Deep science understanding is reflected in students' ability to use content and skills when making sense of the world. Assessing deep understanding requires measuring complex constructs that combine elements of content and skills. To develop valid measures of complex constructs, we need to understand how their theoretical dimensionality, reflected…

This qualitative case study investigated rural high school social studies teachers' perceptions of Robert Stahl's decision-making materials within their content area and the relevance of curricular implementation. The primary questions addressed in this study focused on high school social studies teachers' perception of current instructional…

This study aimed to determine the gender lens of Senior High School educators and learners in General Biology, particularly on The Cell's content standards. The content standards that exhibited most biases were identified. The Gender Lens Instrument in Biology, a validated and reliability-tested tool (Cronbach's [alpha] = 0.81) was used to…

To meet the demands of the Next Generation Science Standards (NGSS), teachers need to reconsider their current instructional practices, shifting from learning about scientific ideas to making sense of phenomena and solving problems using three-dimensional learning components. Project-Based Learning (PBL) provides a framework for creating…

Algebra 1 is a gatekeeper course with profound implications for students' academic and professional success. This study examines the implications of teaching Algebra 1 through a standardized, fully online, asynchronous course developed by one of the largest online course vendors in the United States in alignment with Common Core State Standards…

This companion document to "New Eligibility Rules for the University of California? The Effects of New Science Requirements" provides the following technical appendices: (1) Transcript Evaluation Service (TES) sample; (2) Cal-PASS Plus (CPP) sample; (3) Additional tables and figures; and (4) Qualitative interview questions. [These…

In 2012, the Maine legislature passed a bill requiring public school districts to implement proficiency-based high school diploma requirements. Amendments were passed in subsequent years, and several additional bills related to this policy were introduced in the most recent 128th Legislative Session in early 2018. These bills were considered by…

Project-based learning (PjBL) is an approach often favored in STEM classrooms, yet some studies have shown that teachers struggle to implement it with academic rigor. This paper explores the relationship between PjBL and rigor in the classrooms of ten STEM-oriented high schools. Utilizing three different data sources reflecting three different…

In the 127th Maine State Legislative Session, "An Act to Implement Certain Recommendations of the Maine Proficiency Education Council" (S.P. 660 -- L.D. 1627) was passed into law as Chapter 489. This amended the chaptered law passed in 2012, "An Act to Prepare Maine People for the Future Economy" (S.P.439 -- L.D.1422),…

The National Assessment of Educational Progress (NAEP) measures student science achievement nationally, state by state, and, most recently, across selected urban school districts. Periodically, the framework underlying the science assessment is revised or updated. This document, "Science Framework for the 2019 National Assessment of…

The mission and vision of adult education is to provide every individual in Illinois access to Adult Education and Literacy services. In Illinois, more than 1.15 million adults have less than 12 grades of formal education, approximately 2.8 million Illinois residents speak a language other than English in their home, and more than 350,944…

This report is based on several evaluations of NSF-funded geoscience projects at Stony Brook University on Long Island, NY. The report reviews the status of K-12 geoscience education, identifying challenges posed by the Next Generation Science Standards (NGSS), the experiences of university faculty engaged in teacher preparation, state…

This qualitative inquiry examined 14 secondary preservice teachers' emerging understandings of disciplinary literacy. Data included preservice teachers' written reflections and annotated lesson plans, which were analyzed for understanding of discipline-specific habits of thinking, texts, reading and writing demands of academic texts, language and…

Background: Studies have shown that students' knowledge of osmosis and diffusion and the concepts associated with these processes is often inaccurate. This is important to address, as these concepts not only provide the foundation for more advanced topics in biology and chemistry, but are also threaded throughout both state and national science…

Both the old National Science Education Standards (NSES) and the recent "Next Generation Science Standards" (NGSS) devote significant resources to learning about human environmental impact. Whereas the NSES advocate learning about human environmental impact in a section apart from the science- content learning strands, the NGSS embed…