Since the 1960s, business leaders and educators used the idea of "goal setting theory" as a guide to success. Teachers who implemented goal setting strategies contributed to student success and achievement. During my study, I found little existing literature focused on academic goal setting implementation for students in Tennessee rural…

Purpose: School improvement planning has been a central part of school improvement initiatives for decades. Evidence suggests, however, that traditional planning processes are regularly superficial. In the USA, some principals have begun developing short-cycle planning designed to encourage school leadership teams and staff to develop, monitor and…

COVID-19 disrupted schools across the country. Students and teachers were asked to work together virtually. During this virtual experience the students at Frederick County Middle School struggled to complete learning activities independently. An improvement science approach was used to investigate this problem. Through the improvement science…

This report focuses on a competency-based grading initiative at Carroll Middle School. The initiative was implemented from 2018-19 to 2020-21 to address the lack of alignment between report card grades and End-of-Grade (EOG) test results and was designed to ensure consistent delivery of standards-based instruction, formative assessment, and…

Studies have documented widespread academic disengagement in middle and high school students. This disengagement has been tied to a myriad of negative outcomes, including failure to graduate from high school and transition into college and meaningful vocations. Supporting adolescents in cultivating a sense of beyond-the-self purpose is one factor…

College education is fundamental to students' upward mobility, states' economic growth, and the country's economic competitiveness. Researchers have forecast that 63 percent of future jobs will require a college degree, yet in the coming years the United States will likely produce 3 million fewer college graduates than are needed to fill workforce…

Ramp-Up to Readiness™ (Ramp-Up) is a program for middle and high school students that aims to provide greater depth and breadth of support for college readiness than do current supports. This study examined whether students' ACT Engage goal setting and commitment to college scale scores as well as the likelihood of key enrollment actions such as…

This report presents findings of the implementation of Communities in Schools (CIS) Success Coaches within five Wake County Public School System (WCPSS) middle schools during the 2019-20 and 2020-21 school years. End-of-year outcomes, including attendance rates and English language arts and mathematics grades, are examined and compared between the…

Implementation fidelity is crucial to the success of behavioral interventions. However, measuring and maintaining intervention implementation fidelity in schools' natural settings can be challenging. This article reports findings from a study examining the implementation fidelity of check-in check-out interventions at an urban school district…

Few studies have examined the impact of mastery learning on mastery goal structures or even on students' motivation more generally. In this study, we examined one middle school that implemented a schoolwide mastery learning system, conducting interviews with a sample of administrators (n = 3), teachers (n = 4), and students (n = 9) to determine…

This research addresses the problem of low math achievement of middle school students through the use of a Growth Mindset intervention and related strategies. While the research on Growth Mindset interventions and strategies show positive results in controlled settings, there is a need to better understand Growth Mindset implementation from the…

In 2011 Baltimore City Schools submitted a successful proposal for an Investing in Innovations (i3) grant to offer a three year (2012-2014) summer program designed to expose rising sixth through eighth grade students to VEX robotics. The i3-funded Middle School Science, Technology, Engineering and Mathematics (STEM) Summer Learning Program was…

This case provides principal licensure candidates a strategic perspective on leading and managing educational technology initiatives. It presents issues related to vision setting, planning, implementation, organizational structure, and decision making. The case narrative is presented from the perspective of a principal, but it can also be used to…

Research and practical experience has shown that, more often than not, the professional development opportunities that are provided for teachers are not intentionally structured to meet their individual needs nor do they have a systemic impact on the knowledge base and skill sets of an entire faculty. Furthermore, the continuous pressure that…

Since its publication in 2012, "The Behavior Code: A Practical Guide to Understanding and Teaching the Most Challenging Students" has helped countless classroom teachers, special educators, and others implement an effective, new approach to teaching focused on skill-building, practical interventions, and purposeful, positive interactions…