Middle school girls who are at risk have experienced a disproportionate number of intense and disruptive traumatic life events. Such events can adversely affect healthy development and often contribute to higher levels of school failure and problem behavior. Few programs focus on helping at-risk middle school girls achieve school success through…

A major concern in the public schools is the low academic achievement of African American males. This mixed methods study examined the classroom experiences of African American male students in an alternative program. The dual purpose was to investigate the teachers' perceptions and their ability to provide best learning environments for…

The purpose of the evaluation was to evaluate two alternative programs in a North Carolina (NC) and South Carolina (SC) public school district to determine if they are effective in delivering constructive interventions that modify student behavior once students have left the programs and have returned to their regular learning environments. This…

The purpose of this interpretive case study was to examine the assumptions underpinning one alternative education program, Dream House, to understand how the designers of this program believed they could increase educational opportunity for at-risk youth. A second purpose was to see how this approach played out in the lived experiences of the…

As many young adults continue to disengage with learning each day, teachers and administrators struggle to find programming that re-engages secondary students with their schooling and communities. This book profiles one program that succeeds in doing so, and should serve as a model for others. In a Midwestern alternative school, three teachers…

A system of qualification options has evolved that is complementary to company-based and school-based vocational training. Thus far, these alternatives have been largely disregarded by vocational education research. Yet with respect to the number of annual entries, those alternatives are currently nearly as significant as conventional vocational…

Learning communities are designed to increase student persistence and academic achievement and are a retention strategy to increase these outcomes for 1st-year college students. This article examines the educational outcomes for a learning community specifically designed for nontraditional Latina(o) students enrolled in a grant-funded program to…

As a unique academic offering, the nontraditional, distance-delivered doctorate poses particular issues for faculty members who choose to teach in such a program. Among these issues are compensation, administrative support, technology, innovation, time demands, workload, and promotion and tenure. In this chapter, the authors identify and provide…

The State Compensatory Education (SCE) program is designed to reduce dropout rates and increase academic performance of students identified as being at-risk of dropping out of school. SCE operates as a funding source to supplement instructional services and offer academic support to students who meet the SCE at-risk criteria established by the…

This paper examines how two sites of adult learning in the food movement create educational alternatives to the dominant U.S. food system. It further examines how these pedagogies challenge racialised, classed and gendered ideologies and practices in their aims, curricular content, and publically documented educational processes. The first case is…

The "Code of Virginia" (Section 22.1-279.3:1) requires school divisions statewide to submit data to the Virginia Department of Education (VDOE) on incidents of discipline, crime, and violence (DCV). School divisions began reporting such data in 1991. This annual report focuses primarily on DCV data submitted for school year 2010-2011,…

This case was developed as part of a doctoral course for educational administration students who were specializing in K-12 educational administration. It could be used in a leadership, special education, or policy course for future school leaders or teachers. Currently, most educational institutions use Carnegie Units to structure how students…

This article is an autoenthnographic account of the yearlong journey of two undergraduates and their instructor when the traditional classroom structures associated with the banking concept of education were altered in an upper division class and follow-on research experiences. These changes focused on foregrounding students' experiences of the…

Youth at risk for school failure need community and school supports to reduce the likelihood of developing delinquent behavior. This article provides an overview of community and school approaches aimed at intervening on the school-to-prison pipeline. Community and school efforts are emerging that take into account empirical evidence demonstrating…

Higher education institutions are in the battle of a lifetime as they are coping with political and economic uncertainties, threats to federal aid, declining state support, higher tuition rates and increased competition from for-profit institutions. Amid all these challenges, these institutions are pressed to keep up with technological demands,…