The No Child Left Behind Act of 2001 (NCLB) requires that schools make "adequate yearly progress" (AYP) towards the goal of having 100 percent of their students become proficient by year 2013-14. Through simulation analyses of Maine and Kentucky school performance data collected during the 1990s, this study investigates how feasible…

Despite differences in geographic location, district size, and student characteristics, district special education leaders reflected similar views on opportunities and challenges of NCLBA. Challenges included making AYP, meeting the highly qualified teacher requirement, addressing budget shortfalls, aligning of federal policies, predicting the…

In this article, the authors explore whether educational systems have the institutional capacity to implement comprehensive, systemic reform, as envisioned in legislation such as No Child Left Behind. Drawing upon evidence from various state-level reform initiatives, the authors highlight the ways in which systemic reform appears to positively…

This paper provides an overview of U.S. Department of Education programs authorized and funded under federal law. It includes information as well on the laboratories, centers, and other facilities funded by the Department that provide important resources for education. Each entry, which gives a brief overview of a program or resource, is listed…

This report represents the deliberations of the Pacific Regional Advisory Committee (RAC), one of 10 RACs established under the Educational Technical Assistance Act of 2002 to assess the educational needs of the region. The committee's report outlines educational needs across the state, districts, and territories of Hawai'i, the Commonwealth of…

The "Carl D. Perkins Vocational and Technical Education Act of 1998" (commonly referred to as "Perkins," "Perkins III," or "the Act" and referred to hereafter as Perkins III) requires, in Sec. 113(c)(3)(C), that the secretary provide the appropriate committees of Congress copies of annual reports received by…

This paper proposes a strategic federal investment of $3 billion in the relatively small number of social interventions (i.e., programs, practices, strategies) shown in scientifically-rigorous studies to produce sizeable, sustained improvement in the lives of children and youth. Careful analyses show that the benefits of these interventions in…

The 2008 State Preschool Yearbook is the sixth in a series of annual reports profiling state-funded prekindergarten programs in the United States. This yearbook presents data on state-funded prekindergarten during the 2007-2008 school year. The 2008 Yearbook is organized into three major sections. The first section offers a summary of the data,…

This article reports the results of a preliminary study that applied a randomized posttest-only design to evaluate the effectiveness of a literacy curriculum that incorporated explicit opportunities for Spanish-speaking Head Start preschool children (N = 76) to develop writing abilities in English. The study also addressed English language…

The purpose of this report is to provide an overview of national activities to improve the education of children with disabilities funded in fiscal year (FY) 2005 under the "Individuals with Disabilities Education Act" ("IDEA"), Part D, Subparts 2 and 3 (P.L. 108-446). "IDEA", Part D (National Activities) includes…

"Educators Resource Directory" is designed to provide both educators and education professionals with immediate access to a unique compilation of over 6,500 educational resources and over 130 tables and charts of education statistics and rankings. It would take many hours of searching through multiple resources to uncover all the…

Flexibility and accountability are two levers for change that occupy an increasingly prominent place among federal strategies for educational improvement. In return for introducing higher academic standards and performance-based accountability systems, states and districts have been granted increasing flexibility over how they may use the funding…

This paper discusses the online Personal Learning Planner (PLP) project underway at the National Institute of Community Innovations (NICI), one of the partners in the Teacher Education Network (TEN), a 2000 PT3 Catalyst grantee. The Web-based PLP provides a standards-linked "portfolio space" for both works in progress and demonstration collections…

Initiation and continuation of preschool inclusion is a challenging task. Through interviews and focus groups of school district and special education personnel, researchers in this study examined how 5 programs in 1 Midwestern state provided such services. The investigation used a multiple-case study methodology to examine how these programs…

Having developed a technology-based teaching unit on weather that appeared to work well for middle school students, Nancy Butler Songer and her colleagues at the University of Michigan decided in the late 1990s to take the next logical step in their research program: They scaled up. This article discusses lessons learned by several faculty…