In Georgia, the recent "Protect Students First Act," or GA HB 1084, states that curricula and training programs should refrain from judging others based on race or advocate for divisive concepts such as "One race is inherently superior to another race," or that "the United States of America is fundamentally racist."…

Gerrymandering, or more broadly legislative redistricting, is almost unique as a focus of geographic inquiry in that a typical young adult will (a) know what it is, (b) recognize it as geography, and (c) think it is important. These qualities make redistricting an excellent choice for drawing students into the discipline of geography while…

Statistics & data science are growing, rapidly evolving, and increasingly important for an informed citizenry in a data-saturated world. In this dissertation, I address two central questions: (1) who is taking statistics? and (2) what are statistics courses teaching? I estimate that 920,000 US students take statistics in high school each year,…

Talking about race does not have to be incredibly awkward. In this book, Gooding offers twelve clear, cogent, and concise racial rubrics to help users of mainstream media more readily discern patterns hidden in plain sight. The text primarily leverages popular movies as the medium of analysis--since they are unparalleled in their cultural…

This paper estimates the causal effects of enrollment in one of five oversubscribed high-quality Los Angeles charter schools using a lottery design. Enrolling in a charter school increased eleventh-grade standardized test scores and enrollment and persistence in four-year colleges substantially, but had no effect on high school GPA. Charter…

Dual enrollment refers to any broad array of programs and opportunities that allow high school students to enroll in and take college courses. This includes programs in which students are enrolled in a dual enrollment course through a partnership agreement with their local school system and thereby receive both high school and college credit. Dual…

Escape rooms are collaborative puzzle solving activities that require the participants to utilize logical reasoning and teamwork. With a slight refocusing on previously acquired knowledge, escape rooms can also be used to test and promote learning of certain topics. This paper describes the development of a one-hour in-person STEM focused escape…

Background/Context: To stimulate national and regional economic growth, policymakers and businesses have expressed great interest in growing the supply of workers with skills in science, technology, engineering, and math (STEM). A key link in this pipeline is high school, where learning experience plays a critical role in shaping student's…

This study sought student voices to examine the key characteristics of an out-of-school learning experience, designed to provide enrichment to students with above grade level academic talent. Using open-ended questions on a program evaluation survey, the study gauged the perceptions of 205 students who partook in a university-based academic summer…

Background: Data visualizations transform data into visual representations such as graphs, diagrams, charts and so forth, and enable inquiries and decision-making in many professional fields, as well as in public and economic areas. How students' data visualization literacy (DVL), including constructing, comprehending, and utilizing adequate data…

This study utilized the SEC (Survey of Enacted Curriculum) method to examine the alignment between Chinese high school chemistry curriculum standards (HSCCS) and the assessment of 'Chemical Reaction Principles' in the National College Entrance Examinations (NCEEs). The HSCCS and NCEEs were coded into two-dimensional matrices separately using SPSS,…

This much-needed guide provides the specific skills and materials necessary to facilitate effective dialogues across identity differences. We are living through arguably one of the most divisive times in our country and the world. People do not know how to communicate across differences in a way that advances the public good--from the…

This paper draws on Bakhtin's ethico-ontological vision of dialogue to theorize "relational becoming" on a micro-level. To do so, it introduces three "ethical dimensions of dialogue" (responsibility, responsiveness, and capacitation) and develops the interrelated concepts of addressability and presencing as analytical lenses.…

Teaching about gender-based violence involves dealing with a form of difficult knowledge and as such calls for substantial emotional, political and pedagogical labour on the part of educators. In this paper, we discuss how we have drawn on theoretical perspectives offered by Judith Butler, along with the Deleuzian notion of affective assemblages…

Since its introduction in the early 1900s, the codification of vocational education has made explicit that one purpose of the American public education system should be preparation for the workforce. Over three-quarters of high school students participate in present-day career and technical education, nearly half of undergraduate degrees conferred…