In this study, we tested the outcomes of access to a Response to Intervention (RtI) model in kindergarten or in first grade on end-of-Grade-2 reading achievement and placement in special education. Across five schools, 214 students who began having access to Tier 2 intervention in kindergarten or first grade were compared in Grades 1 and 2 with…

In this evaluation, as in previous years, four main aspects of the implementation of the West Virginia Board of Education's Master Plan for Statewide Professional Development were examined: (a) basic information reported by providers about the size and scope of the effort, including attendance, and adherence to the newly adopted standards for…

We tested the effects of teaching reading skills through U.S. history content for 38 eighth-grade poor readers whose reading ability ranged from second-to fourth-grade levels. Half of the students received special education services, and half of the students were English language learners. Students were taught to decode multisyllabic words, learn…

This article describes how a research-practice partnership has informed the iterative development of a web-mediated early childhood language and literacy professional development (PD) intervention. Funded through the Investing in Innovation (i3) program, this new PD model is based on an effective in-situ intervention. As we translated the…

In a 2012 paper for the Center for American Progress, "The State of Evaluation Reform," Patrick McGuinn (Drew University) identified the opportunities and challenges facing education agencies in Race to the Top (RTTT) grant-winning states as they prepared for the implementation of new teacher evaluation systems. The 2012 study undertook…

Input and output models of policy implementation have failed to address the complexity of implementing policies. Prior studies reveal that policies are never equivalent across contexts. Instead, they are filtered as they travel from the macro-level to the micro-level of policy implementation. This understanding provides a framework for examining…

Districts and schools are constantly trying to find ways to increase student achievement. Research has shown a significant correlation between principal leadership skills and increased student achievement. Research has also shown a correlation between fidelity of implementation of new innovations and positive outcomes. This purpose of this study…

The purpose of this study was to explore whether William Deming's 8 Step Model would increase reading achievement in 3rd grade students. The study investigated how well the process based plan-do-check-act model when used as a treatment with fidelity, coupled with the principal as instructional leader would result in success in the age of federal…

Human factors (HF) is a discipline often drawn upon when there is a need to train people to perform complex, high-stakes tasks and effectively assess their performance. Complex tasks often present unique challenges for training and assessment. HF has developed specialized techniques that have been effective in overcoming several of these…

This study estimates the effect of one year of Fusion Reading implementation, a multistrategy intervention, builds on the work of the Strategic Instruction Model's Learning Strategies Curriculum and Xtreme Reading by integrating some of the same strategies (e.g., paraphrasing, visual imagery, and self-questioning for information acquisition;…

This dissertation was a single case study with Green Dot Public Schools (GDPS) describing their rapid scale-up process. Specifically, it investigates the phenomenon of the inherent tension between maintaining the fidelity of the original model school's design, culture and values with local adaptation of the brand by stakeholders at the expansion…

Increasingly across the United States, institutions of higher education (IHE) are offering a wide array of postsecondary educational (PSE) opportunities for students with intellectual disabilities (ID). As more students with ID aspire to college, it is incumbent upon IHEs to engage in rigorous program evaluation to assess student outcomes and…

This single subject design study (ABAB) investigated the effects of using iPads[R] in a classwide academic intervention to increase independent task completion and basic math skills of seven students diagnosed with autism spectrum disorders (ASD) enrolled in a special education school for students with moderate to severe disabilities. An…

Paraprofessionals are widely employed in response to intervention (RTI) settings to provide instruction to students at-risk for reading disabilities. However, little research has addressed effective and efficient ways to train these paraprofessionals to deliver instruction with high fidelity. In addition, given the limited time and finances…

The purpose of this article is to synthesize the available studies regarding responsive interaction intervention (RII) for children with or at risk for developmental delays with a focus on six dimensions: (a) the characteristics of participants, (b) the features of RII, (c) the measurement of treatment fidelity, (d) the overall effectiveness of…