User-centered evaluations of information systems often focus on the usability of the system rather its usefulness. This study examined how a using an interactive knowledge-domain visualization (KDV) system affected users' understanding of a domain. Interactive KDVs allow users to create graphical representations of domains that depict important…

Single-sex education is an instructional innovation implemented to improve student academic achievement by teaching to the learning styles and interests of boys and/or girls. This ex post facto quantitative study examined the differences in academic achievement between single-sex education and coeducation classes on students' achievement in…

One of the greatest challenges for middle school Earth science teachers is helping our students get a feel for the magnitude of the long spans that make up Earth's history. The intent of the strategy presented here is to help middle school students get a feel for the real sizes of powers of 10, and then help them use that understanding by…

Over the past two decades, writing centers have steadily been expanding services and materials they offer online. The way students write and communicate about their writing continues to change, and the writing center has increasingly been looked upon as a site through which technology and writing have the ability to converge in the form of…

The U.S. Department of Education's proposed guidelines for awarding $4 billion in Race to the Top Fund money send a strong message that any state hoping to land a competitive grant should expect to allow student test scores to be used in decisions about teacher compensation and evaluation. The draft plans outlined by department officials last…

With 2014 approaching as the deadline by which states must get all their students up to "proficient" levels on state tests, a study released last week by the U.S. Department of Education's top statistics agency suggests that some states may have lowered student-proficiency standards on such tests in recent years. For the 47-state study,…

One of the most radical actions one can take is to describe, without exaggeration or bias, exactly what is happening. The author has been reading the "Handbook for the inspection of further education and skills from September 2009." The Office for Standards in Education, Children's Services and Skills' (Ofsted's) new handbook promises a "fresh…

The Common Core State Standards Initiative is a collaborative effort between the Council of Chief State School Officers (CCSSO) and the National Governors Association (NGA) that is developing core K12 standards in English-language arts and math. The current patchwork of state standards makes it difficult, if not impossible, to evaluate student…

That each institution of higher education should develop its own salient special characteristics ("te se") of institutional operation is a matter of major and far-reaching significance for the reform and development of higher education, and every institution of higher education should attach a high degree of importance to, and correctly…

Background: The introduction of the Australian Research Training Scheme has been a strong reason for assuring the quality of the research higher degree (RHD) experience; if students experience poor supervision, an unsupportive climate, and inadequate infrastructure, prior research suggests RHD students will be less likely to complete their degree,…

The purpose of this study was to classify higher education institutions according to institutional performance rather than predetermined benchmarks. Institutional performance was defined as research performance and classified using Hierarchical Cluster Analysis, a statistical method that classifies objects according to specified classification…

In recent years, Bahrain has taken serious actions to diversify its sources of income and solve major national problems such as unemployment. Through this process it discovered that one of the main factors for its economic problems was the quality of higher education on offer. This led to the creation of a national Quality Assurance Authority that…

This study examined patterns of growth across benchmark assessments for curriculum-based measures (CBM) over 2 academic years, with the twofold purpose of replicating earlier findings of growth patterns on R-CBM and conducting a preliminary investigation of growth patterns on M-CBM and CBM-Maze. The sample included 898 cases from 3rd through 5th…

Students who achieve critical academic benchmarks such as high attendance rates, continuous levels of credit accumulation, and high grades have a greater likelihood of success throughout high school and beyond. However, keeping students on track toward meeting graduation requirements and quickly identifying students who are at risk of falling off…

This study investigates the relationship between student engagement (as measured by the National Survey of Student Engagement benchmarks) and pharmacy student professionalism (as measured by the Pharmacy Professionalism Domain instrument) in first and third year pharmacy students at seven different schools of pharmacy. Engagement provides the…