This report presents a summaay and synthesis of data from 43 Wisconsin schools, each of which conducted an extensive vocational program self-evaluation in 1990-91. Chapter 1 provides an overview of the evaluation project process, including the survey instruments used and a list of participating schools. The next eight chapters provide a review of…

Student behavior analysis is an active research topic in distance education in recent years. In this article, we propose a new method called Boosting to investigate students' behaviors. The Boosting Algorithm can be treated as a data mining method, trying to infer from a large amount of training data the essential factors and their relations that…

Since September 1988, the Prince George's County (Maryland) Board of Education and the area's Private Industry Council have worked together to provide literacy-enhancing classes at worksites for persons in the county whose jobs represent 15 different employers. These employers have recognized the problems of workers with poor literacy and…

Dutchess Community College (DCC) in Poughkeepsie, New York, has developed a series of 1-hour, noncredit study skills courses (CSS), which use the content of introductory credit courses as a vehicle for teaching study skills. These course-specific study skills are taught by the instructors of the related credit courses, and stress practical work…

A followup study assessed the effectiveness of the Milwaukee public high school career specialty programs. A total of 160 program graduates completed surveys in the first, second, and fifth years following high school graduation. Included in the survey were multiple-choice questions pertaining to current educational and employment status, the…

A review of literature from the early sixties to the present provides an understanding of problems posed by potential dropouts (disadvantaged learners) and some potential solutions to those problems. The first section describes who potential dropouts are and why they are disadvantaged; how they can be identified; some remedial projects already…

Designed to assist California policy and decision makers with planning to meet the future educational needs of limited-English speaking (LES) and non-English speaking (NES) students, this study was undertaken: (1) to describe and analyze the implementation of all areas of the legislatively required services to LES/NES children, and the structures…

The Occupational Survival Skills (OSS) Modules were designed to offer high school students an opportunity to develop skills applicable to a wide range of jobs in the work world and to develop positive attitudes, perceptions, and motivations toward work. The primary purpose of this study was to describe and interpret the influence of the OSS…

Three project teams, with three teachers, a counselor, and a school-community coordinator on each, developed sex-fair experience-based career education programs and activities for junior and senior high school students in three Arkansas schools. Team members visited community learning sites, offered orientation and exploratory courses to students,…

A project determined the external validity and generalizability of a staff development procedure for inservice secondary and postsecondary vocational instructors in the states of Kentucky, Virginia, and Wisconsin. Four secondary vocational and ten postsecondary schools participated in the project, which included 453 vocational instructors, 53…

TWELVE PILOT PROGRAMS FOR TRAINING FOOD SERVICE WORKERS AND CHILD CARE CENTER AIDES FOR ENTRY-LEVEL JOBS WERE STUDIED TO (1) EVALUATE STUDENT PROGRESS TOWARDS SPECIFIC OBJECTIVES RELATED TO KNOWLEDGE, JOB COMPETENCIES, AND WORK ATTITUDES, (2) DETERMINE THE RELATIONSHIP OF STUDENT SUCCESS IN THE COURSE AND ON THE JOB TO STUDENT CHARACTERISTICS, AND…

Limited to a comparison of one open school and one traditional school, this study was performed to empirically assess the claims of open classroom proponents. Approximately 250 students in grades 1 through 6 of two elementary schools, one utilizing an open classroom instructional program and the other a traditional instructional program, comprised…

To determine the impact of the middle/junior high level Practical Arts Program from the Kentucky State Department of Education, an experimental/control group design was used in testing students at two junior high schools. The Career Maturity Inventory (CMI) and the School Sentiment Index (SSI) were administered, pre- and posttest, to measure…

The goal of this study was to answer the question: "When ethnically diverse fourth- and fifth-grade students participate in a ten-week musical program, are there any shifts in the following: academic performance, attitude towards school, social skills, self-esteem, public speaking ability, and/or school attendance?" This study was…

The benefits of family literacy programs for children were examined in a 1997 follow-up study in which 154 parents and 237 children who had participated in a family literacy demonstration program in 1994-1995 were interviewed along with the teachers of a subsample of the children and the demonstration program coordinators. The demonstration…