This paper describes a practical method for identifying and communicating expectations of student performance in the classroom. The method has been used at McREL for clients who require a systematic approach to setting performance expectations and communicating these to their constituents. This document in organized in the following sections: (1)…

This publication provides a list of history standards and benchmarks embodying content that is highly valued nationally and in the Central Region states (Colorado, Kansas, Missouri, Nebraska, North Dakota, South Dakota, and Wyoming). It is intended to assist curriculum directors, social studies coordinators, and others who seek to identify…

This benchmarking tool is designed to help higher education institutions (HEIs) assess the contribution they are making to their region. It aims to encourage debate on a voluntary basis within and between individual HEIs, and to assess the contributions they are making to the economic and social development of their region and how those…

This Bulletin focuses on comparing and tracking funding levels for higher education and serves as a complement to the "Fact Book on Higher Education" published by the Southern Regional Education Board (SREB). When appropriations for higher education were adjusted for inflation, they decreased in 23 states between the 2000-2001 and…

The Institute for Higher Education Policy reviewed the research on quality and equality in Internet-based higher education and found a relative paucity of original research dedicated to explaining or predicting phenomena related to distance learning. The research that does exist has tended to emphasize student outcomes for individual courses,…

This study was designed to provide schools, districts, and states with a means for identifying the knowledge and skills that are most important for students to learn for the subject areas of geography and history. Five state standards documents were selected to represent the exemplary content in geography and history. These documents were selected…

Comparisons of the training practices of large companies confirm that the delivery and financing of training is changing rapidly. Companies in the American Society for Training and Development Benchmarking Forum are delivering less training with permanent staff and more with strategic use of technology, contract staff, and external providers,…

Participants in cooperative extension family life programs (N=916) identified family strains, coping, quality of life, self-esteem, stress, and willingness to support extension services with tax dollars. The resulting normative data can be used to measure the impact of cooperative extension programs. (SK)

Examines a number of current products that enhance CD-ROM use. Highlights include shareware; audio players; drive control, including security devices; caching, to increase speed; benchmarks and diagnostics, to compare different drive models; enhanced extensions; and file management. (LRW)

Project 2061 has been constructing goals for science, mathematics, and technology education since 1985, beginning with high school graduation standards (in "Science for All Americans 1989") and working toward reasonable standards for students at earlier grade levels. Projected "Benchmarks for Science Literacy" will include…

Discusses benchmarking, the continuous process of measuring one's products, services, and practices against those recognized as leaders in that field to identify areas for improvement. Examines ways in which benchmarking can benefit human resources functions. (JOW)

Examines an approach to school maintenance budgeting that can improve the ability of schools to obtain maintenance and repair funds. The approach is based on the use of the Facilities Condition Index as a budgeting tool, where maintenance is viewed as keeping the physical value of facilities as close to 100% of replacement cost as possible. (GR)

An alternative benchmarking approach for assessing business-school quality was developed by a partnership of five schools. It relies on facilitators who guide institutional representatives in selecting performance indicators and gathering and reporting benchmarks, best practices, and student satisfaction. (SK)

Learning in corporations was assessed using these benchmarks: core qualities of creative organizations, characteristic of organizational creativity, attributes of flexible organizations, use of diversity and conflict, creative human resource management systems, and effective and successful teams. These benchmarks are key elements of the learning…

Discusses issues concerned with diversity and selecting peer institutions against which institutions of higher education attempt to "benchmark" themselves. Suggests diversity and peer selection can be closely linked conceptually within single scales of similarity and dis- similarity. A case study illustrates connections between diversity and peer…