In this article we take a closer look at a developing university-community engagement project being undertaken between California State University, Fresno, and the City of Fresno. A history of the project is provided, along with a review of the relevant literature and a summary of what pieces of the puzzle we feel should be in place for a…

Supporting in-service teachers for successful integration of educational technologies into their teaching practices has been a challenge. While professional development in technology integration is found to help teachers gain technology skills and model good examples of using technology for teaching, they may fail to provide teachers with a clear…

With a growing movement to re-connect children to nature, an understanding of the ability of environmental education (EE) programs to foster connectedness to nature is needed. The purpose of this exploratory quantitative study is to determine the effect of seven EE programs on participants' connectedness to nature. Results from the 385 children…

Two recent studies by Biancarosa et al. and by Saunders et al. have finally demonstrated that "job-embedded, sustained professional development" can significantly improve student achievement. But there's a catch. In both studies, effective professional development (PD) strategies were successful only under certain circumstances or only in some…

Which science programs have been proven to help elementary students to succeed? To find out, this review summarizes evidence on three types of programs designed to improve the science achievement of students in grades K-6: (1) Inquiry-oriented programs without science kits, such as Increasing Conceptual Challenge, Science IDEAS, and Collaborative…

In recent years, leaders of American cities have become progressively concerned about increasing the college-going and completion rate of their residents. Mayors and other community leaders in Memphis, Boston, Louisville, San Francisco and other cities have launched initiatives to increase college completion rates, mobilizing stakeholders from the…

"Characteristics of Excellence in Undergraduate Research" ("COEUR") is based on the collective experience, over many years, of Council on Undergraduate Research members who have engaged undergraduate students in research, developed undergraduate research programs, mentored new faculty to include undergraduate research in their…

Mentorship is empirically related to several desired outcomes in college students including academic success and career development. Yet little is known about how mentorship aids leadership development in college students. This study uses data from the Multi-Institutional Study of Leadership, a national study with more than 110,000 participants…

The need for in-service education for teachers is recognized by all who are concerned with improvement of school practice. A successful in-service education involves many different kinds of activities. This study aims to determine the perceptions of classroom and branch (social studies, science and technology, foreign language, physical education…

More than a decade has passed since the National Research Council described the common elements of effective educational programs for young children with autism. Since that time, few studies have attempted to understand the mechanisms of change and factors affecting the effectiveness of research supported interventions implemented in community…

The purpose of this article is to describe the Quality Educators Academy (QEA), a year-long training for K-8 classroom teachers that was funded by a NC ESEA Title II-A Improving Teacher Quality (NC QUEST) Grant. Key features of the project as well as the design and content of the training contributed to success in recruiting, retaining, and…

A longitudinal evaluation study of a science professional development program for K-12 teachers was conducted using the CIPP evaluation model. Eleven years of program data were described and analyzed. Elementary teachers comprised 62% of the 384 participants, 17% of all participants were middle school teachers, and 13% of all participants were…

Schedule redesign is only one small part of the much larger approach to turning around low-performing schools. Even so, most states' No Child Left Behind waiver applications show a disappointing lack of detail on learning time. While they've done some careful thinking about schedule redesign, states must continue to think critically and…

Little attention was paid to professional development of primary teachers in Ireland to support them in teaching physical education (PE) until 2004 when specific support was provided to help them implement the revised Primary Physical Education Curriculum. A significant National In-service Physical Education Programme was undertaken involving the…

The current interest in using data-driven decision-making in schools has focused on how best to use student achievement data to meet the demands of current accountability requirements. The purpose of this study was to investigate promising practices specific to school leaders' use of data-driven decision-making for school improvement at two…