This report is the culmination of a yearlong effort to study the efficiency of the nation's public education system and includes the first-ever attempt to evaluate the productivity of almost every major school district in the country. In the business world, the notion of productivity describes the benefit received in exchange for effort or money…

How might a district support significant teacher and program change that results in higher student reading achievement while using its own personnel? To answer this question, we explored five districts in one Midwestern state that tried to do just that with the help of a local university. We used both quantitative and qualitative data, including…

The authors expand on research evaluating public school response to school choice policies by considering the particular influence of voucher programs for disabled students--a growing type of choice program that may have different implications for public school systems from those of more conventional choice programs. The authors provide a…

In the pseudo-documentary "The Age of Stupid" (Armstrong 2009), a historian from 2055 scans the remnants of civilization and asks why, in the early twenty-first century, people did not save themselves when they had the chance. The film serves as a motif for issues raised in this article. Why do people continue to believe that education plays an…

In recent years there has been an unprecedented increase in support staff in schools in England and Wales. There were widespread expectations that this will be of benefit to teachers and pupils but there has been little systematic research to address the impact of support staff. This study used a naturalistic longitudinal design to investigate the…

The No Child Left Behind (NCLB) Act compelled states to design school accountability systems based on annual student assessments. The effect of this federal legislation on the distribution of student achievement is a highly controversial but centrally important question. This study presents evidence on whether NCLB has influenced student…

The Progress in International Reading Literacy Study (PIRLS) 2006 findings highlighted concerns about reading literacy teaching quality in South African primary schools (Howie et al., 2007). In response, the national Department of Education (DoE, 2008a, 2008b, 2008c, 2008d) has emphasised instructional practice improvement. However, little…

This toolkit is designed to help community schools evaluate their efforts so that they learn from their successes, identify current challenges, and plan future efforts. It provides a step-by-step process for planning and conducting an evaluation at your community school site(s). The toolkit is a practical, hands-on guide that makes it possible for…

A systematic search of the research literature from 1996 through July 2008 identified more than a thousand empirical studies of online learning. Analysts screened these studies to find those that (a) contrasted an online to a face-to-face condition, (b) measured student learning outcomes, (c) used a rigorous research design, and (d) provided…

Chapin Hall partnered with the W. Clement and Jessie V. Stone Foundation to host a convening for the Stone Foundation Education Grantees in October of 2008. The purpose of the convening was to gather key leaders in the education field for a discussion of the lessons learned in their work and how these lessons inform future practice and policy…

"Education Matters" is the monthly newsletter of the Association of American Educators (AAE), an organization dedicated to advancing the American teaching profession through personal growth, professional development, teacher advocacy and protection. This issue of the newsletter includes: (1) Invading Privacy: Card Check is on the Way! (Hans…

Reform-minded leaders of Qatar, who have embarked on a sweeping reform of their nation's education system, asked RAND to evaluate the education finance system that has been adopted and to offer suggestions for improvements. The authors analyze the system's evolution and resource allocation patterns between 2004 and 2006 and develop analytic tools…

Qatar's education reform, which included implementation of a new finance system, appears to be providing schools with adequate funding but is still struggling with issues of transparency and swift policy shifts that have been difficult to accommodate. [For full report, "Developing a School Finance System for K-12 Reform in Qatar", see…

The article provides a conceptual framework and discusses research methods for analyzing pluralistic agricultural advisory services. The framework can also assist policy-makers in identifying reform options. It addresses the following question: Which forms of providing and financing agricultural advisory services work best in which situation? The…

Emerging contractual delivery systems, collaborative partnerships, new management initiatives, and global product markets require professionals and students to have a broader awareness of construction methods and project management issues. This paper presents the state of the project management education in Pakistan. The analysis is based on…