The USC School Performance Dashboard, now in its seventh year, draws on California school data from 2003-2012 to rate charter schools on academic and financial measures of performance. It also provides an accompanying interactive site at www.uscrossier.org/ceg/. Unlike other school databases, this one assigns values--high, medium, low--to the…

The primary focus of research on employment of language learning strategies has been on identification of adoption of different learning strategies. However, the relationship between language learning strategies and proficiency levels was ignored in previous research. The present study was undertaken to find out whether there are any relationship…

In this study, we investigated whether preequating results agree with equating results that are based on observed operational data (postequating) for a college placement program. Specifically, we examined the degree to which item response theory (IRT) true score preequating results agreed with those from IRT true score postequating and from…

We present the findings of a study on prospective elementary teachers' proportional reasoning. After describing some of the teachers' performance in solving multiplicative structure problems that involve ratios and relations of direct proportionality between quantities, we were able to establish classifications of their answers according to…

Problem Statement: It can be said that one of the key factors ensuring teachers adaptation to developments is teachers' level of commitment to their schools. In this commitment, the teacher is expected to internalize the organizational objectives. The teacher's perception of organizational support is important for him to internalize the…

The use of specific speech acts have been found to vary with culture, thus to perform a speech act successfully in a second language requires not only linguistic competence but also pragmatic competence of the L2 community. Though previous studies have shown dissimilarities in invitational conversations and general refusal strategies (c.f.…

Over the past decade, educational policy trends have shifted to a focus on examining students' growth from kindergarten through twelfth grade (K-12). One way states can track students' growth is with a vertical scale. Presently, every state that uses a vertical scale bases the scale on a unidimensional IRT model. These models make a…

Background: A dimension of negatively oriented affect within oppositional defiant disorder (ODD) symptoms, which has been described as irritability, has been shown to predict depression and anxiety. Related constructs have been linked to temperament and personality constructs. However, only a few studies have examined the prediction from…

In order to improve instruction in introductory astronomy, we are investigating students' preinstructional ideas about a number of cosmology topics. This article describes one aspect of this large research study in which 1270 students responded to a subset of three questions each from a larger set of questions about the following areas: definition…

High-proficiency second language (L2) learners challenge much theory and methodology in contemporary sociolinguistic and L2 acquisition research, which suggests the need for honest interdisciplinarity when working in the interstices of style, stylization, and advanced acquisition processes. When to consider fluent and highly competent speakers of…

Research Findings: A total of 72 Head Start children (M age = 53.26 months, SD = 5.07) were randomly assigned to 4 conditions. Some were taught the oddity principle (choosing the object that differs from others in a group) and seriation (ordering objects on a dimension and inserting new objects into such orders), which are forms of thinking that…

The scale and reach of the recent global financial has created a fresh wave of interest in exploring more sustainable forms of management. A central thrust behind this trend in the practice of management development and education has been the accentuation of reflexivity. There are many variations in how reflexivity is understood, and this article…

Within categories of special educational needs, emotional and behavioural difficulties have received much attention in recent years, particularly in relation to their definition and identification by parents and teachers. This paper stems from previous research which highlights how children from disadvantaged backgrounds and those attending…

The Fraser Institute "Report Card" of school rankings has won the hearts of parents and the press. For over a decade, the rankings have been particularly burdensome for low-ranking (usually low socio-economic status, high-poverty) schools when parents of high-achieving children move them to higher-ranking schools. In February 2010, after…

This paper reports on an attempt to investigate Turkish primary school students' interest in science by using their self-generated questions. We investigated students' interest in science by analyzing 1704 self-generated science-related questions. Among them, 826 questions were submitted to a popular science magazine called Science and Children.…