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    LGBT legal issues in Jesuit higher education
    (2008) Hughes, Bryce E.
    Issues facing the LGBT (lesbian, gay, bisexual, and transgender) community can prove to be a legal nightmare for college and university administrators to address, particularly at religiously affiliated institutions like Jesuit colleges. Administrators have to walk a fine line between nondiscrimination statutes and the religious beliefs and teachings of the school's affiliation. This paper explores the main legal issues pertaining to the LGBT community on campus, including students, employees (faculty and staff), and university policy. It offers a historical perspective on these issues, including a quick overview of Catholic Church doctrine and relevant United States case law, and summarizes implications for administrators at Jesuit colleges and universities. Finally, it makes recommendations to administrators ways in which Jesuit colleges and universities can address these issues, staying true to their mission while being mindful of all human experiences. In 2004, Gonzaga University became the first Jesuit university to establish an LGBT (lesbian, gay, bisexual, and transgender) Resource Center, a much needed but highly controversial milestone in the history of providing LGBT services at Jesuit colleges and universities. Due to their relationship with the Roman Catholic Church, Jesuit universities are faced with the complex issue of balancing their need to provide student support with their need to maintain Catholic identity. This is especially true with regard to LGBT issues because of the Church's strong stance on homosexuality, particularly at Catholic universities, which train future priests. This paper will examine several issues related to sexual orientation facing different facets of the university community (students, employees, and policy), summarizing legal and policy implications for Jesuit colleges and universities. Then these trends will be analyzed through several perspectives to extract implications for Jesuit higher education, ultimately resulting in recommendations for handling LGBT affairs on Jesuit campuses. The purpose is not to call on Jesuit higher education to challenge the Vatican on its stance on homosexuality, but rather to encourage institutions to remain faithful to their mission of intellectual curiosity and thirst for justice. Unfortunately, the scope of this paper cannot meet the goal of addressing LGBT issues broadly. The acronym LGBT includes the letter T, referring to the community of people who identify as transgender. Issues impacting the transgender community, those relating to gender identity or expression, are not explicitly addressed here despite the need for a voice for the transgender community on Jesuit campuses. A whole separate paper could be written to address concerns specifically related to gender identity and expression. Some of the issues that affect lesbian, gay, and bisexual communities will impact the transgender community as well, but for the sake of analysis, this paper will focus on issues related to sexual orientation.
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    Measuring work conditions for teachers of American Indian students
    (2008) Erickson, Joanne L.; Terhune, M. Neil; Ruff, William G.
    The purpose of this study was to re-validate the Quality of Teacher Work Life Survey (QTWLS) with a population of 404 teachers in Montana schools with predominant American Indian student enrollments; and to describe the job-related stress and satisfaction of those teachers. Factor analysis showed nine satisfaction and eight stress factors with this population compared to eleven satisfaction and 10 stress factors in Pelsma, Richard, and Harrington’s (1989) original study with primarily Caucasian teachers and students. Knowledge of these results on the QTWLS could lead to interventions that contribute to an improved work life for teachers of American Indian students and increased learning among the students.
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    Leadership, quality, and school improvement: A reflection
    (2008-08) Ruff, William G.
    The author discussed the notion of leadership as instilling within individuals and infusing within a community the greater capacity for experiencing quality. The meaning of capacity and quality was deconstructed to provide clarity. Capacity was viewed as the potentiality of individuals to assume multiple roles, view events from different circumstances, and determine action from a variety of possible responses. The author defined quality as the close alignment of a mental model to the current reality of a situation. An argument was elaborated concluding that school leadership requires empowerment, but without the requirement for inquiry as well, quality remains unattainable.
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    Moral spaces in MySpace: Preservice teachers’ perspectives about ethical issues in social networking
    (2009-01) Foulger, Teresa S.; Ewbank, Ann D.; Kay, Adam; Osborn Popp, Sharon; Carter, Heather L.
    My Space and Facebook are innovative digital communication tools that surpass traditional means of social interaction. However, in some instances in which educators have used these tools, public reactions to them have resulted in sanctions. With the notion that traditional ideas of privacy and teacher conduct are not yet defined in online worlds, the researchers developed a case-based reasoning intervention to support more informed decisions by preservice teachers. The case-based coursework led students to perceive a need for more definitive guidelines about their participation in social networking spaces. The findings have professional development implications for educators and educational institutions that wish to harness the positive potential of social networking tools without risking professional status.
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    Education library 2.0: The establishment of a dynamic multi-site liaison program
    (2009-12) Ewbank, Ann D.
    Using a combination of marketing, Web 2.0 tools, videoconferencing, face-to-face instruction and site visits, a library presence including systematic information literacy instruction is embedded into multiple programs at sixteen sites in a growing college of education with nearly 6000 students and over 115 full-time faculty members. As the needs of the students and faculty evolve, the library program responds. This article describes the education library liaison program for Arizona State University’s College of Teacher Education and Leadership, including both successes and challenges, within the context of university, college, and library change.
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    Leading with Heart: Urban Elementary Principals as Advocates for Students
    (2009) Rodríguez, Mariela A.; Murakami-Ramalho, Elizabeth; Ruff, William G.
    Principals in urban settings serve elementary schools often densely populated with highly mobile, ethnically diverse, and economically disadvantaged students (Dworkin, Toenjes, Purser, & Sheikh-Hussin, 2000). Due to the changing landscape of increasing accountability issues required by the No Child Left Behind Act (NCLB) (2001), principals must adjust the mission of the school community to meet legislative demands (Johnson, 2004). Elementary principals are now heavily invested in strategies to meet the increased expectations of raising students’ academic performance. It is important to understand how urban elementary school principals reconcile the tensions between accountability and equality for all students.
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    A survey of organization and practice in several semi-nongraded school systems
    (Montana State University - Bozeman, College of Education, 1967) Owens, Olive V.
    The purpose of this study was to obtain first-hand information concerning the organization and administration of nongraded school systems. Five semi-nongraded or nongraded schools were visited. Principals, personnel and parents were interviewed. Principals of the five schools also responded to a written inquiry. In addition, representatives of two schools not visited granted interviews and completed the written inquiry. All schools approached cooperated. Some similarities in operation and administration were evident: 1. All of the schools responding were organized on a 'levels' plan for reading skills. 2. Initial ungrading began with some or all of the primary years. 3. Thorough orientation of staff and community was deemed highly important. 4. Lack of appropriate materials was a limiting factor. 5. More funds for equipment, materials and additional personnel were needed. 6. Each school devised its own reporting plan. Operation and administration varied in these respects: 1. Bases for evaluation of pupil progress (teacher judgement, reading tests based on textbook, and/or general achievement). 2. Plans for reporting to parents (conference, card, anecdotal, and/or combinations of two or more). 3. Number of levels for each year's work (from four per year to as many as seven). 4. Financial support of initial innovation (district or foundation). 5. Source of instigation for the plan (administration or teacher-administration group). 6. Organization of groups within classes (by achievement and/or interest). 7. Basis for assignment to classrooms (achievement, age, personality). 8. Extent of curriculum and years which were ungraded at first and currently (only reading in one or more primary grades to all areas in entire school). There appeared to be no one 'best' plan for implementing a nongraded school. There was only a consensus of philosophy. Administrators, staff and parents were generally enthusiastic about the plan. There was a lack of objective evaluation, even in the schools which had operated the plan the longest number of years.
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    A comparison of the achievement test scores in the intermediate grades in a school using performance grouping and a school using heterogeneous grouping
    (Montana State College, Division of Education, 1961) Burton, Priscilla J.
    The main purpose of this study was to investigate whether or not a form of ability grouping known as performance grouping had an effect on the students' achievement test scores that would not be obtained in a heterogeneous classroom. The major hypothesis held was that added gains would be shown on the standardized achievement test scores by the students in a school using performance grouping that would not be shown by students in a school using heterogeneous grouping.
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    Self concept, marital adjustment, and academic achievement
    (Montana State University - Bozeman, College of Education, 1978) Loberg, Larry Gordon; Chairperson, Graduate Committee: Richard Horswill
    This study investigated the interrelationships between self concept, marital adjustment, and academic achievement as measured by grade-point-average. A proportional stratified random sample of students living in married student housing at Montana State University was drawn. The participants were administered three instruments: a biographical questionaire, the Locke Marital Adjustment Test, and the Tennessee Self Concept Scale. The variables, self concept, marital adjustment, grade-point-average, family income, age, years of marriage, parental status, class level, employment status, housing conditions, family self, social self, personal self, moral-ethical self, physical self, behavior, identity, and self satisfaction were correlated using the Pearson product-moment correlation coefficient. The results showed a significant correlation at the .05 level of confidence between self concept and marital adjustment, self concept and grade-point-average, and self concept subscale categories of family, social, personal, moral-ethical, and physical selves and marital adjustment. A significant correlation between marital adjustment and number of years of marriage, wife^ enrollment in college and marital adjustment, and between family income level and self concept was found to exist. The results showed no significant correlation between housing conditions and marital adjustment, housing conditions and self concept, parental status and marital adjustment, parental status and self concept, marital adjustment and grade-point-average of the wife, self satisfaction and marital adjustment, and class level and marital adjustment.
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    Diorama construction simplified
    (Montana State College, Division of Education, 1960) Simmons, Hugh G.
    The decade preceding the 1960's was an age when the interests of students' and adults' were many and varied. Because of this diversification of interests, ideas to be presented had to be short, to the point, and interesting for effective communication. Each year history was being made, studied, and forgotten by students trying to keep up with the fast-changing pace of events. It was the opinion of the writer that there was a way in which important events could be recorded which would enable students not only to understand an event, but to gain an understanding of the forces or actions which led up to the event. It was the writer's contention that the preparation for and the construction of a diorama, a three dimensional scene incorporating three-dimensional objects with backgrounds in perspective, could stimulate and vitalize history courses at the high school level. The purpose of this investigation was three-fold: to construct a diorama, to produce a slide film set and guide, and to record the various steps in the construction of the diorama.
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