Data from the 1988 Phi Delta Kappa National Research Study on at-risk students were used in an analysis of variables associated with being classified as "at risk." The study collected information on over 22,000 at-risk and not-at-risk students from 274 schools and 9,600 teachers from across the United States. This analysis identified…

A drug and alcohol survey was administered to 283 secondary school students in a large suburban school district in the eastern United States. The survey covered demographic information, life events, coping strategies, and prevalence of substance abuse, asking students about initial and current use of a wide range of substances including alcohol,…

To understand the impact of all of the various science and mathematics improvement initiatives and to make them more effective in the future, it is important to be able to monitor the condition of science and mathematics education in the schools. This report presents a review of the information and data currently available; it is a preliminary…

The nature and extent of variations in student attributions about performance in their courses were studied, and the relationships between the attributions and responses on certain items of a student ratings questionnaire were determined. Causal or predictive relationships among these variables were also investigated. Data were collected using:…

To determine if women or men have lower aspiration levels for school administrative positions, male and female administrative certificate holders were asked for their ultimate career goal. The most frequent response was superintendent (36 percent), followed by elementary principal, out of education, and professor (12 percent for each choice). The…

The National Child Care Staffing Study (NCCSS) was designed to explore how child care teaching staff and their working conditions affect the caliber of center-based child care. Four major policy questions were addressed: (1) Who teaches in America's child care centers? (2) What do they contribute to the quality of care provided? (3) Do centers…

Two methods of using collateral information from similar institutions to predict college freshman grade average were investigated. One central prediction model, referred to as pooled least squares with adjusted intercepts, assumes that slopes and residual variances are homogeneous across selected colleges. The second model, referred to as Bayesian…

Predictor weights estimated by using multiple linear regression are biased when there is restriction in the range (RR) of the dependent variable. Standardized multiple regression yields partial correlations as weights for the predictors, and these can be corrected for range difference between calibration and application samples. However,…

Six of 11 papers presented at a symposium on language aptitude testing are included in this document. "Cognitive Abilities in Foreign Language Aptitude: Then and Now" (John B. Carroll) reconsiders language aptitude testing 30 years after publication of the Modern Language Aptitude Test (MLAT). "Preliminary Investigation of the…

Correlations between the California Critical Thinking Skills Test--College Level (CCTST) and student-related factors regarded as indicators of academic ability and success were studied in a series of four experiments investigating whether the CCTST measures improvement in critical thinking (CT) skills. During 1989-90, data were collected on 1,196…

In order to determine the effect of being disabled on the academic progress of disabled college students, a questionnaire assessing the social climate of a major western university, the quality of its programs and instruction, and student academic and career expectations was administered to 100 disabled students. Factors explored in the…

Five workplans were developed for the National Center for Education Statistics' (NCES) educational indicators program. The implementation of these workplans will be useful to both NCES staff and users of NCES data and will provide opportunities for joint working relationships among the authors, consultants, and NCES staff. The five plans call for…

This report analyzes the effects of multiunit school organization on elementary teachers' patterns of task-related communication. Multiunit teacher work teams, or units, are characterized by discussions between teachers about the intimate details of their daily work; this contrasts with the structurally undifferentiated organization of…

This study examined the value of the American College Testing Program (ACT) and secondary school performance as predictors of academic performance in college. Multiple regression was used to establish a prediction equation for grade-point average (GPA) at the end of the first term of the freshman year as the dependent variable and ACT and high…

The activities and experiences of students who were high school seniors in 1980 were surveyed four years later. Data were provided from the High School and Beyond base-year survey (1980), the first follow-up in 1982, and the second in the spring of 1984, focusing on the graduates' educational, vocational, socioeconomic and familial status, and…