With the recent reauthorization of the Strengthening Career and Technical Education for the 21st Century Act (Perkins V), unprecedented philanthropic investment in career pathways, and the urgent economic needs of the COVID-19 (coronavirus) pandemic, the career readiness field is at a critical moment in time. To meet this moment, states,…

Research shows that a diverse teacher workforce benefits all students -- especially historically underserved students in American education, in particular Black students. With a historic pool of federal education funds now available to help address the effects of the pandemic, school districts and states have a unique window of opportunity to…

"Building Your SPP/APR Stakeholder Engagement Plan: 10 Essential Questions" can help states develop and report on authentic and broad stakeholder engagement as required in the FFY 2020-2025 SPP/APR. This interactive resource guides states through 10 key questions they should be asking themselves as they build their stakeholder engagement…

Purpose: As the federal government has retreated from taking a dominant role in encouraging implementation of common K-12 standards, states and districts have moved to fill this education policy vacuum. This study aims to understand how state and district leaders are navigating this new policy environment. Research Methods/Approach: Drawing upon…

As policy makers consider revisions to the Higher Education Act (HEA), understanding the impact of increasing the size of Pell grants is important if it is to have the intended impact of improving educational outcomes for lower income students across the various types of colleges and universities. Understanding institutional behavior is a place to…

Public schools have a long-established practice of conducting screening assessment of students as they enter kindergarten. The purpose of this study, conducted in spring 2021 by the Maine Education Policy Research Institute at the request of the Joint Standing Committee on Education and Cultural Affairs, is to gain a current list of the assessment…

Despite marked growth in evaluation use and capacity in the U.S. Federal Government over the last 50 years, the levers that have driven institutional change have not previously been identified. This ethnographic study mapped the process and factors that have led to the diffusion of value in evaluation in the U.S. Federal Government. Analyses of…

School accountability systems can serve many purposes, including sharing information, measuring progress toward state and local goals, and supporting greater educational equity. Given the important role accountability systems play in states' education systems, states have taken the opportunity provided by the Every Student Succeeds Act (ESSA) to…

The educational acts of the 21st century have affected public education for twenty years. Their roots historically go back to the 1960s. The original goal was to create an equitable education for children of color so that the achievement gap and dropout rate would be eliminated. Although well intended, these acts may have spawned many unintended…

The Every Student Succeeds Act (ESSA) provides guidance and expectations to state education agencies. We examined the intersection of improvement science and ESSA through a qualitative analysis of the state guidance documents. Utilizing six principles of improvement as a conceptual framework, we identified three themes: improvement as an outcome;…

This study investigated the unique educational needs of high school students who are homeless and served by the New York City public school system. The purpose was to uncover best practices that administrators use to educate these students by posing questions that pertain to issues that a school might have in dealing with the complexities of…

On January 19, 2021, the author of this letter sent the final "Frequently Asked Questions: Impact of COVID-19 on Accountability Systems Required under the Elementary and Secondary Education Act of 1965 (ESEA)," and accompanying "State Plan Addendum template," that provide responses to questions that States have raised regarding…

The Department is providing States flexibility for reporting SY 2019-2020 average daily attendance (ADA) data in order to ensure the data are consistent and as accurate as possible. As required by section 8101(1) of the Elementary and Secondary Education Act of 1965 (ESEA), each State will continue to report ADA based on either the Federal or the…

Discipline referrals and suspensions are used as a last resort to address inappropriate student behavior in schools. The problem investigated in this study was the inconsistent trend in the number of discipline referrals and suspensions during implementation of three different discipline policies (zero tolerance, progressive discipline, and…

Response to Intervention (RTI) is a multi-tiered model that allows for intervention for students with learning disabilities and behavioral needs. Some studies suggest that implementing RTI can improve educational outcomes for all students including English Language Learning (ELL) students. After the 2004 reauthorization of the Individuals with…