In this brief, the authors review some of the main goals of state student financial aid programs and provide a few examples of how these programs are organized. They also describe how state programs vary in terms of who benefits. They then discuss various possible designs for joint federal-state policymaking in this area and study their impact.…

This case study focuses on a 2008 incident where Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) vans appeared near a K-5 elementary school. It was the first time school personnel experienced the impact of federal immigration agents policing illegality in their school community, and the event set off a chain of decision-making choices as to how…

In mainland China, most ethnic minority students today face the challenge of learning three languages in schools, namely, their home language (L1), Mandarin Chinese (L2) and a foreign language, usually English (L3). Research into trilingual education for minority groups has been most active since the turn of the twenty-first century. This paper…

In 2002, the National Research Center for Career and Technical Education (NRCCTE) published "New Designs for Career and Technical Education at the Secondary and Postsecondary Levels," in which Copa and Wolff (2002) proposed that the mission of Career and Technical Education (CTE) is "to serve individuals and the nation through…

The Council on Social Work Education (CSWE) Annual Report covers highlights of the organization's activities for a complete fiscal year. The report serves to inform members and the public regarding important initiatives, program updates, and other news of the year just completed. This report contains information on: (1) centers and initiatives;…

Persistently low-performing schools have been repeatedly targeted for comprehensive reform for more than two decades, usually with poor results. These efforts have suffered, however, because they were often poorly implemented or insufficiently grounded in rigorous research. The Every Student Succeeds Act (ESSA), enacted in 2015, provides a…

This Model State Policy Agenda aims to provide National College Access Network (NCAN) members and partners, particularly those in networks or coalitions, with a guide to develop their own policy goals. This publication discusses affordability of higher education and talent development of students.

A systematic review was conducted to synthesize the evidence related to the effectiveness of baby sign language for children with typical development. This response to a Commentary on the review stresses that the primary purpose of the review was to assist caregivers and policy makers with informed decision-making related to the benefits of the…

Researchers have noted with concern the often weak link between research evidence and policymaking, particularly in some areas such as education. In this introductory essay--dedicated to the late Carol Weiss--we consider this issue first by reflecting on how changing historical conditions can shape institutional demands on and for research…

This paper proposes a new perspective for higher education policy research. It introduces the concept of "policy object" to designate the discrete preoccupation(s) of a policy text (e.g. a new governance regime, a quality system, or new degrees) and suggests that actor conceptualisations of the policy object intersect with other elements…

The emergence and development of quality assurance schemes in European countries over the last 15-20 years has inspired many national case studies of the systems and procedures adopted. The methods, contexts, and procedures associated with this policy change are diverse. But although individual countries have set about changing policy in different…

Recently, critical policy scholars have used the concepts of enactment, context and performativity as an analytic toolkit to illuminate the complex processes of the policy cycle, in particular, the ways in which a multitude of official education reform policies are taken up, challenged and/or resisted by actors in local, situation-specific…

Working from practice experiences, Social Work educators from Aotearoa/New Zealand, Norway and Western Australia have developed a framework for child welfare work . The framework brings together the Rights of the Child, Community Development and Child Protection. This article describes the principles and theoretical underpinnings of this…

In terms of the number of students served and the overall quality of special education services provided, it is clear that special education has, from its early beginnings in the late seventeenth century, advanced at various rates in the different countries of the world. Data from the United States Department of Education (2007) indicates that 12%…

Just as genes propagate themselves in the gene pool by leaping from body to body, so memes (ideas, behaviours, and actions) transmit cultural ideas or practices from one mind to another through writing, speech, or other imitable phenomena. This paper considers the memes that influence the evolution of open and distance education. If the…