The activities and services delivered under the School-to-Work Opportunities Act of 1994 by the Capital Area Education and Careers Partnership in Austin, Texas, during 1998 and 1999 were evaluated by an independent evaluator, using interviews with 24 persons involved in the project, site visits, and document analysis. The evaluation found that…

The American Recovery and Reinvestment Act of 2009 (ARRA), also known as the stimulus package, appropriated $100 billion for education and included $3 billion for school improvement grants (SIGs) to help reform low-performing schools. This amount was in addition to the $546 million provided by the regular fiscal year 2009 appropriations bill for…

A current trend in education is that small teacher groups, called professional learning communities (PLC), are being advocated as a tool to help teachers reach struggling students. Educators planning to use PLC as an intervention strategy can benefit from research-based information about PLC best practices. This multiple case study addressed the…

Research suggests that the inability to complete high school graduation requirements can result in barriers that are detrimental to the success of individuals, stability of families, and the overall progress of the state and nation. The Graduation Coach Initiative was employed as a strategy for addressing chronically low graduation rates in…

The District Awards for Teacher Excellence's (D.A.T.E.'s) first year of implementation in 2008-09 occurred at a time when Texas was operating several state-funded performance pay programs. The three-year Governor's Educator Excellence Grant (G.E.E.G.) program was coming to its expected completion, while the Texas Educator Excellence Grant…

Networks aiming for fundamental changes bring together a variety of actors who are part and parcel of a problematic context. These system innovation projects need to be accompanied by a monitoring and evaluation approach that supports and maintains reflexivity to be able to deal with uncertainties and conflicts while challenging current practices…

In January 2010, the Rhode Island Department of Education (RIDE) identified Central Falls High School (CFHS) as one of the state's persistently lowest-achieving schools. The Central Falls School District (CFSD) and the Central Falls Teachers Union (CFTU) considered the transformation model but could not come to an agreement initially around…

The National Center for Research on Evaluation, Standards, and Student Testing (CRESST) at University of California, Los Angeles (UCLA) was contracted to undertake a three-year external evaluation of the Artful Learning program, an arts-based school improvement model developed from the work and philosophy of the late composer Leonard Bernstein.…

A study examined the status of tech prep in Missouri as of 1993-1994. Data were gathered from a review of the request for proposals of Missouri's 12 consortia, assessment of Missouri's current status of tech prep, and structured interviews with the 12 tech prep coordinators. It was determined that up to 86 secondary schools were initially involved…

This revised guide is designed to help school administrators, teachers, and counselors operate and improve their continuation programs and develop a school program based on the Model Curriculum Standards, Grades 9 through 12 and Raising Expectations: Model Graduation Requirements. It references up-to-date legal and technical information and…

"Modeling Mathematics Teaching Excellence" is a professional development process designed to enable mathematics departments to conduct an assessment of how well their program is meeting the needs of their early adolescent students. It is a modified edition of the Mathematics Assessment Process for the Middle Grades (MAP), a year-long…

This report covers the second year of work by the National Center for Research in Vocational Education in assisting states to increase their ability to evaluate programs and services for special populations. The report also provides information on changes that have occurred in the total evaluation system of the participating states since the start…

These proceedings include approximately 100 abstracts of papers dealing with the following aspects of research in nursing education: clinical judgment, faculty roles and expectations, learning, clinical experience, ethics and moral development, implications for the nursing curriculum of clinical nursing knowledge research, professional…

A National Institute of Education-sponsored, congresionally mandated project studied implementation of Title II (Vocational Education) of the 1976 Education Amendments. Focus was on provisions related to the major themes of program improvement and educational equity. It was found that despite the complexity of the law and the vocational education…

This collection of four policy papers on vocational assessment for the handicapped deals with personnel development, interagency coordination, current research and development, and providing individualized assessment services. Discussed in the initial paper on program improvement in vocational assessment for the handicapped are federal legislation…