To give states the information they need to sustain hard-fought education reform effectively, Achieve conducted research on state education reforms that have been sustained successfully for over a decade or more. Funded by the GE Foundation, Achieve hopes this work will help other state leaders, wherever they may be on their road to reform,…

This research study was designed to determine leadership and instructional behaviors of administrators and teachers who are participants in the Alabama AP Initiative, as well as evaluate the perceptions of the AAPI with regard to student performance. The importance of this research was three-fold. First, this study provided principals, as well as…

Web-based computer-aided instruction (CAI) has become increasingly important to medical curricula. This multi-year study investigated the effectiveness of CAI and the factors affecting level of individual use. Three CAI were tested that differed in specificity of applicability to the curriculum and in the level of student interaction with the CAI.…

For over 30 years, sociologists have expressed concern that the undergraduate curriculum in sociology lacks coherence. The sociology major continues to be loosely structured with few opportunities for sequential learning. To achieve greater coherence in the major, I recommend that departments sequence more courses or infuse both empirical and…

The article examines the approach taken in one primary school to introduce a reflective teaching approach, following an OFSTED inspection. By considering the development of reflective teaching and learning, the development of a working mode and the types of skills needed in order to teach in a reflective manner, it reports on the outcomes from the…

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…

In this article we report on the results of an evaluation of a two-tiered strategic approach to the development of sessional teaching staff in one Australian university. Analysis of the data reveals a tension between the institutional imperatives underpinning the strategy and its local implementations. This tension ultimately undermines the…

Over the past twenty years American education has seen many changes, and most notable have been those related to accountability and assessment. One aspect of these changes has been the movement toward more specified student learning outcomes. In discipline after discipline content standards have been developed outlining that which students should…

Numerous studies have been undertaken demonstrating that online learning is an effective teaching tool, working best when combined with more conventional teaching methods. There is a paucity of data both examining the longitudinal blending of an e-module with more conventional modes of curriculum delivery and also relating to the time and…

Learning communities continue to be at the heart of teaching and learning today. The purpose of this study is to examine the extent of the impact of the Freshman Academy/Learning Community program on student progress at a historically Black university. The authors also looked at the extent to which students engaged in their learning as a result of…

Beginning in September, 2001 when the Portland Public Schools received funding from the National Science Foundation (NSF) through the Urban Systemic Program (USP) initiative, the district focused, accelerated and strengthened its efforts to improve mathematics and science education K-12. Since its inception the authors at Inverness Research…

In this article, the author describes a new instructional design model and how it was applied to an educational planning and evaluation graduate class. The model is known as the "Isman model" and is described a five-step systematic planning process: (1) input; (2) process; (3) output; (4) feedback; and (5) learning. This process can be…

High school teachers from across the nation are realizing that their schools could provide pre-engineering programs that allow students to explore their strengths and interests in engineering and engineering technology. To address this need, school districts across the nation are implementing pre-engineering courses into their curriculum. As…

This report summarizes the activities and findings of the external evaluation of the "Science: It's Elementary" (SIE) program in the period June 2007 through May 2008. The SIE program is managed by ASSET Inc. and overseen by the Pennsylvania Department of Education. SIE is an initiative aimed at improving elementary science instruction…

To prepare preservice teachers for the technology-rich environment of today's schools, faculty involved with the preparation of teachers must model technology use in their own instruction. The purpose of this PT[superscript 3]-funded project was to design and implement a faculty development program focusing on the effective integration of…