Teacher Education, Educational Leadership & Policy ETDs

James L. Maw

Publication Date

9-15-1971

Abstract

This study was designed to measure attitudinal interactions of selected vocational school teachers and students concerning grades and attendance, school policy problems, at a Technical Vocational Institute. This was done in an attempt to determine whether students and teachers viewed themselves and existing attendance and grading policy as constants or variables. It was assumed that those receiving scores indicating they considered themselves constants would be more likely to support the existing policy while those receiving scores indi­cating they considered themselves variables would be more likely to desire a policy change.

Teachers and student attitudinal interactions were measured and plotted on a graph to represent a synthesis of teacher and student attitudes as measured by the Kerlinger-Kaya Progressive Traditional Educational Scale. The graph and the Kerlinger-Kaya Educational Scale are integral parts of the Educational Attitudinal Synthetic Plane Placement Instrument, developed by Felix Garcia Jr. and John P. Grillo, which was used for this study.

Seventy students and fifteen teachers participated in the study, and all student testing was done in the classrooms of the Technical Vocational Institute within one week. The students represented two disciplines, Data Processing and Machine Trades. Data was handled through a computer program developed by John P. Grillo, a co­-developer of the EASPP. This program synthesizes student and teacher attitudinal interaction scores into one graph plot for interpretative purposes.

It was found that the majority of teachers and students held progressive subscale scores as measured by the Kerlinger-Kaya Educational Scale. Moreover, when students selected teachers and teachers selected students to match established problems on the opinionnaire, the combination of scores was predominately progressive. These reactions seemed to indicate the majority of respon­ dents have indicated their propensity to change the Technical Vocational Institute policy for grades and attendance with grades being considered more a variable than attendance was considered a variable.

The Data Processing II and V groups were found to be the most reactionary and variable, and Machine Trades III was the least variable. When students chose teachers to match the established problems, it was found that teachers contributed more progressive attitudinal intensity for changing grades than was exhibited by the selecting students.

This instrument could be used to identify potential partners in the change process if administrators are interested in including staff or students in policy change. School personnel, collegiate educators and State Departments of Education leaders could employ this instrument with different problems to measure attitudinal intersections related to policy change.

Document Type

Dissertation

Language

English

Degree Name

Secondary Education

Level of Degree

Doctoral

Department Name

Teacher Education, Educational Leadership & Policy

First Committee Member (Chair)

Alvin Wendell Howard

Second Committee Member

Robert Harold White

Third Committee Member

Bonner Milton Crawford

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