The ubiquitous use of social platforms across the globe makes them attractive options for investigating social phenomena including migration. However, the use of social media data raises several crucial ethical issues around the areas of informed consent, anonymity and profiling of individuals, which are particularly sensitive when looking at a…

Increasingly, undergraduate institutions are incorporating original research into the curriculum as a matter of best practice. However, while the practice of science has grown more collaborative, undergraduate research has remained largely confined to single-institution studies. Incorporating long-term, distributed research projects into the…

Extension professionals employ many techniques and tools to obtain feedback, input, information, and data from stakeholders, research participants, and program learners. An information-gathering tool called Ketso is described in this article. This tool and its associated techniques can be used in all phases of program development, implementation,…

This chapter proposes approaches for assessing learners and evaluating courses and curriculum that could be used by directors of health professions education (HPE) programs to determine the effectiveness and impact of their programs.

Each year, Austin Independent School District Department of Research and Evaluation (DRE) staff develop a plan of work to describe the scope of work for the coming year. The plans that make up this document identify programs to be evaluated and services to be provided by DRE staff and provide the blueprints for evaluation that staff will follow…

"Opportunity to learn" refers to the extent to which teachers dedicate instructional time and content coverage to the intended curriculum using a range of cognitive processes, instructional practices, and grouping formats. This article describes the My Instructional Learning Opportunities Guidance System, a research-based online teacher…

Forty years ago, the National Center for Education Statistics initiated the national longitudinal studies program in response to congressional concern for policy-relevant information on school-to-work transitions. This program has grown substantially, and not unexpectedly, questions have arisen about its usefulness and present operation. This…

Reach for the Stars is AAMT's data-collection activity for National Literacy and Numeracy Week, funded by the Australian Government. This year's activity was on the theme "More2books" and many thousands of students and their teachers explored the mathematics of the books in their classrooms. This article presents a version of the…

While engaged in academic reading, a university provost converged on an idea to use a preferential approach to students' selection of college courses, similar to the recommendation systems used by "Netflix" and "Amazon." The result of this idea came to be known as "Degree Compass" and was implemented on the campus of…

This publication provides an overview of the Every Student Succeeds Act (ESSA). The following topics are covered : (1) Introductory Information, including a timelime and ESSA modifications to the No Child Left Behind Act (NCLB); (2) State Plan; 3) Statewide Accountability System, ; (4) Academic Assessments; (5) Standards; (6) School Improvement;…

When high school students are asked what's the best part of science class, many will say it's the field trips. Students enjoy engaging in authentic, community-based science outside the classroom. To capitalize on this, Patrick Willis created the Bird Box Survey Project for his introductory field biology class. The project takes students…

Quantitative reasoning is a key intellectual skill, applicable across disciplines and best taught in the context of authentic, relevant problems. Here, I describe and assess a laboratory exercise that has students calculate their "carbon footprint" and evaluate the impacts of various behavior choices on that footprint. Students gather…

Each year, Austin Independent School District Department of Research and Evaluation (DRE) staff develop a plan of work to describe the scope of work for the coming year. The plans that make up this document identify programs to be evaluated and services to be provided by DRE staff and provide the blueprints for evaluation that staff will follow…

Students need practice in proposing hypotheses, developing experiments that will test these hypotheses, and generating data that they will analyze to support or refute them. I describe a guided-inquiry activity based on the "tongue map" concept, appropriate for middle school and high school students.

Each year, Austin Independent School District Department of Research and Evaluation (DRE) staff develop a plan of work to describe the scope of work for the coming year. The plans that make up this document identify programs to be evaluated and services to be provided by DRE staff and provide the blueprints for evaluation that staff will follow…