Learning organizations must have a shared organizational vision. Schools can develop good vision statements when personnel base discussions on a collective investigation of research; emphasize meaningful, credible improvements; and share their thoughts and hopes while working toward consensus. Indicators that schools can impact through school…

Sets forth guidelines for assessing the economic impact of university research and development and identifies what may become the roles and responsibilities of technology transfer officers in the assessment process. (Author/JOW)

Discusses five major discrepancies in speech and language pathology practices and offers suggestions for reconciling them. Discrepancies include the separation of clinicians and scientists, the definition of language, the role of theory in intervention, the approach as it relates to product for language intervention, and the meaning of best…

This article describes the usefulness of a scientific approach to improving knowledge and practice in special education. Of four approaches to knowledge (superstition, folklore, craft, and science), craft and science are supported and implications for special education drawn including the need to bridge the gulf between research knowledge and…

In attempting to guide both researchers and the federal government in the development of a stronger scientific culture for education research, the National Research Council report, Scientific Research in Education, falls short in its conception of research dissemination. Rather than considering the potential of new publishing technologies to…

Federal educational policy, funding, and legislation are currently forwarding a research agenda described by the current administration as scientifically based. We characterize this agenda, described in multiple official documents as the gold standard, as neopositivist. We consider the ways in which this research paradigm and the methods that…

The field of augmentative and alternative communication's (AAC) missing link is the discrepancy between what the research community identifies as needs and what the clinical community, including the AAC user, believes to be the AAC user's needs. An unrealistic picture of the AAC user occurs, developing a top-down effect of limited outcomes,…

This paper reviews criticism on misinterpretation and overuse of significance testing in the social sciences and examines use of effect size measures to enhance interpretation of significance testing. Review of typical effect size measures and their application is followed by analysis of use of effect size measures in studies reported over 10…

The author presents an investigation of patent-application filings made without external financial support, or "at-risk", based on inventions disclosed to the University of California from fiscal years 1991 to 2000. The success of the at-risk patent applications filed on these invention disclosures is examined from the perspective of…

The National Center for the Study of Adult Learning and Literacy (NCSALL) and the National Adult Education Professional Development Consortium (NAEPDC), with funding from the National Institute for Literacy, created a one-day workshop to assist practitioners and administrators in adult basic education, TANF (Transitional Assistance for Needy…

Knowledge use and production is complex and so also are attempts to judge its quality. Research synthesis is a set of formal processes to determine what is known from research in relation to different research questions and this process requires judgements of the quality and relevance of the research evidence considered. Such judgement can be…

One prominent issue in contemporary special education is that teaching techniques found by research to be effective in improving the educational outcomes of students with disabilities are not routinely implemented. One way to enhance teachers' use of research-based practices is to disseminate information on effective teaching techniques in ways…

Using data to redesign instruction is a means of increasing student achievement. Educators in Camden County (Georgia) Schools have used data from benchmark testing since 1999. They hired a commercial vendor to design a benchmark test that is administered four times a year and use the data to generate subject-area reports that can be further…

The evidence-based practice (EBP) movement has the potential to significantly advance the quality of psychological and educational services provided by psychologists working in schools. Training psychologists in EBP has challenged the profession and caused faculty in graduate programs to reevaluate and retool professional training curricula and…

Thomas Jefferson recognized the value of reason and scientific experimentation in the eighteenth century. This chapter extends the idea in contemporary ways to standards that may be used to judge the ethical propriety of randomized trials and the dependability of evidence on effects of social interventions.