To examine the effects of developmental and remedial course participation on student retention and academic performance, Sinclair Community College, in Ohio, undertook a study of outcomes after 3 years for the 1,798 first-time, degree or certificate students who enrolled in fall 1990. Students were grouped based on need for remedial coursework and…

A new free-response item type for mathematics tests is described. The item type, referred to as the Student-Produced Response (SPR), was first introduced into the Preliminary Scholastic Aptitude Test/National Merit Scholarship Qualifying Test in 1993 and into the Scholastic Aptitude Test in 1994. Students solve a problem and record the answer by…

This study provides information about the total and component scores of the Test of English as a Foreign Language (TOEFL). First, the study provides comparative global and component estimates of test-retest, alternate-form, and internal-consistency reliability, controlling for sources of measurement error inherent in the examinees and the testing…

Summer school is thought to be an effective alternative delivery mode for Chapter 1 education. The effectiveness of summer Chapter 1 programs was studied during Fall 1993 in 68 Chicago (Illinois) public schools. Students who had been in fourth grade in 1991-92 were divided into a group that had received Chapter 1 help during the school year and…

Developed as part of the ABCs of Construction National Workplace Literacy Project, this instructional module is designed to help individuals employed as pipefitters learn to solve problems with charts and tables. Outlined in the first section is a five-step procedure for solving problems involving tables and/or charts: identifying the question to…

The National Assessment of Educational Progress (NAEP) serves as the nation's primary indicator of what school children know and can do. This study examines the policy relevant variable, computer use in the classroom, as indicated by the 1992 NAEP Trial State Assessment data for Mississippi. After a preliminary examination of other variables…

The purpose of this publication is to: (1) offer an overview of the Internet and its educational applications; (2) provide teachers and students with a guide for a hands-on experience with the Internet; (3) show how educational resources from around the world can be brought into the classroom; and (4) show how some educators have used the…

Although the effort to restructure the American high school is in high gear, little attention has been directed to how changes in high schools' organizational structures might affect the dynamic of equity in student learning--the ways that schooling outcomes reflect students' social background. This paper aims to identify organizational properties…

The call to restructure American education has captured the imagination of reformers across the country, yet it has not produced a coherent agenda for changing schools. This study investigates how the structure of secondary schools affects learning. Using a sample of 9,631 students in 789 U.S. high schools with 3 waves of data from the National…

In recent years, many schools have turned to Integrated Learning Systems (ILSs) to facilitate instruction and assist with raising state standardized test scores. Typically, these ILSs are utilized in a computer lab with students working individually on computer-based instructional lessons for an allotted time period. Using ILSs in this manner has…

A lesson plan for first-grade children beginning to learn English describes an activity using manipulatives and visual aids to develop recognition of three geometric shapes (circle, square, rectangle), their names, and a few additional words in English (e.g., "bag,""table,""door"). Students are grouped at tables of four to six and provided with…

Students in New Mexico may take either the American College Test Assessment (ACT) or the Scholastic Aptitude Test (SAT), although the ACT is most often used in New Mexico. Results from both examinations are presented in this report, based on those students who were expected to graduate in 1993 and who had expressed an interest in attending…

This paper presents examples from 10 internal consultancies provided by the author within the Open University (United Kingdom) that reveal how teams develop and are integrated into the systems of a complex institution. These consultancies included: providing consulting services to a course team; counseling with a course team chair; serving as a…

During the 1989-90 school year, Tennessee established Project Challenge in 17 of Tennessee's poor and educationally low-performing counties. The program applied the results of Project STAR, a longitudinal experiment causally linking class size to student achievement. This paper presents findings of a study that evaluated Project Challenge by…

In 1994-95, Chapter 1, a federally funded compensatory education program, provided funding to 33 elementary schools in the Austin Independent School District (AISD) (Texas) where there were high concentrations of low-income students. Service was provided through the following components: (1) Schoolwide Projects using resources for all students;…