Objectives: Working under the constraints of external accountability policy, public school principals are faced with challenges in prioritizing educational goals. Using the Schools and Staffing Survey (SASS) data sets, this study examined the nature and sources of changes in principals' educational goal priorities in the era of accountability,…

This study challenges prior evidence on the impact of Korea's high-stakes school accountability policy as a tool to improve overall achievement and close achievement gaps. Applying difference-in-differences method, the study compares Korean high school students' reading and math test score trends before and after the policy based on the National…

Drawing on national and state assessment datasets in reading and math, this study tested "external" versus "internal" standards-based education models. The goal was to understand whether and how student performance standards work in multilayered school systems under No Child Left Behind Act of 2001 (NCLB). Under the…

This study examines the efficacy and moderators of New York State interventions for schools in need of improvement under NCLB, including: (1) school transfer, (2) supplementary education service (3) corrective action, (4) planning for restructuring, and (5) restructuring. Despite the fact that schools in increasingly aggressive treatment groups…

The research report reviewed here concludes that many initially high-achieving students are falling further and further behind over the course of their years in school. The report intends to raise the alarm and to advocate for improved programs for these students. It is, however, a false alarm due to biased methodology and misleading arguments.…

This study tracks American states' policy choices under the No Child Left Behind Act and explores their consequences for student achievement. Using the path analysis of relationships among state-level policy input, context, and outcome variables, the study portrays a Halloween-like "trick-or-treating" game between the federal and state…

Given the policy imperative of using multiple measures for state education accountability under the No Child Left Behind Act (NCLB), this study examines similarities and discrepancies between the National Assessment of Educational Progress (NAEP) and the states' own math assessment results in Kentucky and Maine, with a focus on 3 major academic…

This study offers systematic trend analyses of NAEP national and state-level public school fourth and eighth graders' reading and math achievement results during pre-NCLB (1990-2001) and post-NCLB (2002-2005) periods. It compares post-NCLB trends in reading and math achievement with pre-NCLB trends among different racial and socioeconomic groups…

Education reform during the last 2 decades has been shaped by the forces of growing public distrust of educational bureaucracies in a climate of rapid political change and growing international competition in the context of a global economy. Major school reforms in four selected industrial countries that differ significantly in terms of…

States' policy approaches to accountability tend to divide between a primary emphasis on input guarantees and a primary emphasis on performance guarantees. In the midst of keen controversies about the impact of high-stakes testing under the No Child Left Behind Act, this article examines separate and joint effects of input-guarantee versus…