A comprehensive report from the National Center on Performance Incentives reviews the history of teacher pay policy in the United States and earlier cycles of interest in merit or performance-based pay, the various critiques of its use in K-12 education, and empirical research studies that are useful in considering its likely impact. The report…

The elementary school teachers' view of mathematics is important because it will influence the way they will teach mathematics. Based on a survey study in three Finnish universities we explored the structure of student teachers view of mathematics and also the different belief profiles that they had. The core of student teachers' view consisted of…

This report is intended to provide information to parents and other primary caregivers to help them consider what effects their family media use strategies and practices can have on their young children, and to provide ideas and strategies to help parents and caregivers select and use media resources with their families in developmentally…

Many Ohio educators are retiring at a young age and returning to positions in public schools following retirement. Some states restrict retirees' returning to public-school employment. Ohio is the most lenient state of eight states reviewed in allowing retirees to return to work in public schools. This report provides the results of a study of 25…

Finding the right candidates for positions is a difficult task for employers. For job applicants obtaining the best positions available can also be challenging. One problem is the inherent weakness of one page cover letters, two page resumes, or short portfolios to present an applicant's talents thoroughly. One successful method of displaying a…

This introductory text provides an overview of the processes and procedures associated with developing, maintaining, and evaluating a library collection at the building level. The processes and procedures practiced in school library media centers are discussed in relation to educational theory and principles of collection development. The text was…

Electronic journals are both a blessing and a curse for libraries. To be meaningful in the current information environment--to meet users' ever-increasing demands--libraries must acquire as many appropriate full text resources as possible, as quickly as possible, and make them easy to use. This Digest provides tips for acquiring and providing…

This guide is intended to help education leaders deal with the problem of teacher shortages. It is designed to help community leaders and school officials think strategically about the problems they face with regard to the supply of teachers and help them develop an action plan to address those challenges. The first section provides a conceptual…

This note draws on "The Empirical Curriculum," a study of college course-taking patterns published by the Department of Education. Courses are tracked for three cohorts: adults in the high school graduating classes of 1972, 1982, and 1992 who went on to earn more than 10 college credits within 8.5 years of completing high school. Topics covered by…

Phrasal verbs occur frequently in written and spoken English and may be difficult for non-native speakers to understand and produce, particularly when parts of the phrasal verb should be separated and when they should be adjacent. The study reported here analyzes natural data in context to determine whether the word order of the parts of a…

This paper discusses the interrelated components of institutional structure and administrative leadership within colleges and universities, focusing on the relationship between presidential qualifications and institutional structure. It examines the differing characteristics and qualifications of presidents of institutions that are members of the…

This collection of essays grew out of the "Reading Stephen King Conference" held at the University of Maine in 1996. Stephen King's books have become a lightning rod for the tensions around issues of including "mass market" popular literature in middle and high school English classes and of who chooses what students read.…

Prepared by the manager of a virtual reality (VR) laboratory at North Carolina's Haywood Community College, the three papers collected in this document are designed to help instructors incorporate VR into their classes. The first paper reviews the characteristics of VR, defining it as a computer-generated simulation of a three-dimensional…

This paper examines the extent of current or future shortages of qualified U.S. elementary and secondary teachers. Data come from the 1987-1988 and 1990-1991 waves of the Schools and Staffing Survey (SASS), a nationally representative study by the National Center for Education Statistics (NCES). The SASS includes four sets of integrated…

Designed to help teachers, students, and parents identify engaging and insightful books for young adults, this book presents annotations of over 1,400 books published between 1994 and 1996. The book begins with a foreword by young adult author, Chris Crutcher, a former reluctant high school reader, that discusses what books have meant to him.…