This study assessed the ability of high school advanced placement history students to choose the essay topic on which they can get the highest score. A second, equally important, question was whether the score on the chosen topic was more highly related to other indicators of proficiency in history than the score on the unchosen topic. Overall,…

ASQ (Assessing School-Aged Child Care Quality) is a system for determining the quality of school-age child care programs. The ASQ Program Observation Instrument is a ten-step, self assessment process to guide program improvement. This instrument does not work well in full-day programs that have a single focus, but works well in programs that offer…

A Finnish study compared the career development, participation in vocational education, and working life 4 to 5 years after the completion of secondary school education of students with mild mental retardation (n=13) and students with other disabilities (n=72). Results found most of the subjects had completed their studies, however, only 25…

In this study, a programmatic decision-making framework called the consensus marker-outcome variable system (CMOVS) was developed as a result of a comprehensive "meta-review" and synthesis of research on variables considered by experts to be important to learning for all students, including those with special needs or those at risk of failing. The…

This study investigated the different characteristics of nine fourth-grade boys, three boys with attention deficit hyperactivity disorder (ADHD), three boys with giftedness, and three boys with ADHD and giftedness. Information reported by teachers, parents, and the children were analyzed using an embedded, multiple-case design, with constant…

A study was conducted to determine the extent to which public school teachers of kindergarten through grade 6 have experienced formal evaluations in their current school and the procedures employed in evaluating teacher performance. The nationally representative Survey on Teacher Performance Evaluations was administered to approximately 1,000…

The differences in academic performance among two levels of provisionally accepted (Learning Support) college students--System-placed (S) and Institutionally-placed (I)--and other students were investigated. Of 523 Learning Support students in a required reading course (RDG 099A), 402 students exited the course. Chi-square analyses and t-tests…

Classical test theory, item response theory, and generalizability theory all treat the abilities to be measured as continuous variables, and the items of a test as independent probes of underlying continua. These models are well-suited to measuring the broad, diffuse traits of traditional differential psychology, but not for measuring the outcomes…

The Annual Performance Report submitted by each state to the Office of Vocational and Adult Education was used to monitor what states have developed and how and to what extent states have implemented their accountability system. The following findings of this analysis are synthesized in this report: (1) 32 states require evaluation of all programs…

The first objective of a two-phase project was to clarify the policy rationale and intervention model for state-financed workplace-based retraining programs in terms of their two objectives of retaining jobs and preventing unemployment. The second objective was to develop: (1) an evaluation system for these programs that was composed of business…

One of the biggest problems students face in team projects is social loafing, a situation in which students may view team projects as a free ride. Social loafers let others do the work, knowing that the professor will only grade the completed project. This research examined the performance of students grading other student team members on a group…

This study took an in-depth, global look at the entirety of the teaching practices of six elementary school teachers in Canada who are known to be highly motivating instructors. The study investigated the interaction between teaching practices and the change in elementary-school student motivation. Three teachers were chosen for their reputation…

Using data from the 1996 National Household Education Survey (NHES:96), this issue brief looks at the involvement of nonresident fathers in terms of how such involvement affects student performance in grades K-12. In the NHES, resident parents reported on whether nonresident parents who had had contact with their children in the past year had…

This paper describes a small set of successful school-based clinics (SBCs) that provide primary health care services for the underserved and identifies factors contributing to their success. Six sites were selected on the basis of three general criteria: (1) direct involvement between the SBC and a federally-funded community health center (CHC);…

This paper reports on a study which was conducted to determine the impact of color on learning. The entire seventh-grade class from a Midwest junior high school was used in the study. Each student was randomly assigned into one of four treatment groups: (1) color-cued presentation, color-cued assessment; (2) color-cued presentation, black/white…