After being identified as a school in need of improvement, one struggling inner city high school implemented an evening school alternative program to reduce their suspension, failure, and dropout rates. In its first year, the program graduated 100% of the student participants, all of whom were in danger of dropping out, or being kicked out of high…

This study examines the issues surrounding middle school students' transitions to high school and the degree to which freshman orientation models can help them. The attendance, discipline, report card grades, and end-of-course exams of 60 students who participated in a freshman orientation were compared to those of 150 students who were invited to…

This article examines school removals and transitions among nine special education students. First, the Individual with Disabilities Education Act (IDEA) and the local school discipline policy and special education contexts are discussed. Next, drawing from participants' narrative accounts, the ways in which policy mandates and contextual…

Special education litigation remains a volatile area with significant practice implications. A review of the 2010 case law in the "Special Educator" identified discipline (manifestation determination, seclusion and restraints, harassment), evaluation/RTI, and postsecondary transition as specific areas of concern. School administrators should keep…

Examines the perceptions of future school administrators regarding the role of the school counselor. Future administrators rated crisis intervention, assisting with transitions, and personal counseling as the most important duties of school counselors; however, some respondents identified administrative and disciplinary duties as significant ones…

Although financially overburdened, North Brunswick Township School District in Central New Jersey has committed to an ongoing inschool suspension plan aimed at reducing the numbers of at-risk students and providing some badly needed services. The district's high school eventually adopted the successful middle school model to reduce worsening…

There are those in the school community who believe that the anxious feelings and heightened sense of anxiety experienced by sixth graders as they transition from elementary to junior high school constitute a rite of passage. Teachers and school administrators in the Indiana Area Junior High School in Pennsylvania believed differently. During the…

To determine students' areas of concern while moving from middle- to high-school level, two college deans surveyed all eighth- and ninth-graders in four northwest Georgia school systems. Comprehensive transitional programs targeted concerns about curriculum, facilities, safety, discipline, staff, and general routines. A Wisconsin transition…

The 25th Annual Report to Congress has been designed to showcase the data collected from states and the national studies that make up the Office of Special Education Programs' (OSEP) National Assessment of the Implementation of the Individuals with Disabilities Act. To this end, OSEP proposed questions about the characteristics of children and…