This report looks at student retention in Texas over a 4-year period, beginning with the 1993-94 school year. Grade-level retention is typically defined as having a student repeat an unsuccessful grade or holding back a child not developmentally ready to enter school. The information is analyzed by grade, ethnicity, and gender, as well as other…

Black and Hispanic students are more likely to exercise public school choice. Previous large-scale quantitative studies have ignored ethnic distinctions as well as choice's multidimensional nature. As a result, the effects of public sector choice policy on the academic achievement of minority students are unknown. This study uses data from the…

U.S. ethnic geography is an increasingly important focus of study due to cultural diversity and continued growth of the United States. Geographers are carefully studying the spatial aspects of present U.S. ethnic groups. This collection of essays addresses the important need for creating innovative approaches in teaching U.S. ethnic geography in…

This anthology presents the voices of women and men of Caribbean backgrounds living in the United States. Focus is on five most prevalently represented groups: Puerto Ricans, West Indians, Cubans, Haitians, and Dominicans. The book is organized into five sections: (1) "A Primer on Caribbean Migration" presents an overview of Caribbean…

Preventing Agricultural Chemical Exposure among North Carolina Farmworkers (PACE) is a project designed to describe farmworker pesticide exposure and to develop an educational intervention to reduce farmworker pesticide exposure. The PACE project used a community participation framework to ensure that the community played a significant role in…

This study analyzed data from year 1 of Project Choice, Connecticut's response to Sheff v. O'Neill, a 1989 school desegregation lawsuit. Project Choice is an interdistrict transfer program modeled on a program that began in Hartford in 1966. It allows suburban children to attend urban schools. For each child participating, the district where the…

While the demand for a highly skilled workforce has increased, several reports have highlighted the poor performance of high school students in reading, math, and science. Moreover, the achievement gap between white and minority students is widening. Latino students have one of the highest dropout rates and they perform less well than their peers…

This report presents analyses of data from the Texas Assessment of Academic Skills (TAAS) reading measures. It evaluates outcomes in all of the 111 Texas schools that began Success for All from 1994-97. Success for All is a comprehensive reform model for elementary schools, especially Title I schoolwide projects. TAAS reading scores were collected…

Beginning with the class of 2003, all Massachusetts students must pass the state's high stakes test, MCAS, in order to graduate, which may significantly affect Massachusetts' already high dropout rate. According to this MCAS Alert, instead of remedying the problem of students who graduate without skills, this policy threatens to push the most…

This factsheet describes important changes in the academic characteristics of recent high school graduates that relate directly to university eligibility and student preparation. Data show that by ethnic-racial group, in 1999, 55% of Asian graduates and 41% of White graduates completed the university-preparatory curricula, while only 26% of Black…

This paper summarizes the key findings of two separate studies of issues pertaining to pay equity for faculty by race and gender. Data were obtained from the 1988 and 1993 National Studies of Postsecondary Faculty, which contain information on 11,013 and 31,354 faculty, respectively. It was found that the unexplained wage gap between men and women…

This study examined the demographic, service use, and juvenile justice history associated with clinical variables in a juvenile justice population. Records of 3,283 youth (ages 10 to 18) admitted to a juvenile corrections facility in a six-month period were reviewed. Of this group, 244 (8 percent) had been referred for mental health evaluation.…

This report discusses the outcomes of a study that compared family needs and sources of support perceived by 55 Puerto Rican mothers of young children (ages birth to 5 years) with disabilities residing in Puerto Rico and 39 of their Puerto Rican counterparts living in Florida. The relationship among perceived family needs, sources of support, and…

A primary goal of California's higher education system is to provide capable students access to higher education regardless of the high school they attended, their ethnicity, their gender, or their socioeconomic status. Overall, college-going rates declined between 1985 and 2005. The percentage of public high school graduates going to community…

Assesses how discrimination and biculturalism have affected the Chicanos' ability to communicate bilingually in a monolingual society. Using a historical perspective, the sociocultural significance of Chicano bilingualism is discussed in terms of code switching, language dominance, and cultural values. (JAC)