As an independent school district, Houston Independent School District (HISD) contracted with four operators of seven External Performance Contract Campuses, or contract campuses. Houston ISD contract campuses receive funding through the district. HISD has implemented a comprehensive performance accountability and compliance monitoring system that…

The Arkansas Better Chance (ABC) program longitudinal study (2009-2020) reviews the changing circumstances and outcomes of participation in Pre-K services in Arkansas. The "core comparison" of this study is between ABC participants and students who had no known Pre-K participation but have similar household income levels. The results…

This document presents the technical appendices that accompanies the full report, "Evaluation of the DC Opportunity Scholarship Program: Impacts Three Years after Students Applied." The four appendices include: (1) Program Features, Lottery Structure, Study Sample, and School Characteristics; (2) Technical Approach; (3) Impact Findings…

"Green Dot Public Schools" is a nonprofit organization that operates more than 20 public charter middle and high schools in California, Tennessee, and Washington. The "Green Dot Public Schools" model emphasizes high quality teaching, strong school leadership, a curriculum that prepares students for college, and partnerships…

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…

Many schools have recently experimented with moving breakfast from the cafeteria to the classroom. We examine whether such a program increases achievement, grades, and attendance rates. We exploit quasi-random timing of program implementation that allows for a difference-in-differences identification strategy. We find that providing breakfast in…

City Year is a learning organization committed to the rigorous evaluation of its "Whole School Whole Child" model, which trains and deploys teams of AmeriCorps members to low-performing, urban schools to empower more students to reach their full potential. A third-party study by Policy Studies Associates (PSA) examined the impact of…

We report the implementation and evaluation of a "peer assisted learning" (PAL) scheme designed to reduce the so-called "cooling off" phenomenon in undergraduate mathematics. "Cooling off" occurs when mathematics undergraduates lose motivation and interest in their studies, despite having previously actively chosen to…

Recognizing the importance of both keeping middle school students engaged and improving their math skills, Baltimore City Public Schools (City Schools) developed a summer school STEM program involving not only math and science instruction but also the experience of building a robot and competing with those robots in a city-wide tournament.…

This study hypothesized that HISD prekindergarten participation consistently correlated with better educational outcomes for students. Taking into account students' age differences through kindergarten enrollment, propensity score matching controlled for students' background characteristics. Three cohorts of students in this study were eligible or…

Peer-led Team Learning (PLTL) is an instructional method reported to increase student learning in STEM courses. As mathematics is a significant hurdle for many freshmen engineering students, a PLTL program was implemented for students to attempt to improve their course performance. Here, an analysis of PLTL for freshmen engineering students in…

As part of its ongoing efforts to raise the academic achievement of children from low-income families in Kansas City, Missouri, the Ewing Marion Kauffman Foundation founded the Ewing Marion Kauffman School in fall 2011. The Kauffman School's mission is "to prepare students to excel academically, graduate from college, and apply their unique…

The purpose of this study was to determine the impact of the Home Improvement for Preschool Youngsters (HIPPY) program on school performance during the 3rd, 5th, 7th, and 9th grades. The study employed a quasi-experimental, post-hoc design using existing data on children who participated in the HIPPY program as 3-, 4-, or 5-year-olds, including:…

Attendance is probably the most fundamental behavioral indicator of student engagement with school. Though many students fall off-track to success for the first time in ninth grade, poor attendance patterns often begin increasing in middle school and become worse in high school. Missing school during the secondary grades can often be traced to low…

This causal-comparative study examined the relationship of school uniforms to attendance, academic achievement, and discipline referral rates, using data collected from two high schools in rural southwest Georgia county school systems, one with a uniforms program and one without a uniforms program. After accounting for race and students with…