Award Date

1-1-2008

Degree Type

Dissertation

Degree Name

Doctor of Education (EdD)

Department

Educational Leadership

First Committee Member

Patti Chance

Number of Pages

204

Abstract

Reaching National Educational Technology Standards (NETS) in rural schools is a daunting task for any superintendent. Rural school superintendents' commonly deal with underfunded budgets to meet demands of adding computers, educational software, and other innovative technology resources. Data for this study were collected from 309 self-defined rural school superintendents. Superintendents were selected to participate because of their ability to oversee a large portion of their school districts' financial planning and spenDing Data were analyzed regarding the impact that E-rate and other technology funding sources had on the implementation and progress towards reaching NETS; Measuring the impact of different funding sources on implementing and progressing towards reaching NETS came from two sections of a Rural School Technology Funding Survey (RSTFS). The first section was demographic and descriptive information, while the second section was divided into two parts. These two parts of the second section were multiplied together to produce a six by five matrix. All six rows of the matrix represented NETS and the five columns gave an indication of different funding sources districts used to meet those standards. Local and state funding sources were found most contributable to reaching NETS in rural school districts; The preponderance of superintendents signified that local funding sources contributed a great deal to reaching NETS. This study also indicates that a majority of superintendents perceived that E-rate, other federal funding, and other funding sources had nearly no contribution to reaching NETS. All of these funding sources with the exception of other funding, show that through standardized residuals superintendents with universal service report card grades of F and I are major contributors to the rejection of there being homogeneity among all superintendents with report card grades A, B, C, D, F, and I. State funding also lacked homogeneity across all six NETS and data suggests there to be no evidence from standardized residuals identifying which subgroup of superintendents with state universal service report card grade leads to the rejection of homogeneity; Finally, this study found no significant predictability of a superintendent's uses of E-rate and other technology funding sources to implement and progress towards reaching NETS. Exactly 30 multiple regressions yielded coefficients of determination for the predictability of superintendent perceptions on how five funding sources contributed to meeting all six NETS. The coefficients of determination were based on seven predictor variables including: (a) years of experience, (b) experience at current district, (c) number of applied grant applications, (d) number of grants awarded, (e) number of years district applied for E-rate, (f) amount of E-rate award for 1999--2000 school year, and (g) districts enrollment; The intent of this national study is to append to certain educational research being done in the field of educational funding for technology. Specifics of this research will add to a better understanding of how E-rate and other funding sources contribute to the implementation and progress towards reaching NETS. Policy makers will also have a better understanding of how future rural school technology initiatives and programs may be implemented to develop balanced funding sources consistent with meeting national standards.

Keywords

Funding; Implementing; Rural; Rural Education; School; Sources; Standards; Technology; Technology Standards

Controlled Subject

School management and organization; Educational technology; Education--Finance

File Format

pdf

File Size

4065.28 KB

Degree Grantor

University of Nevada, Las Vegas

Language

English

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Rights

IN COPYRIGHT. For more information about this rights statement, please visit http://rightsstatements.org/vocab/InC/1.0/

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