Given the large continued investment by the federal government in programs that promote academic success and the pursuit of advanced degrees in the sciences among members groups traditionally underrepresented in the sciences, there is a strong need for research which provides rigorous investigations of these programs and their impact on the target…

Examines, in some detail, the process of evaluation and describes methods that have been used in evaluation applied to precollege education. (PEB)

Presents a detailed assessment of a summer national Science Foundation Young Scholars Program for ninth and 10th graders. Results indicate that students perceive program success (emphasis on project success) differently from teachers and program organizers. Identified six variables that must be incorporated appropriately into the design of a…

Fifty-nine secondary school physics students were assigned to treatment groups: (1) Project Physics units, (2) Project Physics and verbal learning unit, and (3) a training program in scientific inquiry. Posttest results revealed that, on most aspects of a science inquiry test, treatments 2 and 3 had significantly greater effect on achievement than…

Investigated secondary mathematics and science majors' understandings of metric relationships and abilities to apply metrics to everyday problems. Differences between groups on the measures were not significant. Both groups understood metric relationships reasonably well, but neither could apply the relationships to everyday situations. (CP)

The development and administration of a scientific literacy test designed to measure achievement of the objectives of the Science Curriculum Improvement Study (SCIS) project is described. Students who had completed the six year SCIS curricula were compared with those who had used other science materials. SCIS subjects scored significantly higher…

Reports the results of a study designed to determine the influence of five stages of instruction on the prospective teachers' ability to construct programmed science activities for fourth grade students. (Author/JR)

A comprehensive, quantitative evaluation of an educational intervention program designed to reduce the attrition of minorities from the biological sciences was undertaken to ascertain whether such efforts adequately address the problem. Program participants had greater odds of persisting in basic math and science courses, and of graduating in…

Although numerous programs have been developed for Grade Kindergarten through 12 science education, evaluation has been difficult owing to the inherent problems conducting controlled experiments in the typical classroom. Using a rigorous experimental design, we developed and tested a novel program containing a series of pharmacology modules (e.g.,…