In 2004, the University of Kansas (KU) launched an interdisciplinary Graduate Writing Program as part of a larger initiative to reduce time to degree rates and increase degree completion rates. Serving both domestic and international students, this program employs a rhetorical genre-based approach in a series of courses organized around the genres…

The researcher for this evaluative study investigated the efficacy and impact of the iStartSmart college success course by examining the first-term retention, fall-to-fall persistence, and three-year completion rates of community college students who enrolled in the one- or three-credit course at a community college in Arizona and the rates of…

Birmingham City University's Library and Learning Resources' strategic aim is to improve student satisfaction. A key element is the achievement of the Customer Excellence Standard. An important component of the standard is the mapping of services to improve quality. Library and Learning Resources has developed a methodology to map these…

The foundation year and specialization year of study are the accepted framework for graduate social work education. A common belief among educators is that accreditation standards are prescriptive by design, resulting in a rigidity that neither encourages nor supports curricular innovation. This article outlines a newly developed curriculum model…

Although studies of districts' and schools' use of research exist, little is known about how SEAs search for, select, and use research and other kinds of evidence in their school improvement strategies. While one might assume similarities in research use behaviors, both the organizational structures of SEAs and the population of external…

The authors summarize the special section in the journal of Counselor Education and Supervision (Vol. 45, No. 4, June 2006) on school counseling supervision and present implications to guide the practice of school counselor supervision. The implications for practice, training, research, and professional standards for school counselors are…

University-based teacher education programs and all of their components, including the content disciplines such as mathematics and science, are undergoing an unprecedented degree of scrutiny and challenge. Today, the entire concept of university-based teacher preparation is being questioned, mostly by critics outside the academy, and it is no…

"The Electric Company" ("TEC") television show won the hearts of children because it made learning fun. Thirty years later, the iconic show has returned with the goal of not only teaching literacy, but also numeracy (the ability to work with and understand numbers) and mathematics vocabulary in a fun, entertaining, and engaging…

The Texas Education Agency (TEA) and the Southern Regional Education Board (SREB) joined hands in 2005 to enhance dramatically implementation of the "High Schools That Work" ("HSTW") improvement design in the state. Between 2005 and 2010, nearly 50 high schools in five cohorts joined the Texas Enhanced "HSTW" Network…

The University of Southern Queensland's Centre for Further Education and Training, which offers distance teaching and training courses to a wide range of mature students, developed a quality assurance framework to guide its efforts to improve the quality of its distance courses for teachers and trainers with little or no training in educational…

A study summarized the activities of two advisory bodies--the Program Advisory Committees (PACs) and Trade Advisory Boards (TABs)--at Saskatchewan Institute of Applied Science and Technology (SIAST). Minutes from all meetings were collected, reviewed, and analyzed according to the main areas of concern for the advisory committees:…

In 1992, a nationwide poll of active forensics programs concluded with an open ended question of how to increase participation in NDT (National Debate Tournament) debate that yielded four goals. The first goal, re-emphasizing communication skills, arose because NDT has emphasized rapid delivery above all else. NDT needs to be more entertaining to…

This paper argues that parliamentary debate provides a meaningful alternative for programs looking to offer debate components in their mission. The most important assumption in the paper is that comprehensive programs are valuable educational laboratories and require debate activities as part of their comprehensiveness; in fact, the comprehensive…

The Job Training Reform Act Amendments were introduced in the House of Representatives to amend the Job Training Partnership Act (JTPA) to improve the delivery of services to hard-to-serve youth and adults and for other purposes. This report summarizes this proposed legislation, which was recommended for passage by the Committee on Education and…

This ERIC Digest provides basic information about school-age day care programs. Discussion focuses briefly on options available to families with school-age children, developmental needs of school-age children, characteristics of high quality school-age programs, supportive services for self-care, and ways of improving school-age child care…