Students' high school experiences often do not prepare them adequately for postsecondary education and the world of work. Special attention should be paid to increasing the rigor, relevance, and engagement of the high school curriculum, including for students who have traditionally faced barriers to successful postsecondary transitions. This Issue…

Describes development of a program to ease the transition into becoming single. The program, a series of six informational letters, was developed for adults who had been separated, divorced, or widowed within the previous two years. The article also contains an evaluation of the program. (CT)

Reviews the Oregon Transition Support Initiative, an ongoing research and implementation project that prevents recidivism by helping stakeholders help incarcerated youth return to their communities. Discusses the transition process as the working relationships that together accomplish the common goal of seeing that youth offenders learn the life…

To determine teacher working knowledge of transition best practices, the Transition Programs and Services (T-PAS) survey was administered to 2,000 middle and high school teachers and 70 school district transition contacts. Three questions were asked: (a) What barriers exist that hinder the transition process? (b) What effective practices…

This annual newsletter contains updates on the latest CCRC research, new publications and details of upcoming presentations at major conferences. The feature article in this issue, "Addressing the Needs of Underprepared Students," by Thomas Bailey, summarizes the discussion found in the paper "Challenge and Opportunity: Rethinking…

The project conducted research and developed a demonstration model aimed at helping schools and families plan transitions for young children moving from special preschools to less specialized settings including regular preschools and kindergarten. The model's target population consisted of 40 handicapped children (ages 3-5) enrolled in three…

The West Virginia Early Childhood Transition Initiative is an interagency systems change effort started in 1993 to develop a seamless system of service for children, ages birth to 5 years. The initiative's training and technical assistance component is known as Operation Tadpole. A state level steering committee coordinates the initiative on an…

A system was developed to evaluate the impact and effectiveness of transition services for special education students in Maine. The project's three phases included preliminary activities relevant to the development of the evaluation system; activities in developing, field testing, and revising the evaluation strategy; and selecting and evaluating…

This volume contains tables of results to accompany an executive summary produced for a project which evaluated the impact and effectiveness of transition services for special education students in Maine. The tables contain data for each of the 21 participating school districts, covering the following program evaluation components: staff survey…

Evaluation of the sixth and final year of operation for a preplacement program for 13 severely multiply handicapped deaf blind children, located in the Industrial Home for the Blind, is reported. The program is explained to prepare students for entrance into their existing special education programs. Qualitative findings on the physical setting,…

This handbook spells out the steps necessary in an effective evaluation of secondary/transition interventin projects for handicapped youth. Initial steps in the evaluation process include describing the evaluation setting, identifying evaluation audiences, stating the evaluation rationale, determining evaluation questions, and identifying…

A transitional "pre-first-grade" program (for kindergarten "graduates" judged unready for first grade) has been operating in the Irving (Texas) Independent School District since the early 1980s. This evaluation, comparing three sets of students (participating pre-first-grade students, nonparticipating refusers who entered first…

Assessed the effectiveness of an intense, year-long experience of course work, research, and personal development for underrepresented minority students before medical school. Program participants demonstrated competency in the first year of medical school consistent with traditional students even though they had lower MCAT scores and college…

Evaluations of the effectiveness of government programs may serve both to improve program implementation and to convey to policymakers information on the effectiveness of these programs. However, the evidence generated from programs and their providers--perhaps especially when these programs are decentralized and implemented and run locally--may…

The author describes the Irish Work Experience Programme designed to give youth work experience to increase their employability. Trainees were placed with a private sector employer for 26 weeks and paid a training allowance. Although many subsequently found permanent employment, the program reached few of the most disadvantaged among first-time…