This document details Texas' participation in Southern Regional Education Board (SREB) programs and services from December 2013 through November 2014. Each member state receives a number of general services, plus access to targeted programs funded by grants, contracts and fees. Appropriations from member states support core operations and general…

This report documents how four state education agencies are supporting local data-driven decisionmaking through their policies, practices, and programs for creating data systems, improving data access and use, and building district and school capacity to use data. Specifically, this report, responding to District of Columbia Office of State…

This report documents how four state education agencies are supporting local data-driven decisionmaking through their policies, practices, and programs for creating data systems, improving data access and use, and building district and school capacity to use data. Responding to District of Columbia Office of State Superintendent of Education and…

This report provides six mini-case studies of higher education policy reforms enacted in other states, exploring the important role that state policy leadership played in developing, promoting, and implementing these policies aimed at improving higher education outcomes, and discussing the relevance of each reform effort for California. This…

Teen birth rates and teen pregnancy prevention strategies vary widely across individual states in the US, which has the highest overall teen birth rate among developed nations. California and Texas, the two most populous states currently accounting for a quarter of all teen births, have taken very different approaches to addressing adolescent…

A recent report published by the National Center on Performance Incentives (NCPI) presents findings from the second-year of a multi-year evaluation of the Texas Educator Excellence Grant (TEEG) program, a statewide educator incentive program that operated in Texas. As part of this evaluation report, researchers examined how first-year TEEG schools…

Less than 25 percent of college students who take any developmental education courses earn a credential within eight years. Over the past three years, the six states in the Developmental Education Initiative have developed and enacted unprecedented changes in policy and practice in an effort to reverse these dismal outcomes. "Ahead of the…

This study presents an empirically-based statewide system that links information about pre-kindergarten programs with children's school readiness scores to certify pre-kindergarten classrooms as promoting school readiness. Over 8,000 children from 1,255 pre-kindergarten classrooms were followed longitudinally for one year. Pre-kindergarten quality…

This project assesses the feasibility of creating a voluntary, nationwide data dictionary that can be used to standardize the reporting of postsecondary accountability reporting requirements for the Carl D. Perkins Career and Technical Education Act of 2006 (otherwise known as Perkins IV). Variables, field codes, and programming instructions,…

This latest brief updates education leaders on the key policies the 13 (Arkansas, Delaware, Florida, Georgia, Kentucky, Louisiana, Maryland, Mississippi, North Carolina, Oklahoma, South Carolina, Tennessee and Virginia) Southern Regional Education Board (SREB) states plan to implement under federal waivers to No Child Left Behind. It details,…

In Texas, as in other states, fewer than a quarter of the students earning associate degrees end up applying to universities. The eventual result is widespread underemployment and a stagnating work force that doesn't keep up with population growth. However, Texas educators are trying to change that with two ambitious programs--one aimed at college…

The state's Race to the Top (RTT) application requires changes to the state's evaluation/accountability system. It requires a teacher effectiveness measure, district effectiveness measure, leader effectiveness measure. Regarding the teacher effectiveness measure, RTT requires linking the data of individual students to individual teachers as part…

This individual profile provides information on Texas' high school exit exam standards and policies. Some of the categories presented include: (1) State exit exam policy; (2) Type of Test; (3) Purpose; (4) Major changes in exit exam policy since the 2009-10 school year for financial reasons; (5) Subjects tested on exam; (6) Grade exam first…

Expanding economic opportunity in Texas depends on our state's ability to increase the college graduation rate for the thousands of college freshmen arriving on campuses each year. The pending budget bills would hamper college access for thousands of Texans through severe cuts to successful financial aid programs, including TEXAS Grants (Towards…

"Straight A's: Public Education Policy and Progress" is a biweekly newsletter that focuses on education news and events both in Washington, DC and around the country. The following articles are included in this issue: (1) Another Positive Step for ESEA Reauthorization: Testifying Before Congress, Duncan Calls for Reauthorization in 2010,…