In December 2015, the U.S. Congress passed the Every Student Succeeds Act (ESSA) and, with it, ushered in a new era of education policy in America. Leaving behind many of the most criticized aspects of its predecessor, No Child Left Behind (NCLB), this new incarnation of the primary federal legislation guiding K-12 education provides state and…

In December 2015, the U.S. Congress passed the Every Student Succeeds Act (ESSA) and, with it, ushered in a new era of education policy in America. Leaving behind many of the most criticized aspects of its predecessor, No Child Left Behind (NCLB), this newest incarnation of the primary federal legislation guiding K-12 education provides state and…

This article is an outgrowth of the evaluation and assessment process in a large interdisciplinary studies (IDS) program at West Virginia University. We argue for the importance of collecting and assessing quantitative and qualitative data concerning learning outcomes, student satisfaction, career choice and development, and graduate education…

This document is intended to help teachers prepare students for the "exit exam of essential skills" required by the Student Accountability Standards enacted by the North Carolina State Board of Education. The strategies in this guide are based on two essential premises: following the North Carolina "Standard Course of Study"…

The Mid-continent Regional Educational Laboratory's (McREL's) Mid-continent Alliance focuses on technical areas that must be considered by every school system that is serious about reform. This document contains four articles that focus on four important pieces of the school-reform puzzle: (1) standards and benchmarks for learning; (2)…

In an era in which the credibility of public schools is falling with the general public, community forensics performances by students have the potential for cultivating public awareness of the effectiveness of the schools. Forensics is intrinsically related to basic speaking and listening skills, and since there is great potential for…

This book was written from the Deweyan premise that children will become lifelong, self-directed learners by engaging in inquiry processes with interdisciplinary content and that, from these explorations, upper elementary and middle school students can inductively formulate concepts and generalizations that help to explain the world and what it…

This program improvement guide is designed to assist district and school level interdisciplinary planning teams to improve career/vocational programs for students with disabilities. Its focus is on the integration of best practices within the educational program continuum to achieve positive student outcomes. The guide includes three sections.…