To improve the responsiveness of educational programs to the needs of low achieving, at risk students, Research for Better Schools (RBS) has developed an assessment procedure. This document is the portion of that procedure that addresses the involvement of students in their learning, or how low achieving students cognitively operate on content.…

A study was conducted to determine the effectiveness of a 10-week, after school reading program developed to motivate reluctant readers through reading aloud to them and through giving them books to read. Appropriate paperback books were read aloud to unmotivated readers in grades 3 and 4 for about 10 minutes or until a particularly exciting part…

In an initial section, this paper presents a review of the literature and discusses the hypothesized relationship between self-efficacy, (defined as personal judgments of how well one can organize and implement behaviors in situations that may contain novel, unpredictable and possibly stressful elements) and achievement behavior. Source of…

In the summer of 1984, the Pennsylvania Department of Education conducted a survey of promotion policies and practices in Pennsylvania schools in response to a request for information from the State Board of Education. This document presents the major findings from the analysis of data from the 423 school districts that completed the survey. A…

Changes in students' perceptions of success and failure as they progressed through a diploma hospital nursing program were studied, in a replication of a study by Davidhizar. Weiner's attribution theory was also assessed to determine students views of the following explanations of success: effort, ability, task ease, or luck. Effort was cited as…

First-year higher education students' approaches to learning navigation were assessed. The research used a structured questionnaire to assess deep, surface, and strategic approaches to learning. Principal Components Analysis (PCA) of 13 sub-scales revealed that students learning navigation employed two main approaches, a deep-strategic approach…

This paper describes the data gathered as part of the School District of Philadelphia/Federal Reserve Bank Cooperative Study of Successful Practices in the Teaching of Reading. The data base includes information about 25 schools, 25 principals, 25 reading teachers, 94 classroom teachers, 68 reading aides, and 1,828 fourth-grade students. The…

A study was conducted to determine why so few women applicants were admitted to apprenticeships, what the differences were between the successful and unsuccessful applicants, and what programs and services were needed to insure the success of both applicants and apprentices. In order to identify the major problem areas, 110 questionnaires were…

This booklet is an annotated bibliography of recent work about the reading performance of Black-English-speaking children. The first half of the book lists materials according to the factors that influence the reading performance of black children: dialect interference, intellectual ability, environment, perceptual deficiencies, self-concept,…

The purpose of this study is to demonstrate that the disproportionate number of poor, minority, and working class students represented among the population of "school dropouts" are, objectively, the victims of an institutional syndrome of systematic exclusion referred to as "the student pushout" phenomenon. Cincinnati's junior…

Using the theory of correspondence and contradiction, the author analyzes the interaction between socioeconomic and educational changes in Ethiopia from 1942 to 1974. An introductory section sets forth the principles of correspondence and contradiction, which refer to how the means of economic production determine conditions in the noneconomic…

Research findings concerning the relationship of grade retention to the self-concepts and academic achievement of middle and junior high school students, and to school promotion standards are examined. The few studies conducted in this area of research seem to indicate that (1) failure to be promoted to a higher grade is related to children's…

The pattern of changes in locus of control for college persisters and dropouts were examined over a three-year period, and differences between males and females were considered. Data on 6,608 students enrolled in four-year U.S. colleges were collected in 1973, 1974, and 1975. A repeated measures analysis of locus of control composite scores…

An examination of the grading policies at the 29 Michigan community colleges is presented. Six major classifications cover all grades given at the colleges: main grading system, pass-fail grades, withdrawal grades, incomplete grades, and audit options. The most common grade policy, used by 24 of the colleges, is the five grade system assigning…

This summary report, one of a series of documents on the evaluation of the University of Western Ontario Preschool Project, reviews studies (conducted as part of the project) of preschool children to determine why disadvantaged children fail in school and to discover if compensatory education activates and maintains the children's cognitive…