Rachel Kushner
Pronouns: She/ Her/ Hers
UROP Fellowship: Center for Human Growth and Development
Research Mentor(s): Christina Weiland, EdD
School of Education
Presentation Date: Wednesday, July 29, 2020 | Session 1 | Presenter: 2
Authors: Rachel Kushner, Paola Guerrero, Christina Weiland
Abstract
The Boston Public Schools is a national leader in providing high-quality universal prekindergarten (UPK) for four year olds. Like the vast majority of universal pre-K programs in the United States, Boston offers children UPK seats in both public elementary schools and community-based centers. To date, there is little research on how children’s experiences and readiness for kindergarten differ across prekindergarten settings, and little is known about efforts to apply high-quality curricular models across sites. The Boston UPK project hopes to address this by extending the BPS prekindergarten model, which has had consistent success in narrowing kindergarten racial and income achievement gaps, into target community-based sites through funding, close communication with directors, and coaching and professional development supports. Our UPK team aims to document the facilitators and barriers of successful implementation using classroom observation videos, surveys, and qualitative interviews with directors, teachers, and coaches across two years (2019-2021). Due to the global pandemic, most UPK sites had to close in spring 2020. Accordingly, the study team’s work had to adapt as well. By analyzing the data we have and are continuing to collect from now online PD sessions, I’ve been able to work with mentors and team members to answer questions from BPS and provide useful information for years to come. Working alongside another RA, I quantified descriptions of the coaches’ informal meetings in 2019-2020 (pre-pandemic) into codes which capture the content covered. When combined with descriptives from scheduled coaching sessions, the data will reveal how coaches addressed the unique needs of each center. I also used Stata to produce a comprehensive report to inform BPS of the degree to which key members in each center participated in the various PD sessions. This report will inform BPS’s decision on how to distribute their resources for continued training sessions, targeting the sites which need it most. On a broader scale, the detailed documentation of in-person and online PD lessons and their reception can be used by other school systems who must conduct training online due to the current situation or pre-existing challenges posed by rural locations.
Google Slide Presentation
Presentation Script
Research Disciplines
Social Sciences
