This 50-state survey of state policies and initiatives related to mathematics and science education is part of a larger study analyzing the impact of state policies in these states on science instruction in school districts. The purpose of this survey was to identify current state initiatives and policies affecting science and mathematics…

This report examines the effectiveness of employment and training programs in Minnesota and discusses the impact of the 1985 Jobs Bill state legislation. Chapter 1 provides an introduction to Minnesota's programs and to studies of employment and training programs conducted nationwide. Chapter 2 studies the use of Job Training Partnership Act funds…

This booklet was created to help communities (especially in Minnesota) to build community partnerships through community education. Such partnerships are needed in order to identify and meet community needs that are no longer being addressed by the Federal Government. The booklet is organized in three sections. The first section outlines the need…

This paper describes the programs to be undertaken in the State of California for fiscal years 1989-1993 pursuant to the Library Services and Construction Act (LSCA). Introductory materials review the LSCA, the State Advisory Council on Libraries, the state's growth and development, a Legislative Statement of Intent, and the State Library's…

Designed to assist Missouri citizens in understanding the role played by the Missouri Coordinating Board for Higher Education, this guide begins by noting that the board performs four major functions: (1) statewide planning; (2) policy analysis; (3) academic program approval and review; and (4) budget recommendations to the Governor and General…

The general purpose of the Arizona career ladder pilot project is to establish a social intervention program which will result in improvement of the professional development and effectiveness of teachers and enhance student learning. This document is a comprehensive report to the Arizona state legislature on the development and progress to date of…

The use of confirmatory factor analytic procedures to examine the dimensionality of writing skills as measured by a large-scale direct writing test was illustrated. Internal construct validity evidence about the nature of writing skills measured by the test was provided. Data used were scores assigned by about 100 trained professional raters on a…

The necessity of controlling the order in which trained essay raters for a statewide writing assessment program receive student essays was studied. The underlying theoretical question concerns possible rater bias caused by raters reading long strings of essays of homogeneous quality; this problem is usually referred to as context effect or…

This book contains the results of the 1987 statewide survey on public involvement in South Carolina's education system. It is designed to serve as a resource directory and provides information that interested persons can use to expand partnerships between schools and the public that they serve. Survey results are catalogued in this directory…

This report presents the Austin (Texas) Independent School District's 1985 test results on the Texas Assessment of Basic Skills (TABS). It was administered to all third, fifth, and ninth grade students and to high school students not meeting ninth grade state-set mastery criteria, the minimum competency requirement for graduation. Results are…

These proceedings of a national Australian conference deal with many aspects of educating gifted and talented students and contain an opening address by I. Mathieson concerning the philosophy of the Queensland (Australia) State Education Department and a statement by James Gallagher, President of the World Council for Gifted and Talented Children.…

The purpose of this report is to summarize what is known about performance-based pay for teachers in a form useful to state educational policymakers. Section 1 reviews the experience of local education agencies with various forms of merit pay, contending that experience with and evaluations of these merit plans serve as "natural experiments" that…

One of a series of studies examining Louisiana's compensatory education program, this study investigated four assumptions upon which a skill-specific intervention program was based. Framed as questions, these assumptions are: (1) Is retention effective for students who do not know basic content for a given grade level? (2) When is retention most…

Approximately 60,000 Delaware public school students in grades 1 through 8 and in grade 11 were administered a battery of achievement tests as part of the state-funded Delaware Educational Assessment Program (DEAP) in 1986. This was the second administration of the Comprehensive Tests of Basic Skills (CTBS), in reading, language arts, and…

Compliance with South Carolina's Basic Skills Assessment Program (BSAP), involving test administration and instructional monitoring, was on schedule for the 1983-84 school year. Results of readiness tests given to over 50,000 first graders showed 72.6% "ready" to begin formal instruction. Teachers were given materials for areas in which…