In 2009-10, the North Carolina Department of Public Instruction was approved to include a five-year graduation rate as well as a four-year rate in determining if schools, districts, and the state made Adequate Yearly Progress (AYP) under the NCLB Act. This rate was based on the incoming 9th grade students of 2005-06. The denominator of the cohort…

The study is based on a secondary analysis of data from the 3rd year of the Scientific Literacy Project (SLP), a federally funded research project that examines how kindergarten students learn science in inquiry settings (Mantzicopoulos, Patrick, & Samarapungavan, 2005). Videotapes of classroom lessons implemented as part of the Year 3…

In the winter of 2009, with more than 1.4 million job losses in the first two months of the year, the federal government passed the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act (ARRA) into law as a way to quickly inject liquidity into a stalling economy and maintain critical services that would allow individuals and communities to survive through the…

The conclusion of the 2010-11 school year will mark nine plus years since enactment of the No Child Left Behind Act of 2001 (NCLB). Throughout this period, numerous states--sometimes almost every one--have annually sought to amend the educational accountability systems they first developed as "workbooks" in 2002-03, consistent with the…

The No Child Left Behind Act (2001) requires that all students, including those with disabilities, to make adequate yearly progress in the general education curriculum. To ensure that this occurs, effective practices are needed that fit the classroom needs of teachers and result in improved academic gains. One practice that shows promise as an…

This study describes the results of an evaluation of the Individualized Learning Intervention (ILI), a mentoring program for early childhood educators that is built upon adult self-directed learning experiences and the collaborative support of others. Sixteen Mentor and 16 Protege teachers in Head Start classrooms were selected for participation…

Tribal Child Care and Development Fund administrators work each day to ensure that the children and families in tribal communities have the child care services that best meet their needs. The Child Care and Development Fund (CCDF), a federal block grant for States, Tribes, and Territories, is a key resource to help increase the availability,…

Federal regulations (U.S. Department of Education, 2007a) provide states with the flexibility to offer an alternate assessment based on modified academic achievement standards (AA-MAS). This assessment option is for a small group of students with disabilities who can make significant progress, but may not reach grade-level achievement within the…

The 2020 Census risks undercounting thousands of young Colorado children, depriving communities of federal funding and political representation for the next decade. Children under age 5 are more likely to be missed by the census than any other age group, with children of color, non-English speakers, and kids living in high poverty communities at…

One objective of the U.S. Department of Education's (ED) School Improvement Grants (SIG) and Race to the Top (RTT) program is to help states enhance their capacity to support the turnaround of low-performing schools. This capacity may be important, given how difficult it is to produce substantial and sustained achievement gains in low-performing…

This 19th annual edition of "Quality Counts" takes a broad look at the issues and forces shaping the discussion around early-childhood education. It examines how new academic demands and the push for accountability are changing the nature of early-childhood education for school administrators, teachers, and children alike. Reporters…

This year's joint report highlights the progress made in education since the special session of the 106th General Assembly (2010), which included passage of the First to the Top and Complete College Tennessee Acts. Both Acts provide a framework for collaboration between all state systems of education, addressing the overarching need to produce a…

The nation's child protection system (CPS) has historically focused on preventing maltreatment in high-risk families, whose children have already been maltreated. But, as Jane Waldfogel explains, it has also begun developing prevention procedures for children at lower risk--those who are referred to CPS but whose cases do not meet the criteria for…

Two recent pieces of federal legislation have greatly influenced how schools educate students with disabilities. While Individuals with Disabilities Education Improvement Act (2004) requires that schools assess students with disabilities using the same assessment instruments with which their non-disabled peers are tested, the No Child Left Behind…

The "29th Annual Report to Congress on the Implementation of the Individuals with Disabilities Education Act, 2007" follows the 2006--i.e., the 28th annual report--in sequence. The "29th Annual Report to Congress" is, however, the first to have three volumes. In the 28th and previous editions, volume 2 consisted of data tables…