Research Findings: This study proposes and tests hypotheses regarding the factors in public early-childhood education (ECE) policy that may explain local universal pre-kindergarten (UPK) policies. By analyzing district-level longitudinal data from the Wisconsin State Department and United States (U.S.) Census over two decades, the study examines…

Rural-serving community colleges (RSCCs) play vital roles in their communities yet often struggle to facilitate student transfer to further education, especially in STEM fields. This mixed methods study explored how rural STEM educators leverage relationships to support transfer. Social network analysis of focus groups with 36 educators at five…

The purpose of this paper is to describe a state-wide process used to determine which Teaching Works High Leverage Practices (Ball, 2016) pre-service teachers could be expected to implement at a proficient level by the completion of their preparation program (Initial HLPs), followed by two sets of high leverage practices novice teachers could…

Background: The National School Lunch and School Breakfast programs reduce food insecurity and improve dietary intake. During the COVID-19 pandemic, school meals were provided to all children at no cost, regardless of income. This policy is known as Healthy School Meals For All (HSMFA). The purpose of the study was to examine the feasibility of a…

Many youth with disabilities experience persistently low rates of competitive integrated employment (CIE) and participation in higher education. In 2014, the Workforce Innovation and Opportunity Act (WIOA) established a policy focus on CIE as the goal of vocational services for youth and individuals with disabilities. In addition, WIOA created…

Latin American families' history and life experiences impact the priorities and values the families have for their children with disabilities. It may be beneficial for early intervention (EI) providers to explore and integrate Latin American families' backgrounds to improve EI services. We completed a qualitative interview study using a collective…

Programs for gifted and talented education should be guided by research-based practices, but states' policies vary in their recommendations for programming, and in how they hold local education agencies accountable for implementing those recommendations. State plans for gifted and talented education rely on the voluntary compliance of districts to…

Purpose: To reduce the smoking rates and alleviate societal problems associated with smoking, health administrators and policy makers have attempted to promote and implement statewide smoking free policy. The present study examined how adults' awareness of and attitude toward the smoke-free air law, their perceived risks of secondhand smoke and…

At the beginning of the 21st century, higher education began to concentrate on leveling the playing field around admission. While this work is still unfolding, in the second decade of the last century, attention also began to be paid to identifying strategies that would improve student success and completion for all students, but especially for…

The Every Student Succeeds Act (ESSA) offers states increased flexibility in how they identify, rank, label, and support underperforming schools. Initial reviews of state ESSA plans, however, suggest that identification and labeling policies have remained relatively unchanged. In this study, we analyze all state ESSA plans to systematically…

A map created from data compiled by Isabela Schettino and Katie Radvany at the Reimagining Education: Teaching and Learning in Racially Diverse Schools Summer Institute (held at Teachers College, Columbia University, and directed by Amy Stuart Wells) shows which states have included references to culturally responsive teaching practices in the…

Using unique statewide panel data from Tennessee, we describe instructional coach (IC) and teacher peer observer (TPO) distributions in terms of their teaching expertise and observable school and district characteristics. The evidence suggests ICs are more likely to work in districts with lower-performing teachers while working in schools with…

The passage of the Every Student Succeeds Act (ESSA) offered a significant opportunity for school librarians; it also created opportunities to partner with school librarians on their efforts to be included in their states' educational plans. This three-part article explores the development and rollout of the American Association of School…

Three years after the passage of the Every Student Succeeds Act (ESSA), Patrick McGuinn reviews how the U.S. Department of Education has managed the approval process for state accountability plans, how state plans are shaping up as a result of their newfound flexibility, and what implementation challenges have emerged. States have required…

Purpose: Schools across the predominately rural state of West Virginia are experiencing widespread teacher shortages, though recruitment and retention difficulties are unevenly distributed across place. Using spatial in/justice as our framework, we explore how principals define place, how place influences principal perceptions of teacher…