The Bureau of Indian Education (BIE) established a System of Support program that included certain mandates for schools in restructuring and school improvement within the framework of the No Child Left Behind Act (NCLB). The Bureau operates 184 elementary schools and 24 colleges nationwide. Some of the schools are required to utilize scripted…

The purpose of this study was to examine principal leadership styles and their influence on school performance as measured by adequate yearly progress at selected Title I schools in South Carolina. The main focus of the research study was to complete descriptive statistics on principal leadership styles in schools that met or did not meet adequate…

This study of high school outcomes in the Baltimore City Public Schools builds on substantial prior research on the early warning indicators of dropping out. It sought to investigate whether the same variables that predicted a non-graduation outcome in other urban districts--attendance, behavior problems, and course failure--were also significant…

This policy brief revisits the long and storied literature on whether money matters in providing a quality education. Increasingly, political rhetoric adheres to the unfounded certainty that money doesn't make a difference in education, and that reduced funding is unlikely to harm educational quality. Such proclamations have even been used to…

In 2002/03, the Charlotte-Mecklenburg Schools initiated a broad program of accelerating entry into algebra coursework. The proportion of moderately-performing students taking 8th grade algebra increased from less than half to nearly 90%, then reverted to baseline levels, in the span of just six age cohorts. We use this policy-induced variation to…

K12 Inc. enrolls more public school students than any other private education management organization in the U.S. Much has been written about K12 Inc. (referred to in this report simply as "K12") by financial analysts and investigative journalists because it is a large, publicly traded company and is the dominant player in the operation…

The American Recovery and Reinvestment Act of 2009 (ARRA) targeted substantial School Improvement Grants (SIGs) to the nation's "persistently lowest achieving" public schools (i.e., up to $2 million per school annually over 3 years) but required schools accepting these awards to implement a federally prescribed school-reform model.…

Redistributing highly effective teachers from low- to high-need schools is an education policy tool that is at the center of several major current policy initiatives. The underlying assumption is that teacher productivity is portable across different schools settings. Using elementary and secondary school data from North Carolina and Florida, this…

In September 2011, the Obama Administration invited states to apply for waivers of key requirements of the Elementary and Secondary Education Act (ESEA) as amended by the No Child Left Behind Act (NCLB). The Administration's waiver initiative offers states the flexibility to move away from the flawed provisions of NCLB, including several…

The purpose of this study is to identify the self-reported research-based instructional and assessment practices used by third through fifth grade teachers among rural school environments in Western Pennsylvania which have attained Adequate Yearly Progress (AYP) pursuant to statewide assessments. Specifically, this study examines the…

Assuming that quality science education plays a role in economic growth within a country, it becomes important to understand how education policy might influence science education teaching and learning. This integrative research review draws on Cooper's methodology (Cooper, 1982; Cooper & Hedges, 2009) to synthesize empirical findings on the…

The purpose of this article is to share information related to the emergence of mathematics renewal (i.e., enhancing teacher instruction) for struggling learners within an elementary PDS. Specifically, background related to the PDS and three phases of the renewal process are discussed (i.e., identification of needs, implementation of new…

Purpose: Australia has enjoyed two decades of growth in international student enrolments. This phenomenon, combined with the evolution of quality assurance policy frameworks, has stimulated interest in the social and academic experiences of international students and their educational outcomes. The Australian Universities Quality Agency's (AUQA)…

This article examines minority teacher recruitment policies and programs of the past two decades and explores their influence on the racial/ethnic makeup of the teaching force in elementary and secondary public schools. The results show that while important progress has been made toward increasing the overall number and proportion of minority…

Since 1988, researchers have monitored the extent and severity of the chronic special education (SE) faculty shortage. The present study sought to add to this knowledge base by (a) gathering data on the supply and demand of leadership personnel in SE since the "2001 Faculty Shortage Study"; (b) combining and comparing these data with other sources…