This study was designed to examine relationships between student perceptions of school effectiveness and student achievement in mathematics and reading. Data were collected from over 350 middle school students in a large southeastern school district in the United States. The results revealed statistically significant correlations among the…

In the United States, the number of English Language Learners (ELLs) has steadily grown over the past decades. In the State of Delaware, the growth has been exponential. ELLs' academic underachievement in reading and math has remained a challenge for K-12 educational institutions. It has continued to be necessary to research the causes and…

Decreasing funding for staff and increasing expectations for teachers place additional pressure on schools to hire and retain the highest quality teachers. Recent studies have identified effective strategies for teaching, but little research has been conducted to identify those innate characteristics or talents unique to effective teachers. The…

This case study retrospectively reflects on a self-contained teacher's decision to pair publisher-created adapted text with audio support as part of a multicomponent reading intervention. She evolved from creating her own adapted text to implementing publisher-created adapted text throughout a school year. The study analyzed students' reading…

This paper is the first to examine the longitudinal results of six years of implementation of Literacy Squared, a biliteracy model for Spanish/English speaking emerging bilingual students. This model includes paired literacy instruction with grade-specific time allocations for Spanish literacy and literacy-based ELD. Furthermore, cross-language…

Purpose: Scholars who advocate for equity-oriented educational practices have argued that the accountability era in the USA, now in place for two decades, has failed in its intended goal to improve student performance for traditionally marginalized student populations. This study aims to use a sociocultural lens to trace how a century-old…

We used survey and administrative data from Washington State to assess the degree to which special education teacher preparation, district literacy instructional practices, and the alignment between preparation and practice were associated with the reading test score gains of students with high-incidence disabilities taught by early-career special…

What does it take to create a statewide ecosystem to support Black student success? Our 2021 case study explores the Black Student Success Initiative at the Oregon Community Foundation. The initiative uses a community-led and trust-based approach to attract funding partners, establish a grantee network, and serve as a driver for systemic change in…

An achievement gap has persisted in elementary schools between Black and White students and Black students and Hispanic students in reading and math (NAEP, 2019). Nieto and Bode (2018) suggested that gaps in educational resources, learning opportunities, and educator expectations influence the achievement gap between Black students from low…

Background: Over the years, the quantity and quality of educational research has been rapidly improving. This can be attributed to the growing call to use evidence of effectiveness in decision-making by policymakers and practitioners. In fact, evidence sufficient to establish programs as "small", "moderate", or…

Students look to their school library to find new books, seek information, creatively solve problems, and use technology. School libraries play an essential role in students' academic growth and development of lifelong learning skills. All of the wonderful resources and services that school libraries provide are easily accessible to the population…

This article examines the relationship between housing, a critical aspect of socio-economic conditions, and literacy achievement of children from a school in a high density suburb in South Africa. Data was collected through a quantitative survey that was administered to learners (N = 160) from four Grade Five classes. The survey included five…

Background: Research has shown that reading motivation is correlated with achievement. Studying motivation in older students is particularly important as reading motivation declines over the course of elementary and middle school. However, current research largely fails to reflect the nuance and complexity of reading motivation, or its variation…

This narrative review discusses quantitative indices measuring differences between alphabetic languages that are related to the process of word recognition. The specific orthography that a child is acquiring has been identified as a central element influencing reading acquisition and dyslexia. However, the development of reliable metrics to…

Nonmainstream American English, or dialect, among children may have important implications for reading research and practice. However, much of the research involving relations between dialect and literacy has analyzed dialect use in only one context and has omitted students with speech, language, and learning disabilities. Consequently, we…