This study examined the effect of class sizes on differences in the trajectories of elementary school students' long-term Japanese language achievement by analyzing panel data composed of standardized achievement test scores at five points from around the end of first grade to around the end of fifth grade. The data for 103 schools, 162 classes,…

This essay is an open letter from a classroom teacher to a concerned citizen. The letter lists a variety of problems caused largely by standardization and the more corrosive effects of positivism. Many of these problems are unknown to those outside the immediate school setting. While the letter focuses on a specific setting, an inner city school…

In a study of Ontario, Canada's province-wide Primary Class Size Reduction (PCS) Initiative, school districts' ability to direct and support schools was related to their experience with planning and monitoring, interest in innovation, and its human and fiscal resource base. Districts with greater "resource capacity" were able to…

During summer vacation, many students lose knowledge and skills. By the end of summer, students perform, on average, one month behind where they left off in the spring. Participation in summer learning programs should mitigate learning loss and could even produce achievement gains. Indeed, educators and policymakers increasingly promote summer…

Background: This article builds on three years of qualitative research on Wisconsin's Student Achievement Guarantee in Education (SAGE) program, a class size reduction policy in Wisconsin. Objective: In this article, we take a practice-oriented perspective on assessment, examining how assessments in schools that participated in a class size…

The effects of class size on academic achievement have been studied for decades. Although the results of small-scale, randomized experiments and large-scale, econometric studies point to positive effects of small classes, some scholars see the evidence as ambiguous. Recent analyses from a 4-year, large-scale, randomized experiment on the effects…

In this article, the author discusses a school improvement model, First Things First, developed by James P. Connell, a former tenured professor of psychology at the University of Rochester in New York. The model has three pillars for the high school level: (1) small, themed learning communities that each keep a group of students together…

Students, faculty, administration, and community members of three Iowa rural school districts were interviewed to identify educational issues in their communities. The results of the Iowa investigation are compared with the results of the Claremont Graduate School investigation published in "Voices from the inside: A report on schooling from…