Unto Perfect Manhood: An Instrumental Case Study of Leadership Formation in an African American Boys Catholic High School - Daniel Ivan MacKinney

Loyola University Chicago Loyola eCommons Dissertations Theses and Dissertations 2010 Unto Perfect Manhood: An Instrumental Case Study of Leadership Formation in an African American Boys High School Daniel Ivan MacKinney Loyola University Chicago Follow this and additional works at: https://ecommons.edu/luc_diss Part of the Education Commons Recommended Citation MacKinney, Daniel Ivan, "Unto Perfect Manhood: An Instrumental Case Study of Leadership Formation in an African American Boys High School" (2010).edu/luc_diss/49 This Dissertation is brought to you for free and open access by the Theses and Dissertations at Loyola eCommons. It has been accepted for inclusion in Dissertations by an authorized administrator of Loyola eCommons. For more information, please contact ecommons@luc. This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-Noncommercial-No Derivative Works 3.

Copyright © 2010 Daniel Ivan MacKinney LOYOLA UNIVERSITY CHICAGO UNTO PERFECT MANHOOD: AN INSTRUMENTAL CASE STUDY OF LEADERSHIP FORMATION IN AN AFRICAN AMERICAN BOYS CATHOLIC HIGH SCHOOL A DISSERTATION SUBMITTED TO THE FACULTY OF THE GRADUATE SCHOOL OF EDUCATION IN CANDIDACY FOR THE DEGREE OF DOCTOR OF EDUCATION PROGRAM IN CURRICULUM AND INSTRUCTION BY DANIEL IVAN MACKINNEY CHICAGO, ILLINOIS MAY 2010 Copyright by Daniel MacKinney, 2010 All rights reserved. ACKNOWLEDGMENTS The completion of this work would not have been possible without the help and support of many people. First of all I would like to express my appreciation to my wife for her patience and loving support throughout this project. Secondly I would like to thank my dissertation committee chair, Dr.

David Ensminger, and the other members of my committee, Dr. Leanne Kallemeyn and Dr. Mark Senter for the many hours they spent reading and listening as well as the time they spent giving me guidance and support. Each one was very helpful and patient as they counseled me.

Finally I would like to express how very grateful I am to the administration, faculty, and students of Assisi Franciscan High School. Their assistance and cooperation throughout the study was invaluable. May God continue to bless the work that they do there. iii DEDICATION This dissertation is dedicated to my parents David and Betty Lou MacKinney for their loving guidance through the years, to my wife, Marilynn, who is my greatest joy and a constant source of serenity, beauty, stability, and great cookies.

It is her love, patience and faith that have held the family together through many difficult times. Above all this is dedicated to the Lord Jesus Christ, the author and finisher of our faith and the one who calls us unto perfect manhood. TABLE OF CONTENTS ACKNOWLEDGMENTS iii ABSTRACT viii CHAPTER ONE: INTRODUCTION 1 Background of Single-Sex Education 9 Current State of Single-Sex Schools 12 The Problem: Decline of an Educational Format that Nurtures Leadership Formation 13 The Importance and Purpose of this Study 14 The Need for a Study of the Impact of Single-Sex Education 16 A Brief Overview of the Research Method 17 Research Questions 19 Theoretical Framework 20 Contributions and Limitations of this Study 24 CHAPTER TWO: LITERATURE REVIEW 26 The Concern: At-Risk and Disadvantaged Boys 26 The Goal: Providing Positive Mentors and Role Models for At-Risk Boys 30 The Need: An Educational Format that Nurtures Success and Leadership Formation 34 Theoretical Framework Part I: Institutional Characteristics as a Means to Explain Student Post Baccalaureate Success 37 Theoretical Framework II: The Correlation Between Self-Efficacy Behavior and Role Models 40 Theoretical Framework III: Servant-Leadership 42 Association Between Single-Sex Schools and Success and Leadership in the Literature 45 Women’s Colleges 46 Men’s Colleges 51 Girls’ Schools 54 Boys’ Schools 59 Evidence of Success with Minorities 62 Why Gender Matters 66 Ambiguous and Negative Findings 72 Summary of the Literature Review 77 Rationale for this Study 79 CHAPTER THREE: METHODOLOGY 81 Brief Overview of the Purpose of Study 81 Research Questions 83 Research Design, Including Justification for the Methods 83 Case Selection Process 85 v Description of the Case, Including How the Case and Context are Bounded 86 Data Generation Tools 92 Procedures for Doing Data Generation 95 Ensuring Validity 99 Data Analysis 101 Description of the Final Report—Plan for the Organization and Format of the Final Report 103 Strengths and Limitations of the Study 104 CHAPTER FOUR: RESULTS 108 How is Leadership Defined at this School? 109 Definition 1: Leadership and Unto Perfect Manhood 110 Definition 2: Leadership as Service 114 Definition 3: Leadership as Character and Moral Values 118 Family Man: An Essential Element of Character 122 Definition 4: Leadership as Success Through Perseverance 123 Definition 5: Leadership as Wisdom and Foresight 126 Summary of the Definition of Leadership at Assisi 127 What Environmental or Institutional Factors Encourage or Nurture Leadership Development? 129 Institutional Factor 1: The Number of Positive Male Role Models 130 How do the Different Role Models Impact Leadership Development at Assisi? 136 How the Religious Role Models Impact Leadership Formation 137 How the Faculty Role Models Impact Leadership Formation 138 How the Student and Alumni Role Models Impact Leadership Formation 141 How the Role Models in the Curriculum Impact Leadership Formation 144 Summary of How Leadership is Modeled at Assisi 145 Institutional Factor 2: The Values Taught and Modeled 146 Institutional Factor 3: High Expectations and a Strong Academic Environment 151 Institutional Factor 4: The Single-Sex Environment 154 Institutional Factor 5: Small School/Family Environment 158 Institutional Factor 6: An All African American School 162 Summary of Institutional Factors that Encourage or Nurture Leadership Development 163 To What Extent do Students and Graduates Exhibit Leadership? 164 Evidence That Graduates Exhibit Leadership Beyond Assisi 168 Summary of the Extent to Which Students and Graduates Exhibit Leadership 171 CHAPTER V: DISCUSSION AND CONCLUSIONS 173 The Problem and Purpose of this Study 173 vi The Case and Theoretical Framework 174 Discussion of Findings 177 Conclusions 180 Alternative Explanations 187 Implications of this Study 190 Legal Ramifications 192 Limitations and Recommendations 193 APPENDIX A: STUDENT INTERVIEW QUESTIONS 195 APPENDIX B: FACULTY AND ADMINISTRATION INTERVIEW QUESTIONS 198 APPENDIX C: PARENT INTERVIEW QUESTIONS 200 APPENDIX D: ALUMNI INTERVIEW QUESTIONS 203 APPENDIX E: OBSERVATION PROTOCOL 206 APPENDIX F1: STUDENT LEADERSHIP SURVEY 211 APPENDIX F2: RESULTS OF STUDENT SURVEY PRIORITIZED BY STRONGEST TO WEAKEST ATTRIBUTES 214 APPENDIX G: NOTABLE AFRICAN AMERICAN LEADERS WHO ARE GRADUATES OF SINGLE-SEX SCHOOLS 216 APPENDIX H: NOTABLE WOMEN LEADERS WHO ARE GRADUATES OF SINGLE-SEX SCHOOLS 218 APPENDIX I: FACULTY SURVEY: SINGLE-SEX V COED GRADUATES 220 APPENDIX J: RESULTS OF FACULTY SURVEY USING CHI SQUARE 222 APPENDIX K: QUALITIES OF SUCCESSFUL LEADERS FOUND IN THREE STUDIES ON LEADERSHIP 224 APPENDIX L: AFRICAN AMERICAN MANHOOD PLEDGE 226 APPENDIX M: ASSISI FRANCISCAN HIGH SCHOOL PROFILE 228 REFERENCES 231 VITA 243 vii ABSTRACT This qualitative study investigates the influence of single-sex education on leadership formation at an all boys, urban Catholic high school where a majority of the students come from disadvantaged backgrounds. The researcher has found an association between graduation from a single-sex school and leadership attainment.

In order to understand what it is about a single-sex education that might nurture leadership development the author completed an instrumental case study of the school seeking to identify those elements that might nurture leadership formation. The theoretical framework for this study is based on the research of Wolf-Wendel (1998) who relies on institutional characteristics as one means to explain students’ post baccalaureate success, Bandura (1997) who identified the influence of role models on self-efficacy behavior, and Greenleaf (1977) who contends that the most effective leaders are servant-leaders. The author identified six environmental or institutional factors that encouraged or nurtured leadership development. They were the number of positive male role models, the values taught and modeled, the high expectations and strong academic environment, the single-sex environment, the small school/family environment and the all African American environment.

viii CHAPTER ONE INTRODUCTION Please allow this introduction to include a personal journey of discovery to explain some of the thought and experiences that led to this dissertation topic as well as the need for it. I entered my doctoral studies with no particular intention other than to acquire a position at a college or university that would allow me to help aspiring students prepare for a career in education, a career that I have enjoyed immensely. About the same time as I was preparing for doctoral studies I read a book by the late Senator Daniel Moynihan (1996), considered an astute observer of society and a competent policy analyst. In one chapter of the book Moynihan addressed the problem of at-risk and disadvantaged boys and it struck me both profoundly and deeply.

Suddenly I had a cause, an inspired motivation to attempt to find a way, through education, to help those boys of whom Moynihan spoke with such passion. At the beginning of my studies I happened across another book, this one regarding the advantages of girls’ schools and single-sex education (Salomone, 2003). I had up to that time attended only coed schools and universities and had taught at a coed high school rather happily for over 30 years. Beyond knowing a few guys who had attended boys’ high schools I had never discussed nor considered such schools to be of any particular advantage.

On the contrary, if I had ever thought of them at all it was to think of them as dreary places too full of testosterone and void of those charms and gifts that males tend to 1 2 find so attractive in females, but are too many to list within the limits of this study. Intrigued by this first article on single-sex education I began to read more on the subject and to discuss the merits of single-sex education with graduates of such schools. During this time of informal investigation I discovered two things; one was that the graduates of single-sex schools consistently spoke very highly of the experience with no remorse about missing the opposite sex during that time. The second discovery, mostly from anecdotal evidence, was that there seemed to be a rather strong association between having graduated from a single-sex school and being in a position of leadership.

This discovery piqued my interest. Believing that leadership skills such as accepting challenges, commitment, communication, goal setting, perseverance, and vision (Kouzes & Pozner, 2000; Locke, Kirkpatrick, Wheeler, Schneider, 1991) would be helpful to anyone, especially disadvantaged and at-risk boys, I began to wonder if single-sex education might be one way of helping such boys lead more positive and fulfilling lives, and less likely to turn to self-destructive behavior such as drugs and gang activity that so many of them tend to do (McLanahan & Sandefur, 1994; Mortenson, 2006; Moynihan, 1996). My feeling was that I had stumbled upon something that might be of great value, something that might be more than a little help to at-risk and disadvantaged boys. This led to more formal investigation and eventually to the topic of this study, the impact on leadership development of an inner city boys’ high school with a significant number of disadvantaged and at-risk boys.

3 I am aware that the excitement and enthusiasm of a discovery, of an “aha!” experience may lead me to slant the evidence and be somewhat biased. I will attempt to guard against that and present the evidence as it falls. We are aware that much has been written by writers with a cause or researchers with an agenda. If the preponderance of the evidence in this study favors single-sex education it is because that is what the evidence has lead me to believe, and not some preconceived notion of my own.

The fact that I recently completed my sixth decade of life, and a long career in public education should also help temper my excitement. I do not believe that there is a “silver bullet” or any easy answer to difficult problems. The purpose of this investigation is to explore one educational format that might be of help to children in need of it. Continuing my investigation of single-sex education I came across the lead story of the October 12, 2007 issue of Newsweek magazine.