In this article, the author interprets the phenomenon of teacher research using feminist theories as a heuristic for analysis. She begins with definitions of teacher research. Following, she employs feminist theories to explain teacher research as an emancipatory act. Based on an inductive analysis of the literature, she discusses three arguments:…

In this original qualitative study, we examined the processes employed by a school district that had made progress in closing achievement gaps in a post-No Child Left Behind context. The district served more than 26,000 students in an economically and ethnically diverse community. Secondary analysis of the findings uncovered a primary…

Proponents of No Child Left Behind (NCLB) hail it as vital legislation that supports a civil rights agenda because of explicit recognition that achievement gaps are unacceptable. One way to make sense of NCLB's impact on school divisions and to understand whether NCLB recognizes the complexity of why minority and low-socioeconomic-background…

What David J. Ferrero has called "the Hundred Year's War between "progressives" and "traditionalists"" continues unabated in the twenty-first century. Undoubtedly, current initiatives in public education favor those who support traditional approaches, yet many critics believe inflexible state tests are restricting…

This article examines the ideological dimensions of educational psychology and psychometrics as they relate to the validation of the "intelligence" of the privileged and the "deficiency" of the marginalized. In this critique a critical psychology emerges that takes seriously the lifeworld experiences of culturally and…

The purpose of this manuscript is to summarize the major provisions of four salient national government initiatives and relate each one to an "essentialist" political agenda that is based on the essentialist philosophy or theory of education. The National Assessment of Educational Progress, A Nation at Risk, America 2000/Goals 2000, and…

Implementation of the No Child Left Behind (NCLB) legislation has been accompanied by demand for data systems capable of providing a longitudinal record of each student's educational experiences and performance over time. The national Study of Education Data Systems and Decision Making is examining both the implementation of student data systems…

This study investigated the convergent and discriminant validity of the high-stakes Florida Comprehensive Assessment Test (FCAT) in both reading and writing at grade levels 4, 8, and 10. The data from the 2006 FCAT administration were analyzed via traditional multitrait-multimethod (MTMM) analysis to identify the factor structure and structural…

This article revisits the debate between cultural and critical literacy through ethnography challenging popular academic views in education and literacy. Set in a preschool classroom at the inception of the "No Child Left Behind" initiative, this essay focuses on teaching assistant Marylou Anderson. Her experiences growing up in…

The No Child Left Behind Act (NCLB) has provoked more controversy than any previous education legislation in recent decades. Our conceptual analysis was guided by three questions: What do we see happening in the schools? What does the law seem to mean in terms of accountability to different people in the schools? Where is the justice in these…

The No Child Left Behind Act of 2001 requires all states to assess the English proficiency of English language learners each school year. Under Title I and Title III of No Child Left Behind, states are required to measure the annual growth of students' English language development in reading, listening, writing, and speaking and in comprehension…

We argue that the existence of the gap is perhaps a result of an overallegiance to the medical model and the lack of measurable criteria regarding the definition of an educated and psychologically healthy student. Further, an additional and equally daunting problem for school psychological practice is that it is influenced by general education…

The No Child Left Behind education act mandates that school districts develop supplemental educational service programs for students not demonstrating mathematical proficiency on state standardized math assessments. Yet there is limited understanding of issues related to supplemental educational service math programs. The purpose of this…

The educational research and policy scene in Australia over the past decade has featured a number of contradictory developments. National policy has sponsored more interdisciplinary and applied research, while moving down a Research Quality Framework pathway which prioritises measurable quality and impact measures. At the same time, recent…

It is widely believed that the end of Nazism, and the postwar era brought an end to academic theories and discourses regarding inherent racial inferiority. There was little tolerance Hawkins (1997) argues, for biological justifications for racism, war, and exploitation. The infamous Social Darwinism of key intellectual Herbert Spencer, and its…