Hiring people who have served prison sentences has never been a priority in the United States. For men and women who were once incarcerated, finding any job is difficult; finding a sustainable, family-supporting job is nearly impossible. Today the country is at a critical crossroads on this issue, and it's time for change. As the nation works in…

School engagement is an important predictor of graduation. One strategy to enhance student engagement is mentoring. Check & Connect is a structured mentoring program that has resulted in favorable outcomes for many students, including those with emotional and behavioral disorders. Effectiveness, however, depends on the quality of the…

The narratives of two groups of 28 American Indian children attending a Midwestern Bureau of Indian Affairs school (16 with a mean age of 5;10 years, and 12 with a mean age of 7;8 years) were examined in three contexts: retell, fictional with sequence pictures, and fictional with one picture. The narratives were examined in terms of microstructure…

This report summarizes the findings from the Kansas Association of School Boards (KASB) 2019-20 Enrollment Projections and describes the new methods KASB members can use to access this information. KASB's enrollment projections for the 2020-21 through 2024-25 school years indicate: (1) Total enrollment will decline from 499,331 in 2019-20 to…

This regression event history study identified factors that are related to the attrition of remedial math students at a rural Kansas community college. It was guided by Bean and Metzner's Nontraditional Undergraduate Student Attrition Model (1985). This study extended the applicability of the Bean and Metzner's (1985) Conceptual Model to remedial…

We report findings of a convergent validity study examining the internalizing subscale (SRSS-I5) of the newly adapted Student Risk Screening Scale for Internalizing and Externalizing (SRSS-IE12) with the internalizing subscale of the Teacher Report Form (TRF; Achenbach, 1991) conducted in 13 schools across three states with 195 kindergarten…

This report presents the findings from the Kansas Association of School Boards (KASB's) 2016-17 Enrollment Projections for the state of Kansas as a whole, and also provides instructions on how these projections can be accessed at the district level. Key Findings include: (1) Total headcount enrollment will see modest increases from 2016-17 through…

The Internet has potential for improving health information delivery and strengthening connections between rural populations and local health service providers. An exploratory case study six rural health care markets in Kansas showed that about 70% of adults use the Internet, with substantial use for accessing health information. While there are…

This report presents the findings from the Kansas Association of School Boards' (KASB's) 2017-18 Enrollment Projections for the state of Kansas as a whole, and also provides instructions on how these projections can be accessed at the district level. Findings include: (1) The projected enrollment is expected to increase 0.4 percent next year,…

This study investigates whether age-related changes in the structure of 5 complex working memory (WM) tasks (a) reflect a general or domain specific system, (b) follows a similar trajectory across different age spans, and (c) contribute domain general or domain specific resources to achievement measures. The study parsed the sample (N = 2,471)…

This study utilized a quantitative design using archival data from Johnson County Community College (JCCC), located in Johnson County, Kansas, and the Office of Financial Aid for students who graduated, withdrew or dropped out of the college in academic years 2006, 2007 and 2008. Because this study used archival data, we can only show…

Despite an overall increase in college attendance, low-income youth and particularly those in the foster care system are less likely to attend college (Wolanin, 2005). Although youth in foster care report high educational aspirations, as little as 4% obtain a 4-year college degree (Nixon & Jones, 2007). The purpose of this study is to explore…

Background: In recent years, several states have created mandatory prison-diversion programs for felony drug possessors. These programs have both individual-level goals of reducing recidivism rates and system-level goals of reducing prison populations. Objective: This study examines the individual level and system level impact of Kansas' Senate…

Prior research suggests that parenting affects children's relationships, including those with teachers, although there is variation across individuals in such effects. Given evidence suggesting that oxytocin may be particularly important for the quality of social relationships, we tested the hypotheses (a) that change in parenting from 4 to 6…

Children from low-income families are more likely than those from higher income families to have poor social, emotional, cognitive, behavioral, and health outcomes. One approach that has helped parents and their young children is home visiting, which provides information, resources, and support to expectant parents and families with young…