The National Incident Management System (NIMS) is part of the National Preparedness System and supports the National Response Framework. NIMS puts forth a systematic approach to collaborating across disciplines and all levels of government to prevent, protect against, mitigate, respond to, and recover from threats and hazards that impact the…

This "Performance Management: Description and Key Elements" document provides a general framework for State education agencies, local educational agencies and partners in the Reform Support Network (RSN) to understand and plan for the important work of performance management.

Until recently, states focused on ensuring the presence of a "highly qualified teacher" in every classroom. Under the 2001 reauthorization of the Elementary and Secondary Education Act (ESEA), known as No Child Left Behind (NCLB), this title described a teacher holding at least a bachelor's degree and the appropriate state license and…

This case describes a database redesign project for the United States Department of Agriculture's National Animal Germplasm Program (NAGP). The case provides a valuable context for teaching and practicing database analysis, design, and implementation skills, and can be used as the basis for a semester-long team project. The case demonstrates the…

The federal role in higher education has grown over the past two decades, and now a new administration has the opportunity to strengthen policies that support students and their colleges and universities. To help inform these decisions, the Urban Institute convened a bipartisan group of scholars and policy advisers to write a series of memos…

The deadline pressure states faced in submitting applications in the federal Race to the Top competition is now being felt at the local level, as school districts scurry to craft work plans that show how they will execute ambitious changes in education policy. Eleven states, plus the District of Columbia, have won a combined $4 billion this year…

A top aide to Vice President Gore has been chosen to lead the U.S. Department of Education's effort to modernize delivery of financial aid to students and colleges. His office is the first federal government entity to be run as a "performance-based organization." Some fear he may politicize the office that lawmakers specified be led by a…

Activities of the Special Issues Analysis Center (SIAC), a technical support center providing assistance to the Department of Education in serving the needs of limited-English-proficient (LEP) students through the Bilingual Education Act of 1988, are summarized. In the third year of its contract, SIAC performed these services: creation of a…

The handbook is designed to help State Planning Agencies (SPA, grantees of Federal funds) to develop or improve performance monitoring systems in order to monitor the implementation, operation, and results of the criminal justice projects they support. Such monitoring is required by the Law Enforcement Assistance Administration (LEAA) guidelines.…

In recent years, an increasing number of states have been moving towards the development and implementation of longitudinal data systems for tracking the progress of individual K-12 students with disabilities across their academic careers up to and including their postsecondary activities. In an effort to avoid duplication of data collection…

A CETA youth project was designed to provide training in vocational awareness, self-awareness, coping skills, job skills, employability skills, career planning, and remedial reading. Over 500 youth between 14-21 were involved and many received computer interactional career training in coordination with an individualized career class. Significant…

Development of the newly federally authorized National Research and Education Network should offer administrative computing and communications organizations at institutions of higher education new levels of network capacity, connectivity, and reliability. Administrative applications will include improved professional communications, sharing of…

The E-School Technology Innovation Challenge Grant of 1996 was the genesis of the Department of Education's (DOE's) efforts to initiate a multi-prong approach to bring standards-based curriculum to the children of Hawai'i and use technology to upgrade professional development for its teachers. In this article, the authors describe how various…

An examination of the employment service's operations in Maryland, Michigan, and Florida showed that its functions fall into two broad categories: labor exchange and non-labor exchange. State and local employment service officials and many employers believed the non-labor exchange functions detract from the labor exchange missions. The extent and…

This document is one of a series of reports which describe the experiences of six state agencies that are developing systems to affect the development and implementation of policy in the federal/state program for vocational rehabilitation. The state programs are developing model program evaluation/management information support units. This second…