Despite widely shared aspirations, the vast majority of community college students do not continue their studies at four-year colleges. In November 2013, "Jobs for the Future" convened higher education leaders and researchers to explore state-level policy strategies for restructuring community college in ways that enhance student…

This policy analysis project focused on state-level education policy which lacks evaluator training as well as on requirements for research-based best practices. Due to federal mandates and funding as well as accountability to all stakeholders, states are adopting more rigorous evaluation systems. These high-stakes evaluation systems are putting…

A report analyzing how accommodated tests, and students with disabilities and the assessments they take, are addressed in state test security policies -- a subject about which little is known. This analysis was conducted to partially fill this gap. The report provides a snapshot of how accommodated tests for students with disabilities, alternate…

Every state can create secure, robust linkages between early childhood and K-12 data systems, and effectively use the information from these linkages to implement initiatives to support programs and children, answer key policy questions, and be transparent about how the state's early childhood investments prepare students for success in school and…

Approximately one-third of American freshmen at two-year and four-year colleges require remedial coursework and over 40 percent of employers rate new hires with a high school diploma as "deficient" in their overall preparation for entry-level jobs. Yet, over the past decade, as these students marched through America's public education…

The Tennessee Educator Survey, created in partnership with the Tennessee Education Research Alliance at Vanderbilt University (TERA), aims to take the pulse of teacher perceptions, monitor school climate and culture across the state, and include educators' voices in the policy discussion. The survey offers a snapshot of where Tennessee is--and…

Developmental education courses in college--defined as classes taken in college that are below college level (Bautsch, 2013)--have come under increased scrutiny in recent years. Concerns focus on the large number of students enrolled in developmental education courses, the high cost of providing them, and the low success rates among students who…

This policy plan offers an approach to early childhood policies that get to the roots of racial equity. It describes how to promote social, economic, health, and educational equity by broadening the current early childhood public policy focus in Minnesota on early education and service programs to also include funding efforts that promote positive…

The Texas Education Agency (TEA) prepares an annual report on graduates and dropouts in Texas public secondary schools. This report includes state summaries of the annual dropout rate, longitudinal graduation and dropout rates, and state attrition rates. In addition to statewide statistics, the report provides historical information about dropout…

As the Public School Forum of North Carolina enters its 30th year in 2016, it continues its tradition of forecasting the ten issues most likely to impact K-12 public schools across the state in "Top Ten Education Issues for 2016." Two ongoing tensions underlie much of the current debate over the future of public education in North…

In recent years, federal education programs and policies have increasingly focused on teacher quality as a means for closing achievement gaps, in part by directing states to measure teacher qualifications and performance and to promote equitable access to qualified and effective teachers among schools within a district. This report provides a…

Only 35 percent of U.S. 8th graders were identified as proficient in math by the 2011 National Assessment of Educational Progress (NAEP). According to the most recent calculations available, the United States stands at the 32nd rank in math among nations in the industrialized world. In reading, the U.S. ranks 17th in the world (see "Are U.S.…

This paper employs panel estimators with data on the 50 American states for the years 1963 to 2006 to test the relationship between Unemployment Insurance (UI) trust fund solvency and UI benefit generosity. We find that both average and maximum weekly UI benefit amounts, as ratios to the average weekly wage, are higher in states and in years with…

Schools across the United States are facing budgetary pressures on a scale not seen in generations. Times of fiscal exigency force policymakers and education practitioners to pay more attention to the return on various categories of public investment in education. The sizes of the classes in which students are educated are often a focus of these…

Even though 34 states and the District of Columbia have No Child Left Behind Act waivers in hand, many of them are still negotiating with the U.S. Department of Education over their teacher evaluation systems--a crucial component if they want to keep their newfound flexibility. More than six months after waiver recipients turned in their…