Identifying the challenges faced by teacher education as the global society becomes increasingly complex requires understanding the current contexts for teacher preparation while projecting what needs to be done to prepare for the future. In order to identify and address the challenges of today and tomorrow, the author contends that teacher…

What is institutional research (IR)? One of the most widely definition of the institutional research is by Joe Saupe, who emphasized institutional research as a set of activities that support institutional planning, policy formation, and decision making. Institutional researchers and IR functions are embedded in the offices of strategic planning,…

Autism Spectrum Disorders (ASD) are lifelong neurodevelopmental disabilities. Burden of Disease is an indicator that provides important information on health status and outcomes such as premature mortality and disability. In order to estimate the burden of disease of ASD in the Spanish population during 2003, we followed the procedures used in the…

Experiential learning can be an effective way to teach many concepts, and evolution is no exception. We describe the pedagogical techniques, class structure and learning objectives, travel logistics, and impact of three undergraduate honors-level experiential learning seminars that combined teaching topics related to evolution with a field trip to…

The 1999 Academic Senate for California Community Colleges paper, "The Role of Academic Senates in Enrollment Management", presented principles for effective faculty participation in developing policies and making decisions that affect course offerings. In 2007, an Academic Senate resolution called for an update to that paper, to provide…

Participatory decision making seems to be the new development paradigm in international cooperation. It is still a long way, however, to achieve the objectives that are formulated by the international development actors. Non-state actors are only limitedly involved in the policy decision-making. In this paper, we argue that when these actors take…

Schools are increasingly expected to take responsibility for aspects of educational quality assurance. The fact that the Flemish government requires its schools to conduct self-evaluations of their equal opportunities policies is an example of this. This article reports on the findings of a study that investigated the quality of these school…

Since former Surgeon General David Satcher first identified childhood obesity as a threat to the nation's health in 2001, health professionals have investigated potential solutions. Venues in which to address this problem have also been explored. The school setting was identified by the Institute of Medicine as a viable location in which to…

Community colleges across the nation appear to be facing a "perfect storm" during which surging enrollments, tepid state funding, and strong accountability forces are colliding to severely threaten access to and completion of postsecondary education and credentials by lower-skilled and low-income students. In the last few years, record enrollments…

Taken as a whole, the findings of educational research are often inconclusive; far too many competing ideas and thus difficult for policy makers to decide what to believe, unless it says what they really want to hear. An alternative is to seek help from the much more "scientifically reliable" findings of neuroscience. Perhaps this will…

Based on document analysis and 40 interviews with Roundtable participants and other stakeholders across North Dakota, this report assesses the factors that enabled the North Dakota Higher Education Roundtable vision to be sustained for more than seven years, identifies obstacles encountered during the sustainability process, and provides…

In 2008, the California Community Colleges Board of Governors amended its Title 5 Regulations to include provisions for granting conditional approval for educational centers. Prior regulations pertained to full or final approval only. The Commission's current guidelines do not contain provisions for conditional approval. This agenda item outlines…

This state policy guide looks at partnerships between charter schools and community, faith-based, and for-profit organizations as one way for these schools to access essential goods and services. Each type of partnership poses specific challenges and opportunities, and, based on a review of charter school legislation and interviews with state…

Purpose: This paper aims to inform the development of policies and programmes to support children and young people's emotional wellbeing and mental health. It seeks to bring together findings both from recent systematic reviews, and from individual evaluation studies which have adopted a relatively rigorous methodology but whose findings have not…

Australia is a federation of six states and two territories. Each state and territory has its own legislature, which may not be of the same political persuasion as the Commonwealth (Federal) Government. Under the Australian Constitution primary control of school education is with the State and Territory Governments, with the Australian…