Recognizing the importance of providing high-quality preschool education for helping to ensure children's future educational success, this document presents guidelines for what constitutes high-quality programming across a broad spectrum of curriculum and practice for California preschools, taking into account the state's move toward higher…

This study assessed the beliefs about and sensitivity toward cultural diversity issues of teacher educators and preservice teachers. A group of 78 predominantly white preservice teachers and 45 predominantly white teacher educators completed the Beliefs About Diversity Scale, which assessed beliefs about race, gender, social class, ability,…

This paper focuses on investigating the purposive design of learning environments to counter the erosion of social capital in communities and schools in contemporary society. Can schools intentionally replenish stocks of social capital by creating normative systems conducive to the optimal academic and social development of students, and by…

In order to examine and understand power relations between international students who speak English as a second language and American students in online discussions in adult and higher education settings, 1002 postings related to discussion topics in two doctoral-level adult education online classes with 45 students 6 of whom were international…

In response to an incident in which white teenagers shot Alaska Natives with frozen paintballs, the Alaska State Advisory Committee (SAC) to the U.S. Commission on Civil Rights hosted a 2-day community forum in Anchorage. The forum solicited input about improving race relations from state, local, and federal officials, representatives of advocacy…

An updated study of Kentucky school district performance since the implementation of the Kentucky Education Reform Act of 1990 (KERA) added 4 years of accountability data; compared the performance of various districts; and explored district financial and teaching resources and their impacts on performance. After the initial years of change…

This publication analyzes relationships between various forms of learning and economic performance at the regional level and provides rather strong evidence of the importance of individual and firm-level organizational learning for regions' economic performance. Chapter 1 is an introduction. Chapter 2 maps out a conceptual framework for the…

The Newspaper Division of the proceedings contains the following 22 papers: "Framing Freedom: Hoosier Republican and Democratic Newspaper Editors Frame Lincoln's Emancipation Proclamation" (David W. Bulla); "Quantifying Newspaper Quality: 'I Know It When I See It'" (Philip Meyer and Koang-Hyub Kim); "Cultural Convergence:…

The new edition of this text provides updated views, events, and research findings, including a study of extraordinarily successful career women, more attention to gifted education in rural areas, counseling of gay students, and suicide prevention. Chapters have the following titles: (1) "Gifted Education: Matching Instruction with Needs"; (2)…

Articles in this special issue include the following: "Learning to Write in a Second Language: Two Decades of Research" (Alister Cumming); "Some Steps Towards a Socio-Cognitive Interpretation of Second Language Composition Processes" (Julio Delarios Roca, Liz Murphy Liz); "Trends in the Conceptualizations of Second Language Composing Strategies: A…

This issue describes how researchers are studying ways to reduce the overrepresentation of students from minority backgrounds in special education. It begins by discussing problems associated with inappropriate classification and placement of minority students, including being denied access to the general education curriculum, being placed in…

The purpose of this study was to identify the reasons and processes by which skin tone affects assumptions regarding competence among African Americans. As such, the study addressed two important hypotheses: (1) that African Americans demonstrate light skin tone bias as measured by perceptions of competence, and (2) that African Americans'…

This study explored the implications of demographic trends on the quality of the future labor force and on public social expenditures. It also focused on the educational costs and social benefits of educational and immigration policy alternatives designed to close the gap in educational attainment between non-Hispanic whites and Hispanics and…

This paper argues that understanding the source and development of student motivation for learning English as a Foreign Language (EFL) is very important for educational purposes. The purpose of this study of 234 Korean 9th graders was to identify the following: (1) Korean students' orientations and motivations for learning English; (2) what kinds…

The Commission on the Status of Women section of the proceedings contains the following 8 selected papers: "Perverse Public Panoptican: Content Analysis of Male and Female Patient Images in Reproductive Health News Reports" (Marie Dick); "The Olympic Ideal: A Content Analysis of the Coverage of Olympic Women's Sports in San…