Extended Learning Opportunities Summer Adventures in Learning (ELO SAIL) is a Montgomery County Public Schools summer program for students in all Title I elementary schools; it targets students who will be in kindergarten-Grade 2 in the fall following the program. This report analyzed demographic characteristics of attendees and the impact of the…

The authors describe an impact study of Classroom Assessment for Student Learning (CASL), a widely used professional development program in classroom and formative assessment. Researchers randomly assigned 67 elementary schools to receive CASL materials or continue with regularly scheduled professional development. Teachers in CASL schools formed…

The District of Columbia Opportunity Scholarship Program (OSP) was created by Congress to provide tuition vouchers to low-income parents who want their child to attend a private school. The Scholarships for Opportunity and Results (SOAR) Act of 2011 also mandated an evaluation of the OSP program. This report examines impacts one year after…

In 2010, the National Center for Learning and Civic Engagement (NCLCE) established the Schools of Success, a national network of 19 schools that use service-learning as an instructional strategy. The schools were part of a three-year project to examine how the elements of service-learning might enhance key student outcomes, such as academic…

Motivated by the passage of the No Child Left Behind (NCLB) Act, all states operate accountability systems that measure and report school and student performance annually. The purpose of this study is to examine the effects of interim assessments on the achievement gap. The authors examine the impact of interim assessments throughout the…

This study investigates the effect of a Framework-aligned professional development program at the PreK-3 level. The NSF funded program integrated science with literacy and mathematics learning and provided teacher professional development, along with materials and programming for parents to encourage science investigations and discourse around…

Early math skills are a strong predictor of later achievement for young children, not only in math, but in other domains as well. Exhibiting strong math skills in elementary school is predictive of later high school completion and college attendance. To that end, the Making Pre-K Count and High 5s studies set out to rigorously assess whether…

This study examines the issues surrounding middle school students' transitions to high school and the degree to which freshman orientation models can help them. The attendance, discipline, report card grades, and end-of-course exams of 60 students who participated in a freshman orientation were compared to those of 150 students who were invited to…

The study, "The Impact of Indiana's System of Interim Assessments on Mathematics and Reading," examined the effects of using Diagnostic Assessment Tools (DAT) on mathematics and reading outcomes for students in 59 Indiana schools during the 2009-10 academic year. DAT consists of interim assessment tools--Wireless Generation's mCLASS for…

To understand the immediate impact of a university-school district partnership that places preservice teachers (both traditional undergraduates and graduate students in an initial licensure residency program) in a Professional Development School (PDS) model, this exploratory study reviewed data from yearly examinations required by the Kansas State…

This study examined whether attending a Knowledge is Power Program (KIPP) middle school improved students' reading, math, social studies, and science achievement for up to 4 years following enrollment. The study reported that students attending KIPP middle schools scored statistically significantly higher than matched students on all of the state…

This article presents the findings of an evaluation of the eMINTS (enhancing Missouri's Instructional Networked Teaching Strategies) professional development program. eMINTS is an intensive teacher professional development program designed to promote inquiry-based learning, support high-quality lesson design, build community among students and…

The purpose of this study was to evaluate the effects of Schoolwide Positive Behavior Supports (SWPBS) in an elementary school within a large, urban school district located in the South. The effects of first year implementation of the SWPBS program were studied by examining Office Disciplinary Referrals (ODRs) and academic achievement data in…

As part of its ongoing efforts to raise the academic achievement of children from low-income families in Kansas City, Missouri, the Ewing Marion Kauffman Foundation founded the Ewing Marion Kauffman School in fall 2011. The Kauffman School's mission is "to prepare students to excel academically, graduate from college, and apply their unique…

This quantitative correlational study involved the analysis, by gender, of the effect of four intervention programs at an Arizona middle school as seen on Arizona's Instrument to Measure Standards (AIMS) test scores. These four intervention programs included: Advancement Via Individual Determination (AVID), a planner stamping system, a World…