This study examined the relationship between acceptance of disability, perceived stigma of students on a college campus and adaptation to college for students with disabilities. One hundred forty-five surveys were collected from student participants via the disability support services offices at sixteen colleges or universities in the northeast…

The health benefits of physical activity are empirically supported and well accepted. However, the relationship between physical activity, physical fitness, and academic performance remains to be clearly established. The purpose of this study was to identify the relationship between physical fitness and academic achievement among a sample of…

In March of 2020, in response to the onset of the COVID-19 pandemic, the state of Illinois mandated the transition to remote instruction for all schools. Although schools had the option to resume in-person instruction during the 2020-21 school year (SY21), the Illinois State Board of Education (ISBE) acknowledged that in-person instruction may not…

The onset of the COVID-19 pandemic in the spring of 2020 was marked by a transition to remote learning in Illinois schools and nationwide. The following school year, schools and families faced difficult decisions about how and when to return to in-person learning. School leaders, parents and caregivers, and students considered how to balance…

Youth who were in foster care as adolescents make up a small but highly vulnerable subpopulation of the college student body. This article analyzes secondary data collected from one of the most comprehensive longitudinal studies of foster youth. The analytic sample includes 329 foster youth from three Midwestern states who attended college in the…

Educational outcomes vary dramatically across schools in the United States. Many underperforming schools, especially in Chicago, also deal with high levels of violent crime on school grounds. Exposure to this type of frequent violence may be an important factor shaping already disadvantaged students' educational experiences. However, estimating…

The purpose of this study was to discover which student engagement variables and student characteristics predict student academic achievement. The research utilized the standardized national Community College Survey of Student Engagement (CCSSE) to examine data from 19,516 students from 13 Illinois community colleges. The outcome of student…

Research Findings: This study examines the theory of change of the Chicago School Readiness Project (CSRP), testing a sequence of theory-derived mediating mechanisms that include the quality of teacher-child relationships and children's self-regulation. The CSRP is a multicomponent teacher and classroom-focused intervention, and its…

The Supplemental Educational Services (SES) provision of the No Child Left Behind Act offers free tutoring services to students attending perennially underperforming schools. The author assesses the extent to which Chicago Public Schools students most in need of and who could potentially benefit the most from additional academic instruction…

In this study, the author and her colleagues examined the higher education pipeline of Early Childhood teachers in Chicago in order to make recommendations for strategies to increase the number of qualified Early Childhood teachers. Key findings of this study include: (1) The Chicago Early Childhood Education (ECE) pipeline for undergraduate…

This dissertation is an empirical investigation of educational policies, practices and organizational settings that shape the schooling experiences of Chicago Public School (CPS) students. The first chapter, "Educational Choice and Student Participation: The Case of the Supplemental Educational Services Provision in Chicago Public…

In 2003, the Illinois Education Research Council (IERC) began to follow the members of the Illinois public high school class of 2002 (the Class of 2002) on their journeys through postsecondary education. There is a wealth of higher education information on these students, including enrollment and the completion of certificates and degrees. Also, a…

Although there are many reasons why students dropout of college courses, those reasons may be unique for students who are enrolled in an online program. Issues of isolation, disconnectedness, and technological problems may be factors that influence a student to leave a course. To understand these factors, an online survey was developed to collect…

The High School Mathematics Test was administered to 9,582 high school students in Illinois and to 1,700 in Japan. The Japanese sample scored more than two standard deviations above the American sample. Factors associated with mathematics achievement included number of mathematics courses taken and student motivation. (GDC)

Despite increasing recognition that a high school diploma is a minimum requirement for success in the workplace, nearly half of Chicago Public Schools (CPS) students fail to graduate, and in some CPS high schools, more students drop out than graduate. Research on dropping out has shown that the decision to persist in or leave school is affected by…