As one of the federally-funded regional educational laboratories, the Appalachia Educational Laboratory (AEL) is committed to assessing the impact of its products and services on a variety of client subgroups. These include educators and administrators at the elementary, secondary, and higher levels. To address the issue of measuring impact, the…

This final report describes activities and accomplishments of the California PEERS (Providing Education for Everyone in Regular Schools) Outreach Project, a cooperative effort of the California Department of Education, California State University at Hayward, and eight school districts. The project focused on increasing the capacity of the…

Students and Teachers Achieving Results (STAR) is a student-centered learning project developed by Long Beach City College, in California, to increase the success and retention rates of underrepresented students. Through STAR, students are provided with a program of linked courses that develop communication skills, utilize interdisciplinary…

This report discusses a 2-year evaluation of the California Early Childhood Mentor Teacher Program (CECMTP), in which experienced child care teachers serve as mentors, using their classroom as a practicum environment to train student teachers. The evaluation assessed the extent to which CECMTP goals were met by answering the following three…

This guide, which was adapted from a 1987 evaluation guide for bilingual vocational training, is intended for directors, staff, and evaluators of local adult and vocational education programs. It presents an overall framework that program staff and evaluators can use to help establish the scope of their evaluations and meet their local evaluation…

Based on a general guide for conducting program evaluations developed by Quebec's Commission d'evaluation de l'enseignement collegial, this two-part report provides guidelines for evaluating programs of studies leading to an Attestation of College Studies (AEC) certificate in the areas of Business Administration Technology (BAT) and Cooperation.…

Keeping schools open longer--before and after school, and during the summer--can turn schools into "Community Learning Centers." By keeping school doors open during nontraditional school hours, the school provides students, parents, and the community with access to valuable educational resources. This guidebook outlines the steps needed…

This paper discusses issues surrounding the use of licensure examination results as measures of outcome in institutions of higher education. Based on informal telephone surveys of several state university systems, and on information obtained from national certification organizations, faculty experts, reviews of the literature, and the experience…

This report is the culmination of a process that began in 1994, at a planning meeting to determine whether there was a sufficient knowledge base to inform the development of a research agenda on the education of language minority children. A committee was established to review what is known about the linguistic, cognitive, and social processes…

In 1992 and 1995, Iowa received statewide Star Schools grants to demonstrate the use of fiber-optic technology to provide live, two-way, full-motion interactive instruction which allows greater levels of interactivity than previous forms of distance instruction. The grant allowed the state to equip over 100 fully interactive video classrooms in…

To evaluate the implementation of the Bilingual Education and English as a Second Language (ESL) programs, the Houston Independent School District (Texas) studied the participation and academic achievement of limited English proficient (LEP) students who participated in these programs in the 1995-96 school year. The Fall 1995 database reported…

This report details results of the 1995-96 study of the Kentucky Education Reform Act (KERA) Preschool Programs, the fifth such evaluation of the state-mandated preschool programs of at-risk 4-year-old children and 3- and 4-year-olds with disabilities. Following an executive summary and explanation of the methodology for the evaluation, this…

Designed to assist local school districts, this manual provides guidelines for the development of local plans for the education of academically or intellectually gifted students in North Carolina. In 1996, the General Assembly in North Carolina passed legislation removing gifted education from the law governing children with special needs and…

Transition projects have emerged to address Head Start fade-out effects, that is, the disappearance of gains made by Head Start program children by the third grade. The Nebraska Transition Project is one of 31 across the United States providing Head Start-like services to families with children in public elementary school, kindergarten through…

Because computers fascinate young learners, they can be powerful teaching tools. Drawing on research conducted simultaneously by researchers in France, Spain, and the United States, this book shows how to use technology--specifically a word processor with voice synthesizer--to build literacy and encourage learning in elementary school students.…