It is urgent to ensure that science, technology, engineering, and mathematics (STEM) education meets the needs of our nation's increasingly diverse student population. This study examined whether a second-grade science program, Scientific Explorers, supported educational equity in STEM achievement for diverse student populations. Sociodemographic…

Research Findings: Students perceived as struggling to regulate their emotions and behavior are at risk for experiencing classroom and school exclusion beginning in preschool. In this preliminary and exploratory secondary data analysis study, we examined teachers' self-reported use of classroom-based soft exclusionary discipline practices with…

The population of English Language Learners (ELLs) enrolled in kindergarten to second grade (K-2) in the Southern region of the United States has increased. K-2 teachers are challenged to serve ELLs in the regular education classroom and students are often being referred for special education services. There needs to be more literature on the…

Women remain underrepresented in engineering and broadening participation has recently become the focus of education reform efforts. Increased emphasis on K-12 engineering education calls for the design of learning environments and curricula that increase interest and conceptual understanding of engineering work, beginning in the early years of…

The Matthew Effect is an educational theory that children who begin their academic careers with lower reading scores do not catch up to their peers, instead falling farther and farther behind as their schooling progresses. This study includes a hierarchical multiple-regression analysis of within-year benchmark data for the presence of Matthew…

The demographics of our nation's public schools continue to diversify. Less than 50% of our nation's public school students are white, however, less than 25% percent of superintendents identify as People of Color. To that end, retention of diverse leaders specifically, Black Women across all sectors is in decline. The mission of The Surge…

American students continue to perform poorly on national and international assessments of Science, Technology, Engineering, and Mathematics (STEM) competencies, and achievement gaps spanning racial/ethnic and socioeconomic lines emerge early and widen over time. Scholars and practitioners agree that expanding access to high-quality STEM education…

Lack of representation of children from nondominant cultural and linguistic backgrounds continues to be problematic in children's literature, and especially within early literacy texts for beginning readers. One remedy is for children to tell their own stories through the language experience approach, which can then be printed into culturally…

This article examines everyday disciplinary practices in three kindergarten classrooms and their role in identity construction. Taking a "figured worlds" perspective, I show how racialized and ableist discourses mediated processes of surveillance, escalation, and physical restraint, leading educators to disproportionately position Black…

Low-income students and students of color are disproportionately identified at lower rates for accelerated programs in K-12 education compared to their peers in the United States. A lack of equitable identification processes that provide access to accelerated programs can be linked to issues of social inequity (Cao et al., 2017). An analysis of…

This exploratory study examines the correlations between teachers' attitudes and the disproportionate representation of African American males in special educational services in the United States education system. Using a sample of teachers from two elementary schools with special education student representation proportional to the student body…

The problem addressed in this study was low student achievement among students from underrepresented student groups. In this quasi-experimental research study, the self-efficacy theory was utilized to examine the relationship between teachers' receipt of instructional coaching and student achievement scores. The purpose of this quasi-experiment…

This study investigated the typology of female and male superintendents in Ohio to determine if a difference exists in the typology of female superintendents when compared to their male counterparts. Theories of gender differences and leadership styles, role congruity theory, and transformational leadership provided the framework for this study.…

The Education Policy Innovation Collaborative (EPIC) has been working closely with the Michigan Department of Education (MDE) and the Center for Educational Performance and Information (CEPI) to study the implementation and outcomes of Michigan's Read by Grade Three Law in real-time as the policy takes effect. Between 2021 and 2023, the Law…

It is now well established that the COVID-19 pandemic had a devastating and unequal impact on student achievement. Test score declines were disproportionately large for historically marginalized students, exacerbating preexisting achievement gaps and threatening educational and economic inequality. In this paper, we use longitudinal student-level…