The American Recovery and Reinvestment Act of 2009 (ARRA), also known as the stimulus package, appropriated $100 billion for education and included $3 billion for school improvement grants (SIGs) to help reform low-performing schools. This amount was in addition to the $546 million provided by the regular fiscal year 2009 appropriations bill for…

The paper discusses the major issues connected with the accreditation procedures in higher education system in the U.S. The questions raised are as follows: what are the reliable and credible indicators of quality instruction that could be measured in the process of accreditation of higher education institutions? How does greater transparency in…

The reauthorization of the "Elementary and Secondary Education Act" ("ESEA") as amended by the "No Child Left Behind Act of 2001" ("NCLB") relied on two notable policy instruments to improve education: accountability and flexibility. "NCLB" complements accountability with several new flexibility…

The Senate Committee on Labor and Human Resources reports an original bill (S. 1238) to amend the Bilingual Education Act to make federal financial assistance available for children of limited English proficiency without mandating a specific method of instruction, to encourage innovation at the state and local levels through greater administrative…

Evidence is mounting that federal employees and their agents may have directed or even pressured states to choose specific assessments, consultants, and the criteria for evaluating core reading programs as conditions for getting funding under the Reading First initiative, possibly in violation of federal law. "Education Week" found such…

The conclusions of the U.S. General Accounting Office (GAO) concerning the effects of consolidating federal categorical aid programs into block grant programs are presented in this report. The block grants reviewed were established before 1981 under the Partnership for Health Act, the Omnibus Crime Control and Safe Streets Act, the Comprehensive…

The history of the efforts of the U.S. Congress to obtain evaluation data and reports for Elementary and Secondary Education Act (ESEA) Title I, projects is one of delay and frustration. Prior to the 1974 amendments to the ESEA, evaluation was negligible, not clearly defined, and not comparable across school districts. The Education Amendments of…

Seven weaknesses of accreditation are described: long intervals between site visits, automatic accreditation of branches, weak penalties, inadequate public disclosure, inadequate enforcement, leadership shortcomings, and problems with program evaluation. (Author/MLW)

The activities and results of a comprehensive three-year evaluation of Utah's Title IV-C programs are summarized. They demonstrated that evaluation can produce valuable outcomes in addition to complying with federal requirements. State officials gained insights into program improvement; local officials gained expertise in program operation and…

The document contains the full transcript of a congressional oversight hearing reviewing the accomplishments, current status, and future directions of Gallaudet College and the National Technical Institute for the Deaf (NTID), schools which provide services for deaf students. Presented first is a statement by a General Accounting Office…

State and local education agencies increasingly have to spend a larger percentage of their time collecting, aggregating, and reporting information to federal agencies. This report suggests that the federal evaluation strategy to describe program implementation as well as impact is usually ill considered, inappropriate and of questionable utility.…

Each recipient of Vocational Education Act funds must establish a local advisory council, composed of lay representatives of business, industry, and labor, to advise it on current job needs and on the relevancy of vocational/technical course offerings. This report reviews the literature pertinent to advisory committees for community college…

This report concerns evaluation of federally supported educational programs at the national, state, and local levels. It was undertaken in response to Section 1526 of the Education Amendments of 1978, which requires that the Commissioner of Education conduct a comprehensive study of evaluation practices and procedures. Two broad sources of…

During calendar year 1994, the U.S. Department of Education published significant revisions to the Education Department General Administrative Regulations (EDGAR). These regulatory changes addressed the noncompeting continuation (NCC) application process for discretionary grants and cooperative agreements, the Department's implementation of the…

Implications for colleges and universities of a proposed new audit guide for Office of Management and the Budget (OMB) Circular A-110 are considered. The Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) is considering issuance of an audit guide that will outline procedures to be followed to comply with the audit requirement in Circular A-110. With…