Under the No Child Left Behind Act (2002), all schools are required to demonstrate that all students make annual yearly progress (AYP). This can be difficult, particularly for students in urban schools and even more so for students with disabilities. The authors report on one large urban school district's attempts to provide support to 140 schools…

Drawing from three years of research in the classrooms of four highly effective elementary and secondary teachers in South Los Angeles, this article considers theories of teaching in urban contexts by examining effective practices in urban classrooms. It outlines an original framework of five indicators of effective teaching in urban schools and…

The last decade has seen an enormous increase in interest in and use of educational indicators. This paper focuses on K-12 student outcome indicators and measures of how well students have learned what is expected of them--the raison d'etre of schooling. It provides a Canadian perspective on student outcome indicators and has three major purposes:…

This third edition of "Education at a Glance" presents a set of 49 international education indicators covering the 1991-92 school year. The publication of this set of indicators marks the completion of efforts begun in 1992 to develop a system for collecting, screening, and processing education statistics that would bring together…

A state educational indicator system being developed by the Pennsylvania Educational Policy Studies (PEPS) project at the University of Pittsburgh (Pennsylvania) is described. The extensive database that has been established as part of the PEPS project includes thousands of variables that are descriptive of the 500 Pennsylvania school districts.…

It is crucial that measures and indicators for important aspects of the educational system be found and collected. As the education system strives to meet commonly identified goals, effective inputs become easier to identify and become more amenable to common collection and use, overcoming the two major impediments to developing national education…

Indicators of mathematics and science education progress are important to policymakers and the public in order to evaluate the quality of education. Recent reports have evaluated existing indicators and suggested core aspects of mathematics and science education that an indicator system should evaluate. This note discusses two fundamental aspects…

A rationale for school-based evaluation, criteria for a sensible evaluation and assessment system, and a systematic process for implementing an evaluation and assessment system are presented. School-based evaluation can be used as a management tool and a means of improving aspects of teaching. Sensible evaluation must be aligned with school goals,…

This document contains resolution text adopted by the American Federation of Teachers (AFT) in July 1998 regarding Redesigning Low-Performing Schools. A Question & Answer section follows the resolution, addressing the following issues: (1) Union support for redesign or closure of low-performing schools; (2) Indicators of low-performing schools…

This document reports on the educational demand in Southside Virginia and recommendations for action. The Southside is defined as including the cities of Martinsville, Danville, and South Boston and the counties of Henry, Pittsylvania, Patrick, and Franklin. A needs-assessment indicated: (1) Strong interest in attending a college in the…

In this paper, the author questions whether the No Child Left Behind Act (NCLB) achieves its stated purpose: to raise standards of academic achievement. Deeper understanding, subtlety of thought, creativity, critical thinking, perseverance, leadership and sensibility about self and the world cannot be measured by multiple-choice technology. The…

This paper attempts to describe and analyze the development and reforms of secondary education in Hong Kong and Shanghai over the past 25 years. Comparing the two cities is useful in constructing a spectrum of possibilities on the one hand, and identifying some common themes in the development of secondary education on the other. The…

In recent decades, a growing number of countries have sought innovative solutions to the substantial challenges they face in financing tertiary education. One of the principal challenges is that the demand for education beyond the secondary level in most countries around the world is growing far faster than the ability or willingness of…

This research brief summarizes a report by Julian R. Betts, Andrew C. Zau, and Lorien A. Rice, "Determinants of Student Achievement: New Evidence from San Diego" (2003) [ED497299]. Surveys by the Public Policy Institute of California have consistently shown that Californians are concerned about the quality of K-12 public schools and that…

This study sought to call attention to the rather massive increases in the enrollment of new degree-seeking students that have occurred at the University of South Florida (USF) in recent years. Over a four-year period (1997-98 to 2001-02), USF, a large multi-campus metropolitan university in Tampa, Florida, saw the number of annual new…