The purpose of this study was to determine the effectiveness of Get the Picture?! in improving the overall college/career readiness of 900 students with disabilities in each of the nine participating treatment high schools in nine rural, high poverty Kentucky school districts after four years of implementation. This quasi-experimental study…

In this report, the authors present the results of a long-term tracking study that follows 1,177 students who applied to enter 1 of 13 oversubscribed Knowledge Is Power Program (KIPP) middle schools through a 5th or 6th grade admissions lottery in 2008 or 2009. Those students are now old enough to have attended college for at least two years. This…

This report presents the findings from an external evaluation of Project COMPASS, an effort by Wake Technical Community College to redesign community college online courses to improve outcomes, particularly for students of color. The evaluation used a randomized controlled trial in which students were randomly assigned to course sections taught by…

Nationally, 38.5% of the students who began at a four-year college in 2011-12 attended another college within the first six years of college entry, and more than half of these students attended a community college. Eight percent of students who began at a four-year institution took up to 10 credits at a community college during the same period.…

The "Final Impact Report for Accelerating Opportunity" study examined the effect of Accelerating Opportunity (AO) on education and employment outcomes for underprepared adult learners. Designed and led by Jobs for the Future and national partners, AO allowed adults with low basic skills to enroll in integrated career pathways at…

In August 2010, the Smithsonian Science Education Center (SSEC) received a grant of more than $25 million from the U.S. Department of Education's Investing in Innovation (i3) program for a five-year study to validate its Leadership Assistance for Science Education Reform (LASER) model in three very diverse regions of the United States: rural North…

Many incoming college students are referred to remedial programs in math or English based on scores they earn on standardized placement tests. Yet research shows that some students assigned to remediation based on test scores would likely succeed in a college-level course in the same subject area without first taking a remedial course if given…

Empirical Education Inc. is the independent evaluator of SRI International's 2014 Investing in Innovation (i3) Development grant called Redesigning Secondary Courses to Improve Academic Outcomes for Adolescents with Disabilities and Other Underperforming Adolescents. The goal of the grant is to develop "Enhanced Units" that combine…

In August 2010, the Smithsonian Science Education Center (SSEC) received a grant of more than $25 million from the U.S. Department of Education's Investing in Innovation (i3) program for a five-year study to validate its Leadership Assistance for Science Education Reform (LASER) model in three very diverse regions of the United States: rural North…

The College Board sought to reduce barriers in the college application process by minimizing information aggregation costs, encouraging a broad application portfolio, and providing an impetus to start the search process. Some students were offered additional encouragements, such as text message reminders or college application fee waivers. In a…

The purpose of this report is to provide an overview of evaluation findings at the culmination of the Collaborative Regional Education (CORE) i3 2013 grant, including implementation and impact results from the local and national study phases. The goal of CORE is to have a positive impact on students' college and work readiness outcomes by…

Ninth Grade Academies (NGAs)--also called Freshman Academies--have attracted national attention as a particularly intensive and promising approach for supporting a successful transition for high school freshmen. An NGA is a self-contained learning community for ninth-graders that operates as a school within a school. NGAs have four core structural…

Engaged in the evaluation of LDC tools since June 2011, UCLA's National Center for Research on Evaluation, Standards, and Student Testing (CRESST) is using multiple data sources and a quasi-experimental design to examine LDC implementation and impact in two cohorts of schools in two large, urban school districts. This report presents the results…

The purpose of this study was to evaluate the effects of a curriculum for college developmental writing classes, developed in prior design research and based on self-regulated strategy instruction. Students learned strategies for planning, drafting, and revising compositions with an emphasis on using knowledge of genre organization to guide…

High school students from disadvantaged high schools in Toronto were invited to take two surveys, about three weeks apart. Half of the students taking the first survey were also shown a 3 minute video about the benefits of post secondary education (PSE) and invited to try out a financial-aid calculator. Most students' perceived returns to PSE were…