Contrary to the charge that advocacy-oriented research cannot meet social science research standards because it is inherently biased, the authors of this article argue that collaborative, community-engaged scholarship (CCES) must meet high standards of rigor if it is to be useful to support equity-oriented, social justice agendas. In fact, they…

The Teacher Compensation Survey (TCS) was a research and development effort by the National Center for Education Statistics (NCES) to explore the possibility of developing an administrative records survey that would compile compensation and demographic data on all public school teachers in the nation. A pilot survey in 2007 collected data from…

Bui, Craig, and Imberman assessed the impact of gifted and talented programs on student achievement using regression discontinuity and random assignment to gifted magnet schools. In both analyses, they found minimal impact of the gifted and talented programs on student achievement. This commentary addresses two concerns associated with the study.…

The National Council on Teacher Quality's (NCTQ) recent review of university-based teacher preparation programs concluded the vast majority of such programs were inadequately preparing the nation's teachers. The study, however, has a number of serious flaws that include narrow focus on inputs, lack of a strong research base, missing standards,…

A special tabulation of individual student scores from the Texas Assessment of Academic Skills (TAAS) test allowed a ranking of Texas schools according to test score changes ("value added"). The rankings varied greatly by student subpopulation. That is, the vast majority of schools are much more effective with some kinds of students than…

This article argues that the Seven Solutions in the US, and the Research Excellence Framework in the UK, manifest the vice of epistemic insensibility. Section I provides an overview of Aristotle's analysis of moral vice in people. Section II applies Aristotle's analysis to epistemic vice, developing an account of epistemic insensibility. In so…

REL Southwest received a request to review the report "Avoidable Losses: High Stakes Accountability and the Dropout Crisis" to assess the soundness of the study methodology and the appropriateness of the conclusions drawn in the report. The review found that conclusions drawn in this study cannot be generalized and are significantly…

Offers a framework blending sociologists' focus on school organization and educational stratification with economists' explicit attention to individual response to incentive structures. Examines whether minority, low economic status, and/or noncollege-bound youths receive weaker incentives for school effort. The variables examined cannot account…

In an attempt to secure a better understanding of why some males withdraw or refrain from entering the nation's labor force, 99 volunteers were interviewed to: (1) identify by name and address, men who are not in the labor force but who, under some circumstances, would want to work, and (2) develop techniques for identifying economic, social, and…

A study of state educational policymaking revealed a number of instances where assertions have been made about what the "research says" in offering support for particular policies; however, in many of these instances the available research seems to have been distorted or exaggerated in order to better leverage particular policy…

Investigates the claims of scientific objectivity that support recent changes in policies toward early-literacy instruction in the states of Texas and California. Uses a framework to assess the validity of this claim through the analysis of 10 major studies of phonological awareness. Finds the two states' curricular policy statements to be highly…

Results suggested that socioeconomic factors were not major determinants of differences in infant mortality in Texas in the 1970's. Data on live births and infant deaths for 254 Texas counties were obtained from the Texas Department of Health for each of the 11 years from 1970 to 1980. Infant, neonatal, and postneonatal mortality rates were…

The four papers in a symposium on the cost effectiveness of community schools are presented here, with a brief introduction. The first paper outlines the procedures necessary for an analysis of cost-effectiveness and identifies the problems in applying this analysis to community schools, including variable selection and measurement and value…

Distressed by media headlines trumpeting supposed "reading-and-writing wars," a reading education professor discusses his Delphi survey of 11 reading experts. Experts agreed that emphasizing only phonics instruction and drill-and-practice would make learning to read difficult. Reading would be facilitated by bringing together…

Five sister reports published by the Friedman Foundation over the past two years have ignored the relevant research literature in asserting that private-school voucher programs can reduce the social costs of dropping out while increasing graduation rates. The reports are state-specific, targeting five different states. But each report follows a…