The 1996 Legislature directed the Minnesota Higher Education Services Office (HESO), in cooperation with the Library Planning Task Force to, "create a plan and process to develop a statewide on-line information system for libraries"; this memo with attached information was submitted in fulfillment of that request. The name chosen for the…

The care and education of the youngest children in the United States has become a critical public policy issue affecting millions of families. This guide closely examines the issues and tradeoffs in key child care policy decisions that face state legislators. The guide provides a discussion of state efforts to build supply, improve quality, and…

Based on data obtained from the state supervisors of foreign languages by the Joint National Committee for Languages, this brief report lists the threats that jeopardize the status of language programs in the United States. These include: budget constraints; the possibility of further minimizing the federal role in education; reversing the…

This paper examines the responses of four high schools to new accountability policies in two states, New York and Vermont. In each state, one school that was better positioned with respect to the policy and one that was a target of the policy were studied. New York's policy attaches high stakes for students though the Regents high school exit…

Now in its seventh year, the Illinois Youth Summit focuses on issues of violence affecting youth. On December 5, 2000, representatives from 21 high school classrooms across Illinois met to determine youth safety issues of greatest relevance to students across the state. These students identified three sources of violence to address at the 2001…

Michigan has had responsibilities for educating the state's American Indians since the Comstock Agreement of 1934. A 1976 legislative act and its subsequent revisions provided for state institutions of higher education to grant free tuition to certain American Indians through the Michigan Indian Tuition Waiver (ITW) program. Eligible Indians had…

The purpose of this document is to help states and districts meet the challenges posed by the 1994 reauthorization of Title I. The goal in developing this document was to produce a practical guide for states and districts to use in developing the systems they were creating under the Title I law. Following an introduction to Title I, chapter 2…

This report summarizes the findings, issues, and lessons learned from the Developing National Public Library and Statewide Network Statistics and Performance Measures study conducted between January 1999 and August 2000. The overall goal of the study was to develop a core set of national statistics and performance measures that librarians,…

In the fall of 1996, as the expansion of Oklahoma's statewide communications and information network (OneNet) became fully implemented, the Oklahoma State Regents for Higher Education began a strategic planning initiative focused on the utilization of technology throughout the state's system of higher education. The planning process began with a…

Noting that one of the leading indicators of progress toward the goal of all children being ready for the first grade is the number of at-risk children with access to high-quality prekindergarten programs, this report presents information on the efforts of states in the southern United States to achieve that goal. The report notes that during the…

States are currently struggling to deal with the rising demand for child care assistance as more parents go to work as a result of welfare reform and to respond to state budget crises limiting the availability of funds for child care. This report uses data collected in May 2002 from state early childhood experts and policymakers to illustrate the…

The movement toward math and science curriculum standards is inextricably linked with high-stakes politics. There are two major types of politics discussed in this paper: the allocation of curriculum content, and the political issues involved in systemic change. Political strategies for gaining assent to national, state, and local content…

This report presents information about the Illinois Board of Higher Education and the state of higher education in Illinois. The Illinois Board of Higher Education, a 15-member board, is responsible for planning and coordinating the states system of higher education. The Board has statutory responsibilities for master planning, the budget, program…

This report reviews the current status, empirical findings, theoretical issues, and practical considerations related to state-level minimum competency testing programs. It finds that, although two-thirds of current testing programs now use direct writing prompts to assess writing achievement, essentially all programs rely on multiple choice tests…

This document consists of 12 consecutive issues of the monthly "Centennial State Libraries" newsletter, of the Colorado Department of Education State Library and Adult Education Office. The issues cover the year 1999. Each issue--except the August issue which is an Annual Report--includes some or all of the following sections: current…