Students who are at risk of dropping out of school can be identified retrospectively as early as third grade on the basis of attendance patterns, academic performance, and behavior. Check & Connect is a model designed to promote student engagement, support regular attendance, and improve the likelihood of school completion. The program has been…

This article explores the growing popularity of Advanced Placement (AP) courses in U.S. high schools and examines whether AP courses are the solution to the nation's perceived academic gap. Some researchers do not think that AP courses are a panacea for improving science in U.S. schools based on a recent study's finding that AP courses do not…

The purpose of this study was to explore the impact of high-stakes tests on teachers' instructional practices. Data were obtained from a survey instrument given to a stratified random sample of Mississippi social studies teachers who teach the same content that is tested on their state's high school graduation examination. An analysis found…

In low-performing public high schools in U.S. cities, high proportions of students drop out, students who stay in school typically do not succeed academically, and efforts to make substantial reforms often meet with little success. The Talent Development High School model is a comprehensive school reform initiative that has been developed to…

To give states the information they need to sustain hard-fought education reform effectively, Achieve conducted research on state education reforms that have been sustained successfully for over a decade or more. Funded by the GE Foundation, Achieve hopes this work will help other state leaders, wherever they may be on their road to reform,…

The "Core Indicators of Effectiveness Report" delineates the performance of Wyoming's community colleges as measured by the 14 indicators set forth by the American Association of Community Colleges (AACC) and adopted by the seven Wyoming community colleges and the Wyoming Community College Commission. These indicators, while providing…

This study compared the progress of 3,300 undergraduate students at Nova Southeastern University (Florida), of whom 2,410 were campus-based and 890 were distance education students. The study population consisted of all Fall Term 1993 Farquhar Center for Undergraduate Studies students, differentiating between campus-based and distance education…

Community colleges are a crucial point of access to higher education for low-income, minority, and other underserved students. These groups are overrepresented (with respect to their share of undergraduate enrollment) in two year and less than two year post secondary institutions. The community college access mission is built on low tuition, …

Using traditional Native research methods (talking circles and vision quests), a teacher at Edmonton (Alberta) Public Schools discovered why Canadian Native students' dropout rate was so high. Kids' complaints about poor relationships with teachers, racism, peer pressure, and poor family support were heeded, and successful interventions were…

On average the B.Sc. (Eng.) degree programmes in South Africa universities graduate about 50-60 per cent of the students admitted. Generally, the highest dropout occurs in the first year of registration. This article reviews admission and graduation statistics at the University of the Witwatersrand (Wits) and assesses the impact of recent academic…

This paper explores the implications for assessment of embedding qualifications from the vocational education and training (VET) sector within university qualifications. As VET qualifications are now all competency based, assessment in the two sectors is quite different, since universities have generally eschewed competency-based training and…

Evaluation is an important component of measuring educational effectiveness. The purpose of this survey is to analyze the attainment of "graduate standards," a school district's list of ten statements of adult roles, skills, and education all students need in order to be successful after high-school graduation. These standards encompass areas such…

This paper explores the links between socio-economic disadvantage, non-completion in higher education and preparation initiatives. It does this through investigating the effectiveness of the Top-Up Programme, a preparation course for 17 and 18 year olds from schools that have low participation rates in higher education. The University of Glasgow,…

This report presents the first post-intervention impacts of the Quantum Opportunity Program (QOP) demonstration. From July 1995 through September 2001, the U.S. Department of Labor (DOL) and the Ford Foundation (Ford) operated a demonstration of QOP designed to help at-risk high-school-age youth graduate from high school and enroll in…

"Kids Count in Colorado!" is an annual publication of the Colorado Children's Campaign, which provides the best available state- and county-level data to measure and track the education, health and general well-being of the state's children. "Kids Count in Colorado!" informs policy debates and community discussions, serving as…