Rural students often face challenges in receiving high-quality education in science, technology, engineering, and math (STEM). Yet without meaningful STEM educational opportunities, rural students might not develop the knowledge and skills needed to compete in a technology-driven workforce. The Learning by Making program (LbyM), an innovative…

Inquiry-based science interventions aim to improve students' science proficiency by helping them understand scientific processes. In these interventions, students conduct hands-on investigations of science concepts and everyday phenomena, construct explanations for what they observe, consider alternative explanations, and communicate and justify…

Inquiry-based science interventions aim to improve students' science proficiency by helping them understand scientific processes. In these interventions, students conduct hands-on investigations of science concepts and everyday phenomena, construct explanations for what they observe, consider alternative explanations, and communicate and justify…

Inquiry-based science interventions aim to improve students' science proficiency by helping them understand scientific processes. In these interventions, students conduct hands-on investigations of science concepts and everyday phenomena, construct explanations for what they observe, consider alternative explanations, and communicate and justify…

In 2012, WestEd received a "Development" grant from the U.S. Department of Education's Investing in Innovation (i3) competition to develop and implement Internet-based Reading Apprenticeship Improving Science Education ("iRAISE"). "iRAISE" was implemented in Michigan and Pennsylvania and was provided to over 100…

Previous research has linked inquiry-based science instruction (i.e., science instruction that engages students in doing science rather than just learning about science) with greater gains in student learning than text-book based methods (Vanosdall, Klentschy, Hedges & Weisbaum, 2007; Banilower, 2007; Ferguson 2009; Bredderman, 1983;…

The use of cooperative learning in secondary school is reported--an area of considerable concern given attempts to make secondary schools more interactive and gain higher recruitment to university science courses. In this study the intervention group was 259 pupils aged 12-14 years in nine secondary schools, taught by 12 self-selected teachers.…

The BioBridge Professional Development model was created to bring current and relevant science into the high school classroom. The purpose of this intervention was to connect teachers with relevant science and to create innovative, hands-on activities that engage students, with the goal of increasing student interest in STEM careers. To this end,…

Forty-one states have adopted the Common Core State Standards. Now, implementing the Standards--to realize their purpose of increasing the college and career readiness of high school graduates--takes on primary importance. This transition to implementation introduces a number of challenging questions: What is the baseline of student performance on…

The "No Child Left Behind Act of 2001 (NCLB)" is designed to achieve an ambitious goal: All children will be proficient in reading and mathematics by the 2013-14 school year. A key strategy for achieving this goal is accountability. Based on findings from two federally funded studies--the Study of State Implementation of Accountability…

This study focuses on how the treatment effects of a teacher professional development initiative in science differed by school capacity. In other words, the authors are primarily concerned with treatment effect heterogeneity. As such, this paper complements ongoing evaluation of the average treatment effects of the initiative over time. The…

This study was designed to establish the efficacy of Teaching SMART (Teaching Science, Mathematics and Relevant Technologies); a science professional development program for teachers with students in grades 3 through 5. Teaching SMART promotes scientific inquiry and emphasizes the importance of equity, empowerment, exploration, and fun in the…