The purpose of this single descriptive case study was to describe how an externship program in the central United States impacts K-8 teachers' investment in and integration of work-based learning (WBL) practices in the classroom. The need to investigate how best to encourage teachers to buy into WBL is driven by misalignment among teacher…

Well-educated workers have higher wages, higher wage growth, and lower unemployment rates than workers with lower levels of educational attainment. While earnings have traditionally grown with educational attainment, the gaps have become more pronounced in recent years. While returns to education have increased, this research shows that…

Project Lead the Way (PLTW) is a hands-on, project-based engineering curriculum for high school and middle school students, which has quadrupled annual enrollment in Texas in five years to over 23,000 students. The diversity of students participating has also increased dramatically. Using six years of longitudinally-linked student data, the…

This report examines the academic and civic behavior outcomes of teenagers and young adults who have engaged deeply with the arts in or out of school. In several small-group studies, children and teenagers who participated in arts education programs have shown more positive academic and social outcomes in comparison to students who did not…

Learning sciences research has been focused primarily on studies of design innovations for schools and on knowledge that develops during brief periods of time (e.g., as a result of the implementation of a science or mathematics unit). This chapter advances the argument that research on learning should also focus on how learners initiate and…

The "Condition of Education" is an annual report mandated by the U.S. Congress that summarizes the latest data on education in the United States. This report uses data from across the National Center for Education Statistics (NCES) and from other sources and is designed to help policymakers and the public monitor educational progress.…

The "Comparative Indicators of Education" report series has been published on a biennial basis since it began in 2002, although this year's is the first to expand its focus to the G-20 countries, having previously been focused on the G-8 countries. "Comparative Indicators of Education in the United States and Other G-20 Countries:…

The Condition of Education is a congressionally mandated annual report summarizing important developments and trends in education using the latest available data. The 2019 Condition of Education report presents 48 indicators on topics ranging from prekindergarten through postsecondary education, as well as labor force outcomes and international…

Chance events are considered important in career development, yet little empirical research is available on their predictors and consequences. The present study investigated socio-demographic (gender, nationality, school-type), personality (openness, locus of control) and career development variables (career decidedness, career planning) in…

Teaching and assessing both content and 21st century skills are critical for student academic success and success in the workplace. In the "Highlights from TIMSS 2007" report, released in December of 2008 by the National Center for Education Statistics, Institute of Education Sciences, data shows that while 4th- and 8th-grade students in…

Although recent evidence suggests that non-cognitive skills such as engagement matter for academic and economic success, there is little evidence on how key educational inputs affect the development of these skills. We present a re-analysis of follow-up data from the Project STAR class-size experiment and find evidence that early-grade class-size…

Workforce projections worldwide show a growing need for people with strong backgrounds in math and science. As the eighth largest economy in the world, California benefits particularly from enterprises in the "STEM" fields (science, technology, engineering, and mathematics). How well California's current public school students are…

Empowering youth through the exploration of their possible futures is a fresh and innovative approach to the Teaching Personal and Social Responsibility model (TPSR). The purpose of this study was to examine the combination of TPSR with the theory of possible selves. This combination, called the Career Club, was a program specifically designed to…

This publication contains a sample of the indicators in "The Condition of Education 2009." The indicators include: (1) Enrollment Trends by Age; (2) Reading Performance and Achievement Gaps; (3) Mathematics Performance and Achievement Gaps; (4) Reading and Mathematics Score Trends; (5) Annual Earnings of Young Adults; (6) Public High…

This paper describes structural equation modeling (SEM) and possibilities for using SEM to address problems specific to workforce education and career development. A sample of adolescents identified as work-bound (i.e., transition directly from secondary school to work) from the National Education Longitudinal Study 1988-1996 database (NELS:…