Rigorous research provides information that will allow other schools and districts to select interventions that have a scientifically based track record of effectiveness. All Striving Reader grants include the mandate to evaluate literacy intervention(s) targeted to adolescents who are reading significantly below grade level. Although all studies…

The study under review is the second-year evaluation report of the Milwaukee Parental Choice Program (MPCP), a publicly funded voucher program that allows low-income students in Milwaukee to attend secular and religious private schools in that city. Its primary finding is that there were no overall statistically significant differences in…

"Assessing the Value of E-Learning Systems" provides an extensive literature review pulling theories from the field of information systems, psychology and cognitive sciences, distance and online learning, as well as marketing and decision sciences. This book provides empirical evidence for the power of measuring value in the context of e-learning…

"Online Assessment, Measurement and Evaluation: Emerging Practices" provides a view of the possibilities and challenges facing online educators and evaluators in the 21st Century. As technology evolves and online measurement and assessment follow, "Online Assessment, Measurement and Evaluation: Emerging Practices" uses…

"Data Trends" reports present summaries of research on mental health services for children and adolescents and their families. The article summarized in this "Data Trends" examines research on the "contribution of informal support linkages in the achievement of treatment outcomes" in three models of family-based practice: Intensive Family…

The World Wide Web influences education and our lives in many ways. Nowadays, Web-based homework has been becoming widespread practice in physics courses and some other courses as well. Although are some disputes whether this is an encouraging or risky development for student learning, there is limited research assessing the pedagogical effect of…

Productive strategies for evaluating outcomes are becoming increasingly important for the improvement, and even the survival, of teacher education. This article describes a set of research and assessment strategies used to evaluate program outcomes in the Stanford Teacher Education Program during a period of program redesign over the past 5 years.…

In 2000, the Accreditation Council of Graduate Medical Education (ACGME) laid out a definition of competence that included six specific areas of focus: patient care (including clinical reasoning), medical knowledge, practice-based learning and improvement, interpersonal and communication skills, professionalism, and systems-based practice. The…

In this article we report a 3-yr study of a large-enrollment Cell Biology course focused on developing student skill in scientific reasoning and data interpretation. Specifically, the study tested the hypothesis that converting the role of exams from summative grading devices to formative tools would increase student success in acquiring those…

This article reports on "Beyond the OPI: Integrated Performance Assessment (IPA) Design Project," a three-year (1997-2000) research initiative sponsored by the U.S. Department of Education International Research and Studies Program. The primary goal of the project was to develop an integrated skills assessment prototype that would measure…

This report discusses the use of performance indicators (PIs) in higher education, focusing on definitions, frameworks, examples, and implications for universities. It notes that demands for accountability have led to intense interest in university performance measures, and that early indicators simply described the university or the system and…

The effectiveness of a 1-day performance-focused human resource (HR) development workshop that was conducted in 21 sessions in cities throughout North America in March-September 1996 was monitored by an electronic survey sent to all 506 participants 7 days after the workshop. Of those participants, 221 (43%) completed the survey, which sought…

The effectiveness of a 1-day performance-focused human resource (HR) development workshop that was conducted in 21 sessions in cities throughout North America in March-September 1996 was monitored by an electronic survey sent to all 506 workshop participants 3 months after the workshop. Of those participants, 101 (20%) completed the survey, which…

A study evaluated an alternative seminar and major paper approach to the traditional doctoral program comprehensive examination at Pepperdine University (California). The pilot project was conducted over a period of 6 trimesters and involved 28 students who had already completed their course work. Students were also involved in the development of…

Program and Service Review (PSR) at Pima Community College in Arizona is a mechanism to provide continuous comprehensive evaluation and improvement of instructional programs and those support functions that directly serve students. The PSR's original statement of philosophy stresses the use of qualitative and quantitative measures to identify how…