Proponents of standards-based reform claim that student achievement testing increases accountability and allows for greater instructional consistency. Performance across schools, boards, provinces, and even countries internationally can be compared and contrasted with the aim of identifying exemplary teaching practices. Teachers can also use…

The SACE Review report, Success for All, completely ignores two important issues, namely, (a) the portability of the certificate, and (b) the nature of secondary schooling in a future that is set in a global world. The Review saw the South Australian education system operating in a context that was limited to the geographical and cultural…

Career development objectives, as codified in the American School Counselor Association's National Standards, can be overshadowed by the growing emphasis on academic standards, testing, and accountability so thematic of national educational and public policy initiatives. The career fair vehicle, which proactively employs the wisdom of social…

To give states the information they need to sustain hard-fought education reform effectively, Achieve conducted research on state education reforms that have been sustained successfully for over a decade or more. Funded by the GE Foundation, Achieve hopes this work will help other state leaders, wherever they may be on their road to reform,…

In the chapters presented in this volume, leading experts describe some of the assessment challenges in greater detail and provide federal recommendations on how to address them. In "College and Work Readiness as a Goal of High Schools: The Role of Standards, Assessments, and Accountability," John Tanner of the Center for Innovative Measures at…

This generation of young people is on track to be less-educated than their parents--for the first time in American history. This, at the same time the world and workplace are changing dramatically and rapidly--when students, more than ever, need high levels of skill in order to compete. Advance Illinois has developed this report "We Can Do…

This study examined teachers' uses of virtual manipulatives across grades K-8 after participating in a professional development institute in which manipulatives and technology were the major resources used throughout all of the activities. Researchers analyzed 95 lesson summaries in which classroom teachers described their uses of virtual…

Secondary vocational-technical education programs in Mississippi are faced with many challenges resulting from sweeping educational reforms at the national and state levels. Schools and teachers are increasingly being held accountable for providing true learning activities to every student in the classroom. This accountability is measured through…

Make economics resonate to high school students. This practical handbook will help economics and social studies teachers foster critical thinking by introducing students to the real-life dimensions of the major controversies in contemporary economics. Filled with useful teaching tips and user-friendly information on finding engaging materials and…

This is the fifth survey since 1998 on the state of economic and personal finance education in the fifty states conducted by National Council on Economic Education (NCEE). A leader in promoting economic and personal finance education, NCEE conducts these surveys to gauge how the state standards, their implementation, course requirements, and state…

To ensure all students have every opportunity to succeed, Indiana adopted world-class academic standards in English-language arts, mathematics, science, and social studies and an assessment system to measure student progress. These standards clearly outline what students should know and be able to do in each subject, at each grade level. This…

Understanding the structure and function of proteins is an important part of the standards-based science curriculum. Proteins serve vital roles within the cell and malfunctions in protein self assembly are implicated in degenerative diseases. Experience indicates that this topic is a difficult one for many students. We have found that the concept…

This article discusses high schools and reform. During the past two decades, school reformers have sighed when speaking of change in secondary schools, saying they were the hardest--and would be the last--nutshell they would seek to crack in making significant improvements in the education of young people. Efforts in secondary schools would need…

Academic sociologists have recently increased their focus on improving high school sociology. Reform efforts include networking between teachers and universities, improving curriculum, and enhancing teacher training. I propose that this list be expanded to include setting curricular standards. Current trends in educational reform center on…

The Council of the Great City Schools has prepared this eighth edition of "Beating the Odds" to give the nation another look at how inner-city schools are performing on the academic goals and standards set by the states. This analysis examines student achievement in math and reading through spring 2007. It also measures achievement gaps between…