Given the intense efforts to change federal legislation, it is surprising that relatively little research has examined how postsecondary institutions respond to organizational pressures and local contexts. These "boundary activities" determine actual practice (Birnbaum, 1991) and may be the only way to remedy the exclusion of undocumented…

Under the No Child Left Behind Act (NCLBA), the federal government provides millions of dollars annually to assist schools that have not met state academic goals. In the 2006-2007 school year, over 10,000 such schools were identified for improvement. NCLBA requires states to set aside 4 percent of their Title I funds to pay for school improvement…

Designed to provide an overview of programs offered by state humanities councils, this publication is divided into seven sections. An introduction defines the humanities and outlines the Division of State Programs within the National Endowment for the Humanities (NEH). A section entitled "The State Humanities Councils" presents the…

Determining whether schools and districts are making adequate yearly progress under the federal No Child Left Behind Act "has evolved into 50 intricate formulas that vary greatly from state to state," according to a recent report by the Center on Education Policy. The report from the Washington-based policy group tracks changes to state…

The U.S. Department of Education is conducting several activities to address privacy and security issues related to education data. Earlier this year a contractor for the Department convened a group of privacy and security experts and produced a report with recommendations to the Department on ways they can address emerging challenges in…

This paper offers unique rankings of the extent to which fiscal structures of U.S. states contribute to economic growth. The rankings are novel in two key respects: They are well grounded in established growth theory, in which the effect of taxes depends both on the level of taxes and on the composition of expenditures; and they are derived from…

Even the last states to be reviewed on their progress for meeting the "highly qualified" teacher provisions of the No Child Left Behind Act have some distance to travel before satisfying the law, according to Department of Education documents and officials. A case in point is Connecticut, one of the final stops for the federal monitoring…

Regardless of one's philosophical views of the role of the national government, the new federal willingness to reexamine its past effectiveness and role provides an opportunity for grassroots involvement by both state educational agencies and local school districts. An evaluation of current federal enactments needs to consider several important…

THIS CONFERENCE ON GIFTED CHILDREN WAS CALLED BY THE U.S. OFFICE OF EDUCATION TO BROADEN THE CONCEPT OF THE GIFTED TO INCLUDE ALL AREAS OF GIFTEDNESS AND TO BRING ABOUT SOME UNDERSTANDING ON THE PART OF SOCIETY OF THE NECESSITY FOR NURTURING EXCELLENCE. TO REACH THE HIGH GOAL OF PROVIDING QUALITY EDUCATION, THERE MUST BE A MASSIVE DETERMINED…

National Commission study helps prod States into enacting more than 100 amendments to improve protection for disabled workers. (Editor)

A brief outline of Federal Plans for educational reforms. (RA)

The congressionally-mandated Vocational Education Study concluded that the Vocational Education Act attempts to accomplish too much with too few resources. A major roadblock is the fact that federal resources are insufficient to realize all the objectives of the Act, and that implementation is dependent upon state and local cooperation. (SK)

With the No Child Left Behind Act in limbo, the time is right for big thinking on intergovernmental collaboration in the ways we measure and report results in our schools. The Rockefeller Institute convened 40 experts including former New York education commissioner Gordon Ambach, Chester E. Finn, Jr., of the Thomas B. Fordham Institute,…

Having all the nation's teachers meet the definition of being "highly qualified" is an admirable goal, but the No Child Left Behind Act's current teacher-quality provisions make it hard to retain well-trained teachers, especially in schools serving poor and minority children, witnesses said the week of April 10, 2006 in California at the…