Although China has expanded its system of short-cycle vocational and technical education in recent years to respond to its rapid economic development, most programs are narrowly focused on special technical areas and offer few general education or personal development components. As such, China's technical institutions differ greatly from…

Needs assessments enable program developers to address the unique characteristics of their target audiences and their environment. They have a number of useful purposes for AIDS (Acquired Immune Deficiency Syndrome) education and training. They inform program planning and implementation, provide baseline data, increase the potential for…

This report discusses issues regarding the out-of-home placement of children with developmental disabilities and the need for permanency planning for these children. The document reports on a project which sought to: (1) discern practices of Colorado's Department of Social Services and Division for Developmental Disabilities which affect the…

For the 1992-93 school year, the Indiana Department of Education awarded planning grants to 10 school corporations and special education cooperatives which applied to be Inclusion School Pilot Sites. Funding was provided for activities related to planning and becoming more inclusive. Visits and interviews at the sites led to conclusions about…

This monograph presents long-range plans of South Carolina's "Continuum of Care for Emotionally Disturbed Children" program, which provides community based services to children and adolescents with severe disturbances, through coordination and utilization of public, private, and individual services. An executive summary notes that 323…

Designed to help colleges plan for the successful continuation of educational improvement projects beyond the end of their original funding period, this report presents a case study of Pennsylvania College of Technology's (PCT's) efforts to ensure the continuation of a Title III faculty development program. After describing the the Title III…

Library binding is one of the activities typically included in newly created preservation departments, but librarians continue to discover that transforming a traditional binding program into one that better meets preservation objectives requires considerable investment of time. This resource guide is intended to help libraries review their…

This needs assessment instrument was developed as part of the PEERS (Providing Education for Everyone in Regular Schools) Project, a California project to integrate students with severe disabilities who were previously at special centers into services at regular school sites and students who were in special classes in regular schools into general…

This publication consists of two parts: an overview of tech prep in Western Wisconsin and the Tech Prep Strategic Plan for Western Wisconsin. The overview combines reduced-size pages (four to a page) with full-size pages that include the following: the definition of tech prep; legislative mandate; rationale; benefits of tech prep; tech prep…

This report highlights and summarizes accountability activities and initiatives submitted by Illinois' 49 community colleges. It is designed to assure that programs and services offered by the colleges are high-quality, cost-effective, and support the mission and priorities of each institution. The first section of this report, "Priorities,…

At the University of Arkansas at Little Rock (UALR), an urban university, students drop out of college on a regular basis. Developing a community of linked courses appears to be an effective way of reaching the university's goal of helping students stay in school past the critical first semester when many of them tend to leave. Seeking to help…

At Stephen F. Austin State University (Texas), focus group research was conducted to determine research needs and to inform the development of a new educational research center. Four graduate research assistants and a professor in the Department of Educational Leadership formed a study group to review the literature on focus groups and…

This document explains Oregon requirements for identification and programming for gifted and talented students. Five simple rules for planning programs and services are listed. Flexible pacing options are discussed, including continuous progress, early entrance, grade skipping, concurrent enrollment, advanced level courses, credit by examination,…

This guide was developed to help Wisconsin agency assessment, evaluation, and planning personnel to develop a perspective on how needs assessment fits into their state's vocational rehabilitation program planning. Volume II provides state agency personnel with tools for conducting rehabilitation needs assessment. The first three chapters consider…

Guiding principles for using sliding fee scales are presented in this paper in an effort to help states plan new child care initiatives, coordinate or strengthen existing programs, and improve sliding fee scales for current programs. Introductory comments urge states to adopt a single sliding fee scale for all their child care programs. The report…