This document presents a self-assessment instrument for early childhood programs serving 3- and 4-year-olds in Massachusetts. The self-assessment is intended to provide guidance to program personnel, local early childhood advisory council members, and parents as they evaluate their programs and identify areas for improvement. The instrument also…

Under the No Child Left Behind Act (NCLB), all public school districts, campuses, and the state are evaluated annually for Adequate Yearly Progress (AYP). The Texas AYP plan meets the requirements of the NCLB, maintains the integrity of the Texas assessment program, and provides a mechanism for evaluating district and campus AYP in 2003. Following…

This Critical Issue Bibliography (CRIB) sheet focuses on performance indicators in higher education. Performance indicators are concrete pieces of information about a condition or result of public action that is regularly produced, publicly reported, and systematically used for planning, monitoring, or resource allocation. The resources in this…

The Distance Learning Policy Laboratory of the Southern Regional Education Board (SREB) and many states and regional organizations are coming to a consensus on the principles and goals that should shape distance learning policies. In the case of quality assurance, the SREB believes there are four guiding principles that states should follow.…

Colorado Senate Bill 00-71 and S.B. 00-124 established the Read-to-Achieve Grant Program. The purpose of the program is to solicit proposals from any elementary school, including a charter school, or consortium of schools, to fund research-based intensive reading programs. The funding opportunity was designed specifically for second and third…

This paper describes the experiences of Colorado Springs School District Eleven in using multiple measures to determine if third graders were reading at "grade level." The use of multiple measures may be threatened by the rapidly increasing pressures about assessment and accountability in Colorado that teachers are beginning to feel that…

In response to trends toward greater accountability expectations for educational programs, a study evaluated the success of the implementation of Ohio's Individual Career Plan (ICP). The ICP is a document initiated by students no later than grade 8 that helps to outline initial career goals and educational plans to reach those goals. A core…

The report summarizes the observations of five State Implementation Grant directors for the first two years of the State Implementation Grant (SIG) program (a program designed to develop a statewide network of services for young handicapped children and to assist states in the implementation of Early Childhood State Plans). (PHR)

The extent to which evaluation and auditing have converged on procedures in recent years and the extent to which they remain different are examined in the five chapters of this special issue. Different emphases, the question of collaboration with the subjects of inquiry, and issues of routinized performance are explored. (SLD)

Defining hunger on the basis of poverty or other nonphysiological criteria is misleading. With nutritional data used by human-service agencies, suggests programs with such conception of hunger hurt the efforts at nutritional change. Uses central Mississippi as an example to propose objective nutritional definition and assessment. (TES)

The evaluation of Minnesota's Early Childhood Family Education program is described, and a dialog between one of the evaluators and an editor of this journal provides further insight into the evaluation process. Noteworthy in this evaluation, called exemplary by the American Evaluation Association, was highly motivated collaboration of evaluation…

In a time of evolving Algebraic standards and expectations for Minnesota teachers and students, the establishment of quality professional development and technical assistance can help educators move more confidently toward greater mathematics understanding and, subsequently, successful teaching and learning. To this end, the Minnesota Department…

Under IC 21-10-3, the Indiana State Board of Education is required to submit a report by November 1st of each year to the state superintendent, governor, and Indiana General Assembly concerning: (1) Consolidated purchasing agreements by school corporations, charter schools, or by Education Service Centers (ESCs) on behalf of member school…

Findings of a study that evaluated the effectiveness of the Minnesota Education Effectiveness Program (MEEP) are presented in this report. MEEP is a school-based program designed to improve the Minnesota educational system and is facilitated through ongoing staff development processes. The participating schools are supported by a statewide network…

This report is an overview of events that have taken place over the last 4 years to further efforts to make the arts part of what every schoolchild learns in every grade. The report recounts how the Arts in Schools Basic Education Grants (AISBEG), a targeted federal pilot project of the National Endowment for the Arts, has stimulated change at the…