Date of Award
1997
Document Type
Dissertation
Degree Name
Doctor of Education (EdD)
Department
Educational Leadership
First Advisor
Angela M. Sewall, EdD
Abstract
Student discipline in the public schools has been a major public concern. Public elementary schools in school districts in and around Little Rock, Arkansas are faced with rising numbers of discipline referrals resulting in out-of-school suspensions. This study examined three questions: (1) Is there a significant relationship between elementary school climates (open, closed, mixed) and the relative frequency of suspensions? (2) Is there a significant relationship between elementary school teachers' and principals' pupil control orientation, humanistic or custodial, and the frequency of suspensions assigned? (3) Is there a relationship between school climate and pupil control ideology? Certified teachers, principals, and counselors employed at their school for at least two years comprised the study population. The OCDQ-RE was used to evaluate school climate and the Pupil Control Ideology Form (PCI) was used to evaluate pupil control ideology. Pearson correlation coefficients and ANOVA were the statistical procedures used. Analysis of the data indicates that: (a) there is a relationship between two of the six climate sub-tests — principal supportive behavior and teacher intimate behavior — and the frequency of school suspensions, but no relationship between the general measures of school climate and suspensions; (b) there is no relationship between pupil control ideology and the frequency of suspensions; and (c) there is no significant relationship between school climate and pupil control ideology.
Recommended Citation
Brown-Rauton, Julia, "The Relationship Among School Climates, Pupil Control Ideologies, and Relative Frequency of Student Suspensions in Pulaski County Elementary (K-6) Schools" (1997). Theses and Dissertations. 162.
https://research.ualr.edu/etd/162
