This dissertation consists of three essays focused on policies that hold the potential to reduce gender and socioeconomic gaps in the developing world. The first two chapters focus on higher education while the last chapter focuses on STEM gender gaps during primary school. Chapter 1 looks at the impacts of new transportation infrastructure on…

After being identified as a school in need of improvement, one struggling inner city high school implemented an evening school alternative program to reduce their suspension, failure, and dropout rates. In its first year, the program graduated 100% of the student participants, all of whom were in danger of dropping out, or being kicked out of high…

NGSS Early Implementers is a six-year initiative created to help eight California school districts and two charter management organizations, supported by WestEd's K-12 Alliance, implement the Next Generation Science Standards (NGSS). Administrators need learning opportunities if they are to adequately understand the substantial shifts of the Next…

The Annie E. Casey Foundation launched Family-Centered Community Change (FCCC) in 2012 to support three local partnerships seeking to help parents and children in high-poverty neighborhoods succeed together. These partnerships, located in Buffalo, New York; Columbus, Ohio; and San Antonio, Texas, are each developing a more integrated set of…

The Head Start Act mandates that each Head Start grantee receive a monitoring review at least once every 3 years; each newly designated grantee be reviewed after the completion of its first year (and then at least once every 3 years thereafter); and all grantees that "fail to meet the standards" receive Follow-up reviews. Reviewers…

The purpose of this report is to provide formative and summative feedback to the Utah State Board of Education (USBE) regarding evidence of implementation and impact for the Interventions for Reading Difficulties Pilot Program. The report, while addressing the effects of the Interventions for Reading Difficulties Pilot Program, is also designed to…

Postsecondary education is a key pathway to economic mobility for many Americans, but financial challenges often make it difficult for learners to pursue and complete their education. Obtaining financing for postsecondary education can be a barrier to access for some students. The process is complicated, and many programs are ineligible for…

The Food Resource Equity and Sustainability for Health ("FRESH") study is an Indigenous-led intervention to increase vegetable and fruit intake among Native American children. As part of this study, we developed a hybrid (online and in-person) food sovereignty and nutrition education curriculum for the parents of these children. This…

The use of mobile applications (apps) is popular among parents and teachers due to their cost-effectiveness and ease of implementation, and the number of apps with the specific aim to increase eye contact for children with autism is growing rapidly. However, research is limited to assess the efficiency of the majority of the apps available for…

Teaching the concepts of expert systems to accounting students is often challenging, not only because these students are not equipped with the necessary technical knowledge to comprehend the concepts taught, but also due to the other various constraints (e.g., limited teaching hours and a diverse background of the students' undergraduate…

In this program description, we examined the impact of East Carolina University's educator preparation program on beginning special educators' preparedness and confidence to meet professional standards and fulfill their job responsibilities using Q methodology. For this work, undergraduate interns who were enrolled in a rural-focused teacher…

Diverse backgrounds, viewpoints and experiences in science, technology, engineering and math (STEM) are vital for innovation and creativity in STEM; and yet, racially minoritized groups, such as African Americans and Hispanics, remain underrepresented in the STEM K-12 and career pipeline. Studies show that exposure and access to STEM experiences…

Out-of-field teaching refers to the practice of assigning teachers to teach subjects that do not match their training or education. This paper reports on a study evaluating the impact of a national professional development programme for out-of-field teachers of post-primary school mathematics in Ireland -- the Professional Diploma in Mathematics…

This article provides a descriptive account of the workings of an Indigenous-led teacher training initiative in the Peruvian Amazon (Formabiap) and considers the extent of its transdisciplinary pedagogic approach, with a special focus on the ontological and epistemological stakes of intercultural knowledge exchanges in the context of contemporary…

Parents of children who are newly identified as deaf or hard of hearing (DHH) face many decisions surrounding communication and intervention, including where to receive early intervention (EI) services. This study explored the experiences and perspectives of parents of DHH children enrolled in a center-based, family-centered EI program focused on…