The Every Student Succeeds Act (ESSA) of 2015 includes several provisions that support state and district efforts to prevent students from dropping out of high school and reengage out-of-school youth. Under ESSA, state plans must describe how the state will work with school districts to transition students from middle school to high school and…

This paper provides rigorous evidence (for 12,130 participants in a series of naturally occurring randomized lotteries) that a large-scale high school reform initiative (New York City's creation of 100+ small high schools of choice between 2002 and 2008) can markedly and consistently increase high school graduation rates (by 9.5 percentage points…

Talented students from underserved backgrounds face many barriers to attaining higher education. Two of the most significant impediments are the low quality of primary and secondary schools they attend and the lack of access to top-tier universities providing sufficient financial aid and targeted support. Lower levels of educational attainment are…

Early colleges are a new model of schooling in which the high school and college experiences are merged, shortening the total amount of time a student spends in school. This study uses a lottery-based experimental design to examine the impact of the model on longer term outcomes, including attainment of a postsecondary credential and academic…

Early colleges are a new model of schooling in which the high school and college experiences are merged, shortening the total amount of time a student spends in school. This study uses a lottery-based experimental design to examine the impact of the model on longer term outcomes, including attainment of a postsecondary credential and academic…

The "No Child Left Behind Act (NCLB) of 2001" requires all schools, districts/local education agencies (LEAs) and states to show that students are making Adequate Yearly Progress (AYP). NCLB requires states to establish targets in the following ways: (1) Annual Proficiency Target; (2) Attendance/Graduation Rates; and (3) Participation…

Fewer than one-third of degree-seeking, full-time freshmen in the nation's public four-year institutions graduate in four years. To help raise this rate, SREB examined many strategies that public institutions are using to help more students earn bachelor's degrees, with particular attention to students in regional colleges and universities who…

A longitudinal research study was conducted at a public university in Pennsylvania on a sample of 129 at-risk students from a state-funded program (Act 101) designed to provide support services for economically and educationally disadvantaged students. This research employed a non-experimental, ex post facto methodology to assess the impact of…

This case study describes how Alexander Community College (ACC), a two-year State University of New York (SUNY) institution is addressing challenges associated with its developmental education effort--primarily high costs for repeated developmental (assumed by the institution and students) and low persistence and graduation rates for developmental…

This study examines the implementation and organization of the state mandated curriculum in the 4-hour SEI block in 18 K-12 classrooms in 5 different districts. We focus on the effects of grouping by language proficiency, the delivery of the structure-based ESL curriculum, the provision of resources and limiting of access to grade-level…

The Brooklyn College, City University of New York (CUNY), Search for Education Elevation and Knowledge (SEEK) Program, a higher education opportunity program, provides special assistance to students who are entering college for the first time. SEEK students are from educationally disadvantaged backgrounds, and receive financial support as well as…

An approach to remedy the scarcity of Black students within the sciences at southern African universities has been the development of access programmes. There has been little acknowledgement of the contribution of these access programmes in increasing the quantity and quality of graduates. The contribution made by the Science Foundation Programme…

The impact of the economic crisis in America is having significant consequences across all environments. Children in Alabama are being hit particularly hard, with budget constraints leading to greatly reduced services for marginalized children and families in rural and urban areas. According to the United States Census Bureau, 16.6% of the…

This study examined the influence of individual attributes, high school experience, and college experience upon persistence for remedial and non-remedial students. The subjects were 438 first-time true freshmen who graduated from a large private university on the West Coast. In addition to finding that remedial and non-remedial students did not…

In 2005, the National Centre for Vocational Education Research (NCVER) produced a statistical compendium examining vocational education and training (VET) students with a disability as a whole group; it also compared different disability groups, focusing on their participation levels, achievements and outcomes from VET in 2003 (Cavallaro et al.…