Schools have continued to rely on paraeducators to assist special education teachers and other professionals in the provision of special education and related services. Although paraeducators often support students with extensive support needs (ESN) in a range of school environments, the subset of intervention studies focused on paraeducators who…

Ensuring an informed and effective dementia workforce is of international concern; however, there remains limited understanding of how this can be achieved. This review aimed to identify features of effective dementia educational programs. Critical interpretive synthesis underpinned by Kirkpatrick's return on investment model was applied. One…

Check & Connect was created in a five year period from 1990 to 1995. The original manual, entitled "Keeping Kids in School: Using Check & Connect for Dropout Prevention" and written by David Evelo, Mary Sinclair, Christine Hurley, Sandra Christenson, and Martha Thurlow, was published in 1996 (ED398701). This newly revised Check…

Describes a study of how more than 500 teachers responded to staff development sessions and reveals the characteristics of presenters that made such sessions successful. (AEA)

This paper describes a study designed to identify factors that have inhibited the success of adult training programs. The investigation looked specifically for key factors or incidents that contributed to program failure. The sample included 51 adult training programs scheduled for implementation between 1988 and 1992 in the Great Plains region of…

This paper presents a review of the research and professional literature on staff development, an analysis of the characteristics associated with effective staff development programs, and recommendations for the design of effective staff development programs based on that research. The studies cited deal with: (1) the functions of staff…

A California school district used the Hunter teaching model for a study to measure the effect of the model on teachers and students in two schools over a four-year period. Evaluation shows that student achievement and teacher behavior improved during the first three years then dropped during the fourth. (MD)

A report is given of a comprehensive review of research on inservice education. The review process began with 6,000 abstracts and references. About 150 of the documents reported some quantitative findings. Fifty-nine studies met topic criteria and also had statistics which could be synthesized. These studies were sorted into four categories of…

Shows that the inconsistencies in implementation of process strategies for reading and writing instruction by a first grade teacher participating in a three-year staff development program are a result of the lack of four components in the program: feedback, planning time, focus on one innovation, and consensus on school goals. (SR)

This paper introduces the antecedents and concepts underlying a 2-year investigation of Interactive Research and Development on Schooling (IR&DS). IR&DS is an alternative means of conducting school-based research and development and is seen as a means to: (1) involve school personnel in systematic inquiry; (2) improve the utility of…

A 6-year study of outdoor-based management training (OMT) programs used traditional evaluation methods and new methods designed specifically for these unique programs. A survey of 1,000 training directors indicated that this type of training was very controversial. The next step was to use traditional training and organizational behavior…

A study examined the usefulness of one major strategy for helping teachers, administrators, and resource staff use research on bilingual instruction. The strategy studied was the Multi-District Trainer of Trainers Institute (MTTI) as implemented in California. The study's objectives were to: describe the MTTI design, content, delivery, and…

This document considers the impact of federal policy in the dissemination and implementation of one government-sponsored school improvement program. It reports a study of Experience-Based Career Education (EBCE), a high school work-and-school program developed under the auspices of the National Institute of Education (NIE). The report begins…

Research on improving teacher practice is examined, focusing on the collaboration of researchers and practitioners in developing effective change strategies. Three studies are introduced that provide long-range data and form a knowledge base: (1) the Rand Corporation study of federal programs supporting educational change (1978); (2) the I/D/E/A…

A study used pretests/posttests and experimental/control groups to evaluate four business communication skills (BCS) programs conducted with employees at the University of Texas at Austin. Of 91 BCS participants, 86 were women and ages for all participants ranged from 20 to 61 years. Del Gaizo's four levels of evaluation (happiness index, learning…