Students' attitudes toward physical education (PE) affect decisions to be physically active, are affected by the teacher and the curriculum, and become less positive as children get older. Federal funding has been granted to improve physical education programs, yet it is unknown how this funding affects attitudes and decisions to remain active.…

Some state mandated tests showed that many African American male students are not proficient readers. Teachers need to understand how to implement instructional strategies that will help enhance African American male students to read proficiently. The purpose of this basic qualitative study was to explore elementary school teachers' perspectives…

State-funded prekindergarten educational programming for all children is a rarity in the United States. Five states offer no financial support to fund prekindergarten educational programming, and the majority offer partial funding. Only three states provide universally funded prekindergarten educational programming. The purpose of this study is to…

Despite consistently strong performances among NH 4th graders on the NAEP assessments, large disparities have been observed among NH elementary students on the NECAP assessments based on race and SES. The current study assessed the effectiveness of NH elementary schools, as defined by the effective schools research. Of the 209 elementary schools…

This European Training Foundation (ETF) assessment provides an external, forward-looking analysis of Azerbaijan's human capital development issues and Vocational Education and Training (VET) policy responses in a lifelong learning perspective. It identifies challenges related to education and training policy and practice that hinder the…

The objective of this study was to identify trajectories of school improvement experienced by Chilean elementary schools over the last decade. Using econometric analysis and controlling for potential confounding factors, we created an index of school performance combining outcome indicators focused on different school dimensions, and estimated the…

Michigan has a problem. By several measures, the achievement of students attending its K-12 educational system has not kept pace with other states. Although Michigan's student achievement has improved over the past decade, the improvement has been modest, and achievement in many other states has easily surpassed that in Michigan. Furthermore,…

IES is the primary research, evaluation, and statistics arm of the U.S. Department of Education. Established through the Education Sciences Reform Act of 2002 (ESRA), the Institute's mission is to expand fundamental knowledge and understanding of education and to provide education leaders and practitioners, parents and students, researchers, and…

Arizona has grown rapidly over the years and our education system has grown in step with the population. But increasing the total budget for education doesn't mean that we have directed more resources to each student. The numbers show that Arizona has one of the lowest per-pupil funding rates in the country. Parties of one faction or another argue…

This paper describes a qualitative case study designed to examine the challenges to effective science instruction faced by elementary teachers and examine the influence those challenges have on teachers' science teaching practices. Data were gathered through a questionnaire administered to over 240 teachers in a northern Florida school district…

This report includes a high-level overview of student outcome data and how Kansas measures up to the other 49 states. It is meant to complement the other reporting that the Kansas Association of School Boards has released and will be releasing related to improving student outcomes for all Kansas public schools. The following are key findings…

The current financial state of our nation, in combination with the pressure to meet state accountability testing and a global call for better prepared twenty first century learners, has produced a situation where all levels of government have to make difficult decisions regarding expenditures. In order to ensure that education receives appropriate…

The study reviewed in this paper examined the effects of offering a school-wide teacher performance bonus program on students' reading and mathematics achievement. The study sample included 309 high-poverty New York City public schools serving students in grades K-8 from 2007-08 to 2008-09. Of these schools, 181 were randomly chosen to be offered…

This country review offers an independent analysis of major issues facing the use of school resources in Portugal from an international perspective. It provides a description of national policies, an analysis of strengths and challenges and options for possible future approaches. The analysis focuses on the process of decentralisation of school…

This fact sheet provides demographic information for the young Dual Language Learner (DLL) population in Colorado, based on Migration Policy Institute (MPI) analysis of U.S. Census Bureau American Community Survey (ACS) data pooled over the 2011-15 period. DLLs, defined as children ages 8 and under with at least one parent who speaks a language…