Based on current research and seminal theories on learning, quality, and academic persistence, this study sought to establish the core components of academic quality in higher education and to determine if these components can be used to predict students' intention to persist. This study also looked at differences between traditionally aged…

In this paper we consider the challenges involved in evaluating teacher preparation programs when controlling for school contextual bias. Including school fixed effects in the achievement models used to estimate preparation program effects controls for school environment by relying on differences among student outcomes within the same schools to…

The Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation created the Early College High School Initiative in 2002, opening more than 200 hundred early college programs across the nation and every year a new report is created to evaluate the progress of the program (Berger, Adelman, & Cole, 2010). Staff at the Regional Educational Laboratory Southeast (REL-SE)…

The Tennessee General Assembly passed legislation in 2007 requiring that the State Board of Education produce an assessment on the effectiveness of teacher training programs. The law requires that the report includes data on the performance of each program's graduates in the following areas: placement and retention rates, Praxis II results, and…