The past four decades have seen a rapid decline in marriage rates and a rapid increase in nonmarital births. These changes have had at least three worrisome effects on children. Scholars disagree about the magnitude of these effects, but surveys and other research evidence appear to definitively establish that the nation has more poverty, more…

This paper examines the impact of a UK government initiative, introduced in late 2008 and closed in 2011, to provide a computer and 1 year of Internet connectivity to low-income households with children aged 5-19 years. This paper presents and discusses the findings from the evaluation of the initiative, the Home Access Programme (HAP) pilot study…

In 2009, (and over a six week period) the National Literacy Trust (NLT) hosted a survey that was offered to the 21 local authorities making up the Partners in Literacy network at that time. Partners in Literacy (PiL) is a pilot project, funded from 2009 by the then Department for Children, Schools and Families and delivered by the NLT in…

In this technical report, we describe the development and piloting of a series of mathematics progress monitoring measures intended for use with students in grade 1. These measures, available as part of easyCBM [TM], an online progress monitoring assessment system, were developed in 2008 and administered to approximately 2800 students from schools…

The federal government recently enacted its first school voucher program as a pilot project in the District of Columbia. To be eligible, students need to be entering grades K-12 and have a family income at or below 185 percent of the poverty level. Although a rigorous analysis of the Opportunity Scholarship Program's impact on student achievement…

Universalizing primary education for girls and children in disadvantaged areas remains the most challenging task for developing countries in Asia and the Pacific. This evaluation report reviews the processes and outcomes of the Pilot Project on Promotion of Primary Education for Girls and Children in Disadvantaged Areas in Gansu Province, China, a…

This report is a summary of study visits plus workshops that took place in Bhutan, Nepal, and India in 1998 within the framework of UNESCO's Asia-Pacific Programme of Education for All (APPEAL). Three educators each from China, Lao PDR, and Vietnam and educators from the host countries participated. The project aimed to promote literacy and…