This guide, second in a series of four volumes, offers a method of surveying parents' attitudes about choosing schools for their children and provides a survey instrument used over a period of 5 years in four Massachusetts urban school districts. Section 1 introduces the basic research questions pursued in the survey. Section 2, "The Parent…

A telephone survey was conducted at John Tyler Community College (JTCC) to determine the initial goals, reasons for leaving, current activities, plans, and characteristics of students who left the college after one or more quarters of attendance. Telephone calls were made to all 103 full-time students and a 17% sample of the part-time students…

The principal purpose of this project was to find what, if any, early indicators exist to identify incoming students whose academic performance in high school would be high. The corollary objective was to consider what types of intervention strategies might be designed to assure that students so identified would fulfill their early promise. An…

This is an evaluation of the Parent Orientation Program. It was designed to: improve parental knowledge about school reading and mathematics requirements for their children; improve the performance of the parents in reading and mathematics through the evening adult program; and provide parents with school information via family workers. The…

A linear program model designed to aid in site selection and the development of pupil assignment plans is illustrated in terms of a hypothetical school system. The model is designed to provide the best possible realization of any single stated objective (for example, "Minimize the distance that pupils must travel") given any number of specified…

Attrition/retention of two cohorts of first-time, full-time degree students enrolled at the State University of New York was studied. Attrition is defined as the failure to achieve some goal or objective. Students enrolling in bachelor degree programs and in two-year degree programs in the fall of 1971 and 1972 were studied. Information on the…

The 12 items in this annotated bibliography on absenteeism are entries in the ERIC system. The publications cited focus on attendance policies and techniques for reducing truancy. The techniques mentioned include alternative individualized programs, punishments (such as lowered grades) for absences, and rewards (such as parties or higher grades)…

In order to examine the effectiveness of a token economy program, sheltered workshop attendance of chronic schizophrenics was investigated under the following conditions: response cost versus no response cost consequences for nonattendance; response cost and noncontingent token payment; and restricted versus unrestricted mobility during the no…

This paper develops and estimates a model of college attendance that focuses on the influences of public policy and of economic environment. The Policy instruments examined are tuition, admissions requirements, college locations, breadth of curriculum, draft deferments, and class integration of neighborhoods. The aspects of the economic…

Excessive absenteeism is a complex and continuing secondary school problem with personal, institutional, economic, and social causes. Issues of excused or unexcused absences and age of majority are complex and largely ignored by research. Research indicates absenteeism is positively correlated with the second semester, boys, older students,…

A series of considerations intended to improve the level of information transfer and dissemination in conferences and intercampus meetings are described. Included are suggestions for (1) setting agendas, (2) maximizing training effect, (3) taking best advantage of typical attendance patterns of participants, (4) presenting information for more…

Poor attendance in foreign language classes is presented as an indicator of poor performance. (HP)

Three consequences of class size variation are examined: (1) The average class size experienced by students is directly related to the amount of variation in class size; (2) Overall student attendance is inversely related to the amount of variation in class size; and (3) overall student participation time is directly related to the amount of…

Reports on three efforts to reduce class absenteeism through telephone calls to randomly selected students to express concern that they study and attend class; professor-initiated brief interpersonal contacts with randomly selected students; and a grading policy rewarding attendance, punishing absenteeism and using a combination of the two. (DMM)

Reports on a two-year study of magnet schools evaluating educational quality and desegregation. Findings show that magnet schools can improve the quality of education in urban school districts. (MD)