Students exhibiting mature number sense make sense of numbers and operations, use reasoning to notice patterns, and flexibly select the most effective and efficient problem-solving strategies (McIntosh et al., 1997; Reys et al., 1999; Yang, 2005). Despite being highlighted in national standards and policy documents (CCSS, 2010; NCTM, 2000, 2014),…

In this state, one constant that students with disabilities have experienced has been the lack of accessibility to the high-stakes standardized test, the Massachusetts Comprehensive Assessment System (MCAS). The purpose of this Action Research study was to investigate and improve the access, to MCAS testing for students with disabilities in…

Prior work has documented a substantial penalty associated with taking the Partnership for Assessment of Readiness for College and Careers (PARCC) online relative to on paper (Backes & Cowan, 2019). However, this penalty does not necessarily make online tests less useful. For example, it could be the case that computer literacy skills are…

Recent work has shown that Boston charter schools raise standardized test scores more than their traditional school counterparts. Critics of charter schools argue that charter schools create those achievement gains by focusing exclusively on test preparation, at the expense of deeper learning. In this paper, I test that critique by estimating the…

The purpose of this evaluation was to examine the impact of i-Ready Personalized Instruction that met Curriculum Associates' recommended usage levels on mathematics achievement, as measured by the Massachusetts Comprehensive Assessment System (MCAS) mathematics assessment. This study compared mathematics achievement growth of students who used…

The purpose of this evaluation was to examine the impact of i-Ready Personalized Instruction that met Curriculum Associates' recommended usage levels on ELA achievement, as measured by the Massachusetts Comprehensive Assessment System (MCAS) ELA assessment. This study compared the ELA achievement growth in the 2020-21 school year of students who…

This article explores how college expectations in 8th grade change by 10th grade, and if students realize the expectations for a given level of college from 8th and 10th grade, in light of the "college for all" ethos. This study is based on administrative data from 235,875 public school students in Massachusetts from 2006 to 2016. Using…

There is increasing evidence that fine-grained aspects of student performance and interaction within educational software are predictive of long-term learning. Machine learning models have been used to provide assessments of affect, behavior, and cognition based on analyses of system log data, estimating the probability of a student's particular…

The Boston Foundation has long held education as one of its core strategic focus areas, aiming to strengthen the education-to-career pipeline and bolster pathways from early childhood through postsecondary completion for Boston residents. Intended to inform the Foundation's potential direction and activities related to science, technology,…

There is a paucity of evidence supporting the use of curriculum-based mathematics measures (M-CBMs) at the middle school level, which makes data-based decisions challenging for school professionals. The purpose of this study was to examine the relationships among three existing M-CBM indices: (a) basic facts, (b) concepts/application, and (c)…

The Massachusetts Expanded Learning Time (ELT) initiative provides grants to selected schools to redesign their schedules by adding 300-plus instructional hours to the school year to improve outcomes, broaden enrichment opportunities, and provide teachers with more planning and professional development time. The Massachusetts Department of…

A paucity of research has examined the utility of curriculum-based measurement (CBM) for data-based decision making at the secondary level. As schools move to multitiered systems of service delivery, it is conceivable that multiple screening measures will be used that address various academic subject areas. The value of including different CBM…

Out-of-school factors can significantly impact students' readiness to learn and thrive in school. Research confirms that larger social structures and contexts beyond the school are critical, accounting for up to two-thirds of the variance in student achievement (Coleman et al., 1966; Rothstein, 2010; Phillips, Brooks-Gunn, Duncan, Klebanov, &…

The Massachusetts Expanded Learning Time (ELT) initiative was launched in 2005, and it provides grants to selected schools across multiple districts to increase instructional time by at least 300 hours per academic year. Participating schools receive an additional $1,300 per student to lengthen the day and/or year. Schools are expected to use the…

Over the past twenty years, efforts to turn around low-performing schools have increasingly become a central component of federal and state education policy agendas. The purpose of the study was to evaluate the impact of the Wraparound Zones Initiative (WAZ), a program supported by the Massachusetts Department of Elementary and Secondary Education…