We examine the mortality effects of a 1947 school reform in Japan, which extended compulsory schooling from primary to secondary school by as much as 3 years. The abolition of secondary school fees also indicates that those affected by the reform likely came from disadvantaged families who could have benefited the most from schooling. Even in this…

Group-based educational interventions on health promotion for people with early-stage dementia have shown promising results. The aim of this study was to explore the associations between sociodemographic characteristics (e.g. sex, education, marital status) and outcomes of a 12-week group-based educational intervention on health promotion for…

This study investigates the impact of Social-Emotional Learning (SEL) on the mental health and well-being of students at Henan University. Amid China's exam-oriented educational landscape, students often face significant psychological challenges due to academic pressure and limited emotional support. This research aims to (1) examine demographic…

This dissertation consists of three essays focused on policies that hold the potential to reduce gender and socioeconomic gaps in the developing world. The first two chapters focus on higher education while the last chapter focuses on STEM gender gaps during primary school. Chapter 1 looks at the impacts of new transportation infrastructure on…

Purpose: Research has indicated that interactive shared book reading can support a wide range of early language skills and that children who are read to regularly in the early years learn language faster, enter school with a larger vocabulary, and become more successful readers at school. Despite the large volume of research suggesting interactive…

Research Findings: Low-socioeconomic status (SES) (intervention group, n = 31; control group, n = 32) and middle/high-SES (reference group, n = 33) 5-year-old Chinese kindergartners were screened through SES and IQ test. Their number sense was examined over five time points. The pretest was conducted at the beginning of the fall semester, followed…

Estimates of school voucher impacts on educational attainment have yet to explore heterogeneities in socioeconomic status among disadvantaged minority students. We theorize reasons for these heterogeneities and then estimate experimentally the differential impacts of voucher offers on college enrollment and graduation rates for minority and…

Background: Prior studies suggest that Federal Work-Study (FWS) participation is positively associated with student learning, persistence, and academic achievement at four-year institutions. Limited research, however, has evaluated whether FWS participation improves academic success among students attending community colleges. Purpose and Research…

Research has largely been silent on English Learner (EL) persistence and completion in U.S. community colleges, yet studies conducted across higher education report that only one in eight ELs completes a bachelor's degree (Kanno & Cromley, 2013). Many interventions have been proposed to improve college student persistence and completion. This…

This article documents the patterns of White-Black and White-Hispanic enrollment gaps in Advanced Placement (AP) and Dual Enrollment (DE) programs across thousands of school districts in the United States by merging several data sources. We show that the vast majority of districts have racial enrollment gaps in both programs, with wider gaps in AP…

For decades, social theorists have posited--and descriptive accounts have shown--that students isolated by both social class and ethnicity suffer extreme deprivations that limit the effectiveness of equal-opportunity interventions. Even educational programs that yield positive results for moderately disadvantaged students may not prove beneficial…

This study examined participation in accelerated college credit programs dual enrollment, concurrent enrollment, and Advanced Placement courses in Rhode Island high schools to understand their effects on educational attainment in the 2013/14 grade 9 cohort. The state, which has funded and promoted these opportunities for students to earn college…

This Study Snapshot highlights key findings where the Rhode Island Department of Education, the Rhode Island Office of the Postsecondary Commissioner, and state legislators sought evidence of the effects of state-funded programs for students to earn college credit during high school. Using data on the 2013/14 statewide grade 9 cohort, this…

The "The Effects of Accelerated College Credit Programs on Educational Attainment in Rhode Island" study examined participation in accelerated college credit programs dual enrollment, concurrent enrollment, and Advanced Placement courses in Rhode Island high schools to understand their effects on educational attainment in the 2013/14…

Building on the experience of working with middle-income countries in PISA since 2000, and in an effort to respond to the emerging demand for PISA to cater to a wider range of countries, the OECD launched the PISA for Development (PISA-D) initiative in 2014. This one-off pilot project, spanning six years, aims to make the assessment more…