Graduate surveys are a good way for home study schools to determine whether graduates are getting jobs in their field of training and whether courses are meeting student expectations. Although telephone surveys are more costly and time-consuming than mail surveys, they are usually more accurate. Survey response rates can be boosted to 50-60% by…

A wealth of material about education in the United States is collected and released by the U.S. Department of Education's National Center for Education Statistics (NCES). The NCES gathers data on all aspects of education from across the country, organizes the data in useful forms, and releases the resulting surveys and studies as survey reports,…

EQUALS is a teacher education program that helps educators acquire methods and materials to attract minority and female students to mathematics. The Investigations Units, of which this document is an example, provide ideas and materials for middle schools. This unit is primarily about displaying data using number-line plots and scatter plots and…

This report analyzes interscholastic athletic programs offered by Minnesota high schools to identify errors in data reporting and suggest corrective action, identify areas of gender inequality in athletic offerings, and identify needed improvements in rule, law, or reporting requirements. The report outlines issues in sports equity, compares…

A project was conducted to design an alternative assessment tool for use with adult learners traditionally identified as reading below fifth-grade level. This assessment allows for the creation of a goal-oriented Individual Education Plan that is personalized to the learner's needs and educational goals. The approach, analogous to the art…

This paper contends that the survey research approach is limited for generating substantive data to improve college teaching, because it is impersonal, lacks opportunities for probing, suppresses the idea of discourse by offering fixed-choice and yes-no questions, disregards respondents' social and personal contexts of meaning, and is dependent on…

Since 1990, it has been possible to charge fees for all of Australia's Technical and Further Education (TAFE) courses. Although data can be extracted regarding TAFE enrollment patterns before and after the introduction of fees, detailed information about economically disadvantaged students cannot be obtained through the existing data collection…

This document, which is intended for individuals at the state and local levels with responsibility for school-to-work opportunities, focuses on recommended standard procedures for evaluating school-to-work transition programs. In the introduction, the role of evaluation as a critical element in an overall program management strategy is discussed…

To satisfy federal requirements, the National Center for Education Statistics and the Division of Adult Education and Literacy planned a nationally representative household sample survey to assess the literacy skills of the adult population of the United States, to be conducted by the Educational Testing Service with the assistance of Westat, Inc.…

Alexander Astin, a pioneer in assessment research, has argued persuasively for building national databases that would permit programs and institutions to share common data and thus compare themselves with peers (1987, 1991). Others have suggested that certain process and outcome data should be collected and shared by disciplinary associations and…

This report describes the variety of bilateral linkages which have been developed by U.S. institutions with specific Canadian and Mexican colleges in a wide range of fields. Out of 1,219 U.S. colleges and universities responding (35 percent response rate) to a survey concerning educational linkages, 109 reported linkages with Canadian…

Assessment as conducted at Finger Lakes Community College (FLCC) in Canandaigua (New York) has taken various forms and has been conducted under various names. This publication offers an overview of assessment at the college from a philosophical and historical perspective. In both general and specific terms, the efforts of the college to meet the…

This study examined the relative intellectual impacts of two- and four-year college educational programs by focusing on changes in reading comprehension, mathematics, and critical thinking skills in 204 freshmen students who attended either a public two-year community college near a large metropolitan area or a public four-year, urban research…

This paper identifies issues and needs related to services for migrant children based on a review of the literature and discussions with experts in the field. Background on migrant children includes definitions; demography; migrant data sources; and descriptions of federal migrant education, migrant health, and migrant Head Start programs. A…

This report summarizes the National Job Training Partnership Act (JTPA) Study, which examined the impact of Title IIA of JTPA on participants' employment, earnings, and welfare receipt. Between 1987 and 1989, more than 20,000 adults and out-of-school youths who applied for JTPA services in 16 areas across the country were randomly assigned to a…