This chapter offers both challenges and new directions in conducting quantitative assessments and research with queer-spectrum and trans-spectrum college student populations. Both the challenges and future directions are grounded in the literature and the experiences of the authors.

Good assessment is part of all good learning communities, and this article provides a useful set of best practices for learning community assessment planning: (1) articulating agreed-upon learning community program goals; (2) identifying the purpose of assessment (e.g., summative or formative); (3) employing qualitative and quantitative assessment…

Communicating with investigators about financial compensation in the area of statistical collaboration represents an important but often underemphasized component of biomedical research. The more complex the area, the greater the need for sound and effective communication strategies. Ittenbach and DeAngelis (2012) recently compared two…

Although there is general agreement that doctoral students and their experiences are diverse, in what respect this is true is in question. Most institutional practices in the collection of data in this regard have been established to satisfy government reporting requirements and concerns, such as funding, participation and equity, and efficiency.…

Introduction: Although there is increasing focus on provider behavior change as an outcome of continuing medical education (CME), it has long been known that an increase in knowledge alone is rarely sufficient to induce such change. The Personal Learning Plan (PLP), designed to motivate and assess CME learning, was partly derived from SMART goals…

With support from the Lumina Foundation, the Hispanic Association of Colleges and Universities (HACU) has launched HACU's Hispanic Higher Education Research Collective (H3ERC). The first major task of this virtual gathering of researchers and practitioners in Hispanic higher education has been to assess the state of our knowledge of the key issues…

A simple and readily understandable visual display of quantitative measures of academic efficiency and productivity is demonstrated in this article. This graphical construction facilitates annual comparisons of unit efficiency and productivity as well as an analysis of temporal changes in unit activity. By establishing a common framework upon…

The mere word "bureaucracy" brings to mind images of endless lines, piles of paperwork, and frustrating battles over rules and red tape. But some bureaucracies are clearly more efficient and responsive than others. Why? In "Teaching, Tasks, and Trust", distinguished political scientists John Brehm and Scott Gates show that a good part of the…

Relationships between principals, teachers, and parents cannot be ignored when attempting school reform. No matter how innovative the changes or ideas, reform is unlikely to succeed unless the adults work together to implement it. This book answers the question of how to build trust within the school community. Parents are dependent on teachers to…

In health research, we depend heavily on the goodwill of study participants. However, the whole social contract of health research is based on the premise that everyone comes to the research table with honorable intentions. What course should we take if we doubt the authenticity of our participants' accounts? Through the use of an illustrative…

This appendix accompanies "Gaining Ground in the Middle Grades: Why Some Schools Do Better. A Large-Scale Study of Middle Grades Practices and Student Outcomes. Initial Research Report." This appendix focuses on the findings and domain comparisons of the study. This appendix contains the following: (1) Decision Rules; (2) Full Set of…