Proponents of school choice and school reform often claim that different school "types" will produce better academic outcomes for students than does the traditional public school model. Unstated but implicit in these views is a causal assumption that certain school types are "better" and produce improved student academic achievement, a very…

The Administration's "Blueprint For Reform," and FY 2011 budget proposal set forth an education agenda that would make the expansion of charter schools a cornerstone of the reauthorized Elementary and Secondary Education Act (ESEA). Likewise, HR 4330 would promote charter schools as a central catalyst for education reform. Without…

The Secretary of Education has expressed strong support for school diversity and reduction of racial isolation in speeches and in the Joint Guidance on Voluntary School Integration, and the Department of Education (DOE) has included a general preference for school integration among its permissible funding preferences. However, this support for…

This manual was written to help guide education stakeholders--including parents, students, school board members, community activists, administrators, policymakers and attorneys--in their efforts to promote racial diversity and avoid racial isolation in suburban school systems. Critical information on the current legal, political and policy issues…

The current study from the National Center on School Choice contributes to the research by exploring the factors that affect principals' perceptions of charter school competition and the extent to which their leadership behavior may change in response. Central research questions of the study were: (1) How do principals perceive the competition…

The purpose of this study was to explore the professional learning process that teachers reported enhanced their use of technology in their classrooms. The framework for this qualitative, theory-building study was guided by research from the field of adult learning. Data were obtained from interviews of six teachers who worked in an urban science…

This study investigates the predictive validity of students' levels of critical thinking disposition, as measured by the California Measure of Mental Motivation (CM3; Giancarlo, Blohm, & Urdan, 2004) for students' math achievement, as measured by the Mathematics assessment included in the Florida Comprehensive Assessment Test (FCAT). The CM3…

The event "School adopts an experiment" is an event targeted at high schools and secondary schools. It is based on a tight and direct collaboration between researchers and school students and teachers. Several schools were involved in the event by "adopting" an experiment in physics research laboratories. Groups of selected students were first…

As students advance in their education, the use of stories and specifically the process of storytelling often wane from the central mode of learning to be replaced with more didactic methods and content-driven applications. However, the use of stories has remained a central component of moral/ethics education and continues to be used as a…

In this article, we describe a simple method which can be used to measure the efficiency of a low power dc motor, a motor-converted dynamo and a coupled motor-dynamo module as a function of the speed of rotation. The result can also be used to verify Faraday's law of electromagnetic induction. (Contains 1 table and 8 figures.)

The perirhinal and entorhinal cortices are critical components of the medial temporal lobe (MTL) declarative memory system. Study of their specific functions using blood oxygenation level-dependent (BOLD) functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI), however, has suffered from severe magnetic susceptibility signal dropout resulting in poor…

This lesson combines the science concepts of renewable energy and producing electricity with the technology concepts of design, constraints, and technology's impact on the environment. Over five class periods, sixth-grade students "work" for a fictitious power company as they research wind as an alternative energy source and design and test a…

As an experimental project proposed to students in fourth year of university, a viscometer was developed, consisting of a small magnet levitating in a viscous fluid. The viscous force acting on the magnet is directly measured: viscosities in the range 10-10[superscript 6] mPa s are obtained. This experiment is used as an introduction to complex…

The electromagnetic environment is composed of electric and magnetic fields which result from man-made and natural sources. An elementary experiment is described to explore the electromagnetic environment by measuring electric fields in the frequency range from approximately equal to 10 to 24 000 Hz. The equipment required to conduct the…

One of my favorite 19th century electrical scientists is Edward Weston, and one of my favorite devices for teaching the topics of electromagnetic forces and torques is the D'Arsonval galvanometer. The junction of these two topics is Weston's improved meter movement that has been used in analog meters for the past 125 years.