional practices within the content-area classroom. In order to provide an overview of the factors which had an effect on the content-area teachers' mandated training, various areas were reviewed: history of legislative actions that led up to the Consent Decree; stipulations set forth in the Consent Decree; Miami-Dade County Public Schools District LEP Plan including stipulations for teacher training; research on teacher training for teachers of language minority students; and the process of change. This descriptive study specifically addresses teachers' perceptions of the effectiveness of the mandated teacher training as it relates to language minority students. ^ Content-area teachers who had completed the mandated teacher training were surveyed using self-administered anonymous questionnaires mailed to their school sites. Questions focused on the teachers' perceptions of: students' need of second language instructional strategies within the content-area classroom; teacher training requirements mandated by the Consent Decree; and changes in their instructional practices as a result of the training. ^ Based on the responses of the subjects, the results of this study indicate the overall success of the training implemented to comply with the stipulations set forth in the Consent Decree. In general, the results indicate that the teachers perceive that they are ultimately in agreement with the mandated training. The results also indicate that the teachers perceive a need for second language strategies when working with language minority students. These results can serve as starting point for further research not only into teachers' perceptions of the effectiveness of training for teachers of language minority students but also into the outcomes of this teacher training as it is reflected within the classroom. ^

A meta -analysis of empirical research studies on resilience among students at -risk for school failure

Being at-risk is a growing problem in the U.S. because of disturbing societal trends such as unemployment, divorce, substance abuse, child abuse and neglect, and the new threat of terrorist violence. Resilience characterizes individuals who rebound from or adapt to adversities such as these, and academic resilience distinguishes at-risk students who succeed in school despite hardships. ^ The purpose of this research was to perform a meta-analysis to examine the power of resilience and to suggest ways educators might improve academic resilience, which was operationalized by satisfactory test scores and grades. In order to find all studies that were relevant to academic resilience in at-risk kindergarten through 12th-grade students, extensive electronic and hardcopy searches were conducted, and these resulted in a database of 421 articles. Two hundred eighty seven of these were rejected quickly, because they were not empirical research. Upon further examination, another 106 were rejected for not meeting study protocol criteria. Ultimately, 28 studies were coded for study level descriptors and effect size variables. ^ Protective factors for resilience were found to originate in physical, psychological, and behavioral domains on proximal/intraindividual, transitional/intrafamilial, or distal/extrafamilial levels. Effect sizes (ESs) for these were weighted and the means for each level or category were interpreted by commonly accepted benchmarks. Mean effect sizes for proximal (M = .27) and for transitional (M = .15) were small but significant. The mean effect size for the distal level was insignificant. This supported the hypotheses that the proximal level was the source of most protective factors for academic resilience in at-risk students followed by the transitional level. The distal effect size warranted further research particularly in light of the small number of studies (n = 11) contributing effect sizes to that category. A homogeneity test indicated a search for moderators, i.e., study variables affecting outcomes, was justified. “Category” was the largest moderator. Graphs of weighted mean effect sizes in the physical, psychological, and behavioral domains were plotted for each level to better illustrate the findings of the meta-analysis. Suggestions were made for combining resilience development with aspects of positive psychology to promote resilience in the schools. ^

Emotional Intelligence and Leadership in Organization: A Meta-analytic Test of Process Mechanisms

The present study – employing psychometric meta-analysis of 92 independent studies with sample sizes ranging from 26 to 322 leaders – examined the relationship between EI and leadership effectiveness. Overall, the results supported a linkage between leader EI and effectiveness that was moderate in nature (ρ = .25). In addition, the positive manifold of the effect sizes presented in this study, ranging from .10 to .44, indicate that emotional intelligence has meaningful relations with myriad leadership outcomes including effectiveness, transformational leadership, LMX, follower job satisfaction, and others. Furthermore, this paper examined potential process mechanisms that may account for the EI-leadership effectiveness relationship and showed that both transformational leadership and LMX partially mediate this relationship. However, while the predictive validities of EI were moderate in nature, path analysis and hierarchical regression suggests that EI contributes less than or equal to 1% of explained variance in leadership effectiveness once personality and intelligence are accounted for.

The State of our Toolbox: A Meta-analysis of Reliability Measurement Precision

My study investigated internal consistency estimates of psychometric surveys as an operationalization of the state of measurement precision of constructs in industrial and organizational (I/O) psychology. Analyses were conducted of samples used in research articles published in the Journal of Applied Psychology between 1975 and 2010 in five year intervals (K = 934) from 480 articles yielding 1427 coefficients. Articles and their respective samples were coded for test-taker characteristics (e.g., age, gender, and ethnicity), research settings (e.g., lab and field studies), and actual tests (e.g., number of items and scale anchor points). A reliability and inter-item correlations depository was developed for I/O variables and construct groups. Personality measures had significantly lower inter-item correlations than other construct groups. Also, internal consistency estimates and reporting practices were evaluated over time, demonstrating an improvement in measurement precision and missing data.