Date of Award

Spring 5-15-2026

Degree Type

Dissertation

Degree Name

Executive Ed.D. in Education Leadership Management and Policy

Department

Education Leadership, Management and Policy

Advisor

Jason Burns, Ph.D.

Committee Member

Aubrey Johnson, Ed.D.

Committee Member

Erin Grogan, PhD.

Keywords

teacher academic expectations, state education policy, Pygmalion Effect, charter management organization, standards-based accountability, NWEA MAP Growth, Expectancy theory, mathematics achievement, education reform.

Abstract

Standards-based reform has shaped American education for decades, yet the mechanisms through which state policy influences what teachers expect of students and how those expectations shape student outcomes remain understudied. This quantitative study investigates the relationship between state education policy, teacher academic expectations, and student achievement in elementary and middle schools within a single charter management organization (CMO) operating in both Philadelphia, Pennsylvania and Camden, New Jersey. The study utilizes a unique natural experiment: twenty-four schools sharing a common curriculum, instructional model, salary schedule, and leadership structure, but operating under two distinct state accountability systems. This design allows state policy context to be isolated as a variable of interest while holding organizational factors constant.

Grounded in Vroom's expectancy theory (1964) and the Pygmalion Effect (Rosenthal & Jacobson, 1968), the study is guided by three research questions examining whether teachers in different states form different academic expectations, the relationship between teacher expectations and student achievement, and whether that relationship differs by state context. Four data sources were analyzed: teacher expectations as measured by the TNTP Instructional Culture Insight Survey (Academic Expectations and Academic Opportunity domains), student achievement and growth on the NWEA MAP assessment, state proficiency data from the Pennsylvania System of School Assessment (PSSA) and New Jersey Student Learning Assessment (NJSLA), and NWEA linking studies to enable cross-state comparisons on a common scale. Analytical methods progressed from cross-sectional regression to school fixed effects and student fixed effects panel models using STATA, providing increasing rigor across five model specifications.

Results indicate that teachers in New Jersey report significantly higher Academic Expectations (M = 5.88 vs. 4.42, difference = 1.47 points, p < .001) and Academic Opportunity scores (M = 6.57 vs. 4.71, difference = 1.86 points, p < .001) than their Pennsylvania counterparts. State context alone explained 23.7% of variation in Academic Expectations and 38.6% of variation in Academic Opportunity, with differences stable across all years measured (2019–2023). Teacher expectations were significantly and positively associated with student math growth across all model specifications, with each one-point increase in Academic Expectations associated with a 2.54 percentile point increase in math growth after demographic controls. The expectations-achievement relationship was approximately twice as strong in New Jersey as in Pennsylvania in cross-sectional analyses; however, student fixed effects panel models revealed that the within-student expectation-achievement relationship operated similarly across both states (β = 3.72, p < .001), suggesting that state policy shapes the level and distribution of expectations rather than the fundamental mechanism through which they influence individual learning.

These findings carry meaningful implications for state policymakers, charter school leaders, and education practitioners. They suggest that state accountability policy established through academic standards, assessment rigor, and teacher certification requirements functions as a cascading influence on teacher expectations and ultimately student outcomes, with particular consequence for mathematics achievement in the critical middle school years.

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