"Straight A's: Public Education Policy and Progress" is a biweekly newsletter that focuses on education news and events both in Washington, DC and around the country. The following articles are included in this issue: (1) NCLB Turns Five: Key Players in Reauthorization Process Celebrate Fifth Anniversary of Landmark Education Law, Begin…

In Russia as well as in foreign countries we can witness sort of the confusion of the terms of "media education" and "media literacy". There are quite a few differences in theoretical approaches to media education, to distinguishing of the most important aims, objectives, means of introduction into the teaching process, etc.…

Over the past few years, media use among children and teens has become more prevalent than ever. With the launch of the iPod, the explosion in instant messaging, the birth of mobile video and YouTube, and the advent of social networking sites like MySpace, young people are rarely out of contact, or out of reach of the media. Meanwhile,…

This study investigated how experiences in the family context contribute to the postsecondary educational attainment of Mexican American youth. The sample consisted of 104 recent high school graduates. One half of the sample was attending a 2-year college, and the other one half was not enrolled in any postsecondary institution. This study…

This paper describes how the patriarchal structure of Japanese society and its notions of women, femininity, and gendered stereotypes produced strong cultural barriers to increasing the participation of females in science education. Baseline data on attitudes toward science and the perceptions of gender issues in science education, academic major…

Background: The risk of sexually transmitted diseases is high but opportunities of sexual education for adolescents are limited in Turkey. The aim of this study was to evaluate sexual attitudes and behaviors and to determine the predictors of sexual initiation among adolescents. Methods: A questionnaire designed by the researchers was administered…

This study investigates 727 parents from China, Japan, and Korea by a self-devised scale and compares the differences in their expectation of early childhood education in cross-cultural backgrounds. The result shows that parents from the three countries have a positive attitude toward their children's development. The main effect of nations on…

Extending research on age norms in adults, the development of the knowledge of two components of the cultural concept of biography, biographical salience of and age norms for life events was studied from late childhood to early adulthood in Study 1 and across adulthood in Study 2. The largest increase in knowledge was found between ages 8 and 12,…

Over the last generation, the instructional staffing system in American higher education has experienced a significant reduction in the proportion of jobs for full-time tenured and tenure-track faculty members and a dramatic growth in fixed-term full- and part-time instructional jobs without tenure. About 70 percent of the people teaching in…

To help inform policymakers and the public about the progress of education in the United States, Congress has mandated that the National Center for Education Statistics (NCES) produce an annual report, "The Condition of Education." This year's report presents 42 indicators on important topics and trends in U.S. education. These…

Private schooling in the third world is on the increase and in particular in one of the low-income areas of India, where a data analysis on Hyderabad has been carried out. The University of Newcastle has conducted an initiative research in Hyderabad on the impact on pupils' progress in Reading and Spelling tests. This initiative was called…

This publication provides statistical data on enrollment, degrees conferred, faculty, and financing at West Virginia's 16 public colleges and universities. It also provides selected data for the 10 independent colleges and universities in the state. Chapter 1 provides headcount and full-time equivalent (FTE) enrollment data from 1985 through 1994,…

This study examined whether scripts provide a basis for the categories preschool children use to structure their semantic memories and whether the use of taxonomies to structure memory becomes more common only after children enter elementary school. Subjects were 108 children in three equal groups of 18 boys and 18 girls children each of 4-, 5-,…

This qualitative study examined the attitudes and interests of 284 gifted readers in grades 6, 7, and 8. Students were from a high socioeconomic status, suburban school district in the midwestern United States and were either identified as gifted or had a history of involvement in a program for the gifted. Data collection instruments included a…

The quality of the Annual Conference of the National Alliance of Black School Educators (NABSE) was evaluated through surveys of participants. Conference attendees' ratings of the presenters, the facility, and the inservice training was studied for subgroups based on position, gender, age, and experience. Four sets of data were collected relating…