This is the full report. In 2019-2020, the program's third federally funded year, GEAR UP (Gaining Early Awareness and Readiness for Undergraduate Programs) Austin served a cohort of 8th grade students (n = 2,546) across 11 middle schools. Nearly all GEAR UP students received support services relevant to college preparation. Evaluation findings…

To combat educational and health disparities, out-of-school-time (OST) STEM enrichment programs provide services to underserved youth to encourage them to pursue college and health careers. This article describes a study conducted to determine if the Health Sciences and Technology Academy (HSTA) program participants who receive year-round…

Higher education institutions are in a great position to create authentic programming to support local underfunded or underperforming public school districts. This article gives an overview of an education outreach collaborative between a 4-year public university, local schools, and a community institution and highlights lessons learned from the…

Many adult English language learners (ELLs) aspire toward postsecondary educational programs but do not go on to obtain college credentials after beginning classes in Adult Basic Education (ABE) or community college English as a second or other language classes to prepare for college-level English. Understanding how adult ELLs experience learning…

In this study, the authors analyze the undergraduate economics coursework of U.S. college graduates who became pre-college classroom teachers. The results show that teachers successfully completed on average the equivalent of about half an economics course in their undergraduate coursework. About 6 in 10 teachers earned no course credits in…

Teachers in Nevada have faced the problem of providing consistent, effective literacy instruction to elementary students, which impacts overall student achievement; only 48.3% of students in Clark County, Nevada were proficient in English Language Arts (ELA) in the 2018-2019 school year. This problem was explored from a case study perspective…

Background: Women and under-represented minority (URM) students continue to be under-represented in STEM and earn the lowest proportion of undergraduate engineering degrees. We employed a mixed methods research approach grounded in social capital theory to investigate "when" they first consider pursuing engineering as a college degree…

Place-based initiatives, such as the federal Promise Neighborhoods grant, attempt to coordinate interventions, supports, and services with a myriad of organizations to targeted communities. Although Institutions of Higher Education (IHEs), inclusive of academic medical institutions, are among the most overall researched anchor institution,…

In November, amid a global pandemic and economic crisis, voters will choose the next president of the United States. Clearly, there will be no shortage of pressing issues to tackle within the first 100 days of the next administration. Addressing COVID-19 and the economy will certainly be top agenda items, but regardless of this election's outcome,…

The COVID-19 pandemic caused a rapid and unprecedented shift of widening participation and outreach activities to online and remote delivery. The impact of this went beyond practitioners and the university sector; positive and negative implications are felt by stakeholders and the broader community. This shift online is discussed through the lens…

English learners (ELs) constitute a large--and growing--share of the student body in the United States. Data from the U.S. Census Bureau indicate that nearly one-quarter of U.S. children speak a language other than English at home. Furthermore, one-third of children under age 8 have at least one parent who speaks a non-English language--these…

The rising percentage of nonwhite students in the U.S. public school system accompanied by persistent educational debt and racial inequities presents an opportunity gap for many marginalized students. Scholars suggest that teaching ethnic studies curriculum with critical race pedagogy can help address the opportunity gap. Ethnic Studies centers on…

Education leaders in Virginia use early access to Algebra I as one method to provide students more time to take college preparatory courses in high school, thereby increasing students' likelihood of graduating prepared for college and careers. Yet, little data are available for these leaders to examine whether their approach is warranted. Members…

This document provides the two appendixes that accompany the full report, "Algebra I and College Preparatory Diploma Outcomes among Virginia Students Who Completed Algebra I in Grades 7-9." Appendix A, "Methods," details the data sources, study population, and analysis methods used in the study. Appendix B, "Supporting…

Education leaders in Virginia use early access to Algebra I as one method to increase students' likelihood of graduating from high school prepared for college and careers. This study used administrative data to calculate descriptive statistics on Algebra I outcomes and attainment of college preparatory diplomas among students by their grade 5 math…