The purpose of this study was to understand the nature of the relationship between organizational strategy and district performance among California's largest unified school districts. Organizational strategy was measured using planned and realized strategies (independent variables). Realized strategy is also referred to strategic orientation.…

Multi Media Madness (3Ms) was a faculty development program where participants were guided by mentors through the development of a multimedia project. Nine faculty participants attended a week long workshop session in June 2003 taught by three mentors. At the end of the workshop series, the participants submitted a project plan that was reviewed,…

EducationWorks (EW) contracted with Research for Action (RFA) to research and evaluate its socialized recess (SR) program conducted by Education-Works/National School and Community Corps (NSCC) teams which are based full-time in individual public schools. The purpose of this research was to give EW/NSCC deeper insights into the accomplishments and…

The research reviewed in this topical bibliography and commentary generally pursues two lines of inquiry: what exactly information literacy is, and how educators can apply theories of information literacy to the day-to-day problems of elementary and middle-school students. The research contains a particular emphasis on the inability of current…

The state of Louisiana has commissioned several pilot projects to design, implement, and evaluate a teacher leader curriculum leading to eligibility for the new teacher leader certificate. The purpose of this paper is to describe one of these pilots, the St. Charles Teacher Leader Institute (TLI), which was implemented as a partnership between the…

A school district located in the southern region of the United States is implementing the Reading Recovery (RR) Program in 10 elementary schools. The RR program is an initiative to help elementary schools improve student learning, especially in the area of reading. A broad literature review framed this quantitative investigation. The overall…

This report describes work by Public/Private Ventures to mount a faith-based initiative that would produce credible evidence and lessons concerning the capacity, limits, and practices of faith-based organizations in working with high-risk youth. Organizations in 15 cities agreed to participate in the National Faith Based Initiative for High-Risk…

The AVID Best Practices Study assessed the relative efficacy of 11 AVID program essentials; examined schoolwide effects of AVID; and identified necessary research-based changes in AVID program essentials or staff development. AVID is an elective program for students that provides rigorous academic focus and addresses essential aspects in college…

Underage drinking prevention has two goals: prevent harm to the individual drinker and prevent harm to society. Modern prevention programs should be measured not by their intentions, but by their consequences: reducing the number of criminal events, reducing the amount of harm to individuals, and reducing the harm to society. This guide discusses…

This guide details what coalitions and organizations need to do to insure the enforcement and judicial communities are active partners in the effort to reduce underage drinking. One of the first tasks discussed is the necessity for groups to understand the needs and concerns of law enforcement and to recognize that underage drinking enforcement…

Targeting public policy is a necessary part of a successful underage drinking prevention effort. This guide details how coalitions and organizations can effectively work to change public policies that impact underage drinking. The booklet first explains the elements of public policy including laws, regulations, and the policies and practices of…

This report examines the first 2 years of the Alabama Reading Initiative (ARI), whose goal is 100% literacy for all Alabama's public school children using a balanced approach to reading instruction. It includes results from the external evaluation team, examples of changes in teaching practices and student behaviors, as well as the voices of…

This study attempted to build the best fitting prediction model, with high predictive validity, for success at a minority professional school. The resulting model could be used to document the effectiveness of academic programs and applicant screening. Data for 216 medical students from the college were used to evaluate the usefulness of the…

Noting that growing evidence indicates that high-quality preschool child development programs contribute to the short and long-term development of children living in poverty, this digest summarizes recently reported experimental and quasi-experimental studies of Head Start and similar programs. Recently reported experimental studies include those…

For more than a decade, the Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services Administrations Center for Substance Abuse Prevention (CSAP) has supported demonstration programs designed to identify interventions that work with high-risk populations to prevent substance abuse, delay its onset, and reduce substance abuse-related behaviors. Research now…