In 2010-11, the School District of Philadelphia (the District) operated thirteen accelerated high schools that served approximately 2,000 under-credited, over-age students. Each of the accelerated schools was managed by one of seven external providers, each with its own educational approach, and each with a contractual agreement with the…

Principals are expected to use data to develop a clear vision, stimulate meaningful dialogue among stakeholders, create interventions for struggling students, and improve school programs. The purpose of this three-phase, sequential, mixed-methods study was to examine how principals use summative and formative assessment data to improve academic…

This dissertation examines the phenomenon of how communities can effect change in policy and practice to support greater ecological and cultural sustainability. The general purpose of this research is to examine selected local initiatives for ecological and cultural sustainability to better understand the role of adult education in those efforts.…

Attrition in online programs has historically been much higher than in traditional face to face programs, creating concern regarding the appropriateness of online learning for all populations. This study aimed to address the question of whether students' levels of self-directed learning readiness and the quality ratings of online courses would be…

This research examined the relevance of professional associations to effective reading teaching in Chicago Public Schools (CPS). It looked at the performances of students in meets and exceeds in the Illinois State Achievement Test (ISAT) for third and eight grade students in selected schools in CPS between 1999 and 2004 and how the professional…

Michigan school districts face tough choices allocating their resources to provide students with an education. Despite increased spending in Michigan schools, school boards regularly have to find ways to trim expenses, and sometimes that means lowering employment benefits, eliminating positions and other moves that few school board members enjoy.…

In 2005, the U.S. Department of Education's Office of Elementary and Secondary Education issued a request for proposals (RFP) for programs to improve adolescent literacy. The Department's stated goal was to improve the performance of struggling adolescent readers and help build a strong scientific research base around specific strategies to help…

In the past quarter century, the nation's K-12 public schools have experienced a large influx of students who speak languages other than English. Research has shown that many factors affect how English learner (EL) students acquire English language skills, including their preparation before entering U.S. schools, their out-of-school environments,…

New Hope, an employment-based poverty-reduction intervention for adults evaluated in a random-assignment experimental design, had positive impacts on children's achievement and social behavior two and five years after random assignment. The question addressed in this paper was the following: Did the positive effects of New Hope on younger children…

Educational reform in the United States has focused on several factors such as academic achievement, performance on standardized test scores, dropout rates, the mandate of the No Child Left Behind (NCLB) Act of 2001 (Dee and Jacob, 2010) and other changes. A new call for a broader and bolder strategy for educational reform that focused on…

This article reviews current scholarship about how to promote change in instructional practices used in undergraduate science, technology, engineering, and mathematics (STEM) courses. The review is based on 191 conceptual and empirical journal articles published between 1995 and 2008. Four broad categories of change strategies were developed to…

Although the internationalization of curricula has increased steadily over the past 30 years, most universities and business schools have concentrated their efforts on program assessment activities, leaving course-level assessment as a gap in most international business assessment portfolios. To address the gap in aligning course-specific designs…

This article reports on the implementation of the Integrated Performance Assessment (IPA) in an Early Foreign Language Learning program. The goal of this research was to examine the performance of grade 4 and 5 students of Spanish on the IPA. Performance across the three communicative tasks is described and modifications to IPA procedures based on…

The effectiveness of online messages to change dietary intake and level of physical activity was assessed. Thirty-six volunteers completed a 26-item pre- and post-intervention online survey and received a total of 36 email messages about MyPyramid, food labels, healthier lifestyles, and physical activity. Participants reported increased fiber…

Young people from refugee backgrounds face significant academic and social challenges in mainstream secondary education in Australia. Research suggests that mentoring initiatives and tutoring can help students remain engaged in education and achieve positive educational, social and emotional outcomes. The Classroom Connect Project is a joint…