States, districts and schools are now being offered unprecedented opportunities to develop programs that will improve student performance and turn around underperforming schools. An understanding of how reducing chronic early absence helps those efforts will go a long way to assure that innovative school improvement policies and practices will be…

This first issue of "Blueprint" focuses on standards that states have adopted to delineate what students should know at each grade level of the K-12 system. Textbooks, teacher training, professional development, and assessments are built upon education standards. To generate information that will help state leaders improve their…

In the wake of a U.S. Justice Department investigation that found widespread use of excessive force by staff at upstate psychiatric care facilities for mentally ill children, this new edition of Child Welfare Watch identifies shortcomings in mental health services and explores possible solutions, including the expansion of alternatives to…

This monograph is divided into five chapters. The first chapter provides a road map for understanding the review of studies on cost-efficiencies of online learning, including understanding why cost-efficiencies are so important to many higher education institutions and the framework used to categorize and discuss these studies. The second chapter…

Gloria, a first-year principal at Sunflower High School, sighed as she stared at her computer screen. She had been asked to write letters of reference for three teachers who were leaving her school. The first resigned among rumors of misconduct with a student--but before an investigation began. The second was asked to resign after a school…