Research has demonstrated the wide-ranging and positive benefits from high-quality publicly-funded prekindergarten education. Yet, access for families with young children remains uneven, with significant gaps across geography, income, race, and ethnicity. Over the last few decades, many states have worked to broaden access to prekindergarten…

This paper examines how colleges respond to the introduction of broad merit aid programs. Previous research has emphasized the impact of merit aid on enrollment, student choices, and post-matriculation outcomes. Yet much less is known about how state-implemented merit aid programs affect colleges' financial decisions. To explore impacts, college…

This article is the third in a larger study of schooling during the Great Depression that seeks to elucidate specific examples of elementary social studies teaching and learning in the South during this time, particularly in Arkansas. Responding to Christine Woyshner's (2009) concern that histories of social studies should look beyond national…

The Tuition Opportunity Program for Students (subsequently renamed the Taylor Opportunity Program for Students, or TOPS) was created via ACT 1375 during the 1997 Regular Legislative Session. The first college freshman class to receive TOPS awards entered postsecondary education in the fall of 1998. ACT 1202 of the 2001 Regular Legislative Session…

This article is about a year-long teaching and research project conducted with 696 4th graders (mostly 10-year olds) and their 36 teachers in Wyoming/USA. The researchers employed an action research approach. They planned and taught a two-day, Wyoming-themed, interdisciplinary unit, "We Are Wyoming", which integrated Social Studies,…

This study uses a historical perspective to examine the interface of the Maryland Juvenile Justice Department and the Mental Hygiene Administration in their efforts to provide services to youth involved with the juvenile justice system who were found to have mental disorders. A time line was constructed documenting developments from the 16th…

This document examines the chronological history of financing the Alaskan public school system. The first section traces the influence of the Greco-Russian Church and the Russian-American Company on education in Russian Alaska. The second section focuses on early United States education efforts, including the Sheldon Jackson era, the Organic Act…

These two reports briefly describe the active projects and nationally circulated mateirals associated with the American Issues Forum Bicentennial Programs. The summary report of active projects is designed to show how various national media, national and international organizations, corporations, and state and community groups are actively…

Results of New Hampshire's first biennial Educational Assessment Program involving 7,500 public school students in grades 5, 9, and 12 are reported. Multiple choice and essay tests were administered in reading, writing, mathematics, state and national history, and government. Instructional assistance--including workshops, suggested classroom…

Focusing on the development of unemployment insurance since the first federal legislation was enacted in 1935, this report provides the background and highlights of federal and New York State laws on coverage, the amount and direction of benefits, entitlement and disqualification provisions, and methods of financing. The first of three sections…

The paper provides information about a survey designed to ascertain which states require a state studies course and the evaluation of these courses. Forty-three of 46 states affiliated with the Council of State Social Studies Specialists responded to questions asking: (1) if their state required state studies in its school curriculum; (2) if there…

This study includes consideration of periodicals for the promotion of public school education, those which deal with the history or scientific study of education, or the technique of schoolroom work, improvement of teachers and general school news. The principal source of information, fully indicated in the bibliography, has been the periodicals…

This paper is an informal assessment of Alaska state spending during the lucrative "oil years" of the early 1980s. The huge Prudhoe Bay oil field began producing in 1977 and reached a daily output of about 1.5 million barrels in 1980. From 1980 to 1986, the field helped Alaska's government to have, in relation to its population, a…

The report summarizes results from a mental retardation/developmental disabilities (MR/DD) expenditure analysis study. Three parts comprised the study: (1) the state government expenditure analysis which covered fiscal years (FY) 1977 through 1984, and dealt primarily with state general fund expenditures of the principal MR/DD state agency, the…

The tenth annual report of the President's Committee on Mental Retardation reviews the history of America's services for the retarded from the 1850's to the present. Traced is governmental involvement through conferences on children and youth, and reviewed is the role of parents and volunteers in securing appropriate services. Among agencies…