Abstract

The practice of tracking has had longstanding negative impacts on students, especially students in lower academic tracks. This research suggests that tracking develops the themes of a narrative of deficit through inequality and exclusion and impedes student motivation due to the negative implications. A common finding of outside research studies was that of disapproval for the current school organizational structure of tracking due to the negative consequences on students. Furthermore, several research studies developed an outline of positive ways to advocate for a unifying system of educational change. Educational leaders should heed the suggestions of researchers to promote changes within the system to benefit marginalized students. Students' silenced narratives should be considered to promote voice within educational change. The purpose of this narrative research is to explore motivation through the overt and covert narratives of 10th grade English Language Arts students, who self-select higher and lower academic tracks at a large, southeastern United States, public high school through a qualitative unstructured questionnaire. This study also observes 10th grade English Language Arts students' ability to discuss these issues. Using information from a 10-question qualitative, unstructured questionnaire of twelve (12) research participants, this thesis explores the following questions: Research question one (RQ1): What are 10th grade English Language Arts students' attitudes towards higher and lower academic tracks?, Research question two (RQ2): What factors contribute to 10th grade English Language Arts students' motivation to self-select higher and lower academic tracks?

Notes

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Graduation Date

2019

Semester

Summer

Advisor

Olan, Elsie

Degree

Master of Education (M.Ed.)

College

College of Community Innovation and Education

Department

School of Teacher Education

Degree Program

Secondary Education; English Language Arts Education

Format

application/pdf

Identifier

CFE0007640

URL

http://purl.fcla.edu/fcla/etd/CFE0007640

Language

English

Release Date

August 2019

Length of Campus-only Access

None

Access Status

Masters Thesis (Open Access)

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