In response to the school accountability movement and the move toward market-oriented education policies in recent decades, many schools and districts have felt increased pressure to find effective ways to boost student achievement. However, many districts--largely those serving low income black and hispanic students in urban settings--have still…

A new design-based theory has recently been developed to estimate impacts for randomized controlled trials (RCTs) and basic quasi-experimental designs (QEDs) for a wide range of designs used in social policy research (Imbens & Rubin, 2015; Schochet, 2016). These methods use the potential outcomes framework and known features of study designs…

We use longitudinal data from Washington State to provide estimates of the extent to which performance on the edTPA, a performance-based, subject-specific assessment of teacher candidates, is predictive of the likelihood of employment in the teacher workforce and value-added measures of teacher effectiveness. While edTPA scores are highly…

This document presents the technical appendices that accompany the full report, "Special Education Finance in California." The appendices include: (1) Problems with AB 602 and Other State Funding Programs for Special Education; (2) Additional Figures for Analysis of Distribution of Students with Disabilities; (3) Using Supplemental and…

The purpose of the "Accelerating Student Progress: Increasing Results and Expectations" (ASPIRE) Award Survey was to gain insight regarding the level of knowledge and perceptions of Houston Independent School District (HISD) teachers and staff after nine years of implementation of growth-based performance pay in HISD, as well as their…

Houston Independent School District (HISD) strives to provide an equitable education to all of its students. In an effort to uphold the district's mission, the Teacher Appraisal and Development System (TADS) was designed with the goal of promoting effective teaching by providing systematic, rigorous feedback on teachers' effectiveness in the…

In January 2007, the Houston Independent School District (HISD) inaugurated the Teacher Performance-pay Model, 2005-2006, becoming the first school district in the nation to implement a performance-pay system of this magnitude based on individual teacher effectiveness. The experience gained in the first year and consultations with national experts…

Parental involvement is seen as one of the most malleable factors of the student's home situation, which makes it a relevant subject for schools, educational policies, and research. Though many studies have researched its role in student achievement, effects are not univocal. It is difficult to tell whether these inconsistent results are caused by…

This study examines the accuracy of performance ratings from the Framework for Leadership (FFL), Pennsylvania's tool for evaluating the leadership practices of principals and assistant principals. The study analyzed three key properties of the FFL: internal consistency, score variation, and concurrent validity. To measure the internal consistency…

Aware of the challenges set before the Houston Independent school District by rapid growth in the numbers of English learner students, and a critical shortage of teachers with bilingual certification for more than a decade, members of Regional Educational Laboratory Southwest's English Learners Research Alliance sought information that districts…

In preparation for online administration of the ACT® test, ACT conducted studies to examine the comparability of scores between online and paper administrations, including a timing study in fall 2013, a mode comparability study in spring 2014, and a second mode comparability study in spring 2015. This report presents major findings from these…

Despite women's impressive gains in education and the workplace over the past 50 years, men greatly outnumber women in leadership, especially in top positions. From corporate boardrooms to the halls of Congress, from universities to the courts, from religious institutions to philanthropic organizations, men are simply much more likely than women…

One outcome of the implementation of No Child Left Behind Act of 2001 and its call for better accountability in public schools across the nation has been the use of student assessment data in measuring schools' effectiveness. In general, inferences about schools' effectiveness depend on the type of statistical model used to link student assessment…

The Tennessee Department of Education's office of coordinated school health (CSH) works with every school district in the state to address all aspects of student health, with a special emphasis on reducing Tennessee's childhood obesity rates. Encouraging adequate physical activity and providing physical education for all students are the central…

The article investigates the patterns that arise in the convergence of numerical methods, particularly those in the errors involved in successive iterations, using data analysis and curve fitting methods. In particular, the results obtained are used to convey a deeper level of understanding of the concepts of linear, quadratic, and cubic…