This paper presents inspiring stories of two school districts--Boston and Sacramento--that are changing their high schools through districtwide student engagement initiatives. These stories illustrate years of hard work, dedication and partnership by many young people, advocates, advisors, teachers, principals and district personnel. Each…

This article describes research results based on multiple years of experimentation and real-world experience with an adaptive tutoring system named Wayang Outpost. The system represents a novel adaptive learning technology that has shown successful outcomes with thousands of students, and provided teachers with valuable information about students'…

Educational games intend to make learning more enjoyable, but carry the potential cost of compromising learning efficiency by consuming both instructional time and student cognitive resources. Therefore, instead of creating an educational game, the authors create a learning environment with game-like elements, the aspects of games that are…

In this paper, we investigate the correspondence between student affect and behavioural engagement in a web-based tutoring platform throughout the school year and learning outcomes at the end of the year on a high-stakes mathematics exam in a manner that is both longitudinal and fine-grained. Affect and behaviour detectors are used to estimate…

This study is a literature review to investigate the effects of implementing technology into a high school mathematics classroom. Mathematics has a hierarchical structure in learning and it is essential that students get a firm understanding of mathematics early in education. Some students that miss beginning concepts may continue to struggle with…

This article explores the possibilities and frustrations of using digital methods in a multi-sited ethnographic research project. The project, "Urban School Performances: The interplay, through live and digital drama, of local-global knowledge about student engagement", is a study of youth and teachers in drama classrooms in contexts of…

Early college high schools are a promising but expensive pathway to college readiness. Most such schools are supported with state funds and/or grants. This descriptive case study presents an early college program, now in its fourth year in a traditional high school, in which the families, high school and local community college shared the entire…

Widespread concern has been expressed about the persistent low mathematics achievement of students in the US, particularly for students from low-income and minority backgrounds and students with disabilities. Instructional gaming technology, when designed and fictionalized well, has the potential to improve the motivation and mathematics…

In recent years, an increasing number of analyses in Learning Analytics and Educational Data Mining (EDM) have adopted a "Discovery with Models" approach, where an existing model is used as a key component in a new EDM/analytics analysis. This article presents a theoretical discussion on the emergence of discovery with models, its…

A few years ago, in "Student Success in College (SSiC)," the authors profiled twenty colleges and universities that were unusually effective in fostering student engagement and success, defined as better-than-predicted scores on the National Survey of Student Engagement (NSSE) and better-than-predicted graduation rates. These schools are…

College and university educators seek to increase student engagement in learning content, skills, and applications. To achieve this goal, we used transformative teaching techniques in the design of a World Challenge: a two-week, group-based, reflective course for sophomores leading their own learning in developing creative solutions to the problem…

Expanded learning time seems to be a simple idea: by lengthening the school day (or year), students have more time to learn. Yet as schools revisit their schedules and decide how to allocate time in their academic calendars, they can and do face challenging decisions related to time allocations. This brief highlights lessons learned from some…

The Massachusetts Expanded Learning Time (ELT) initiative is designed to improve academic outcomes by increasing the amount of learning time for students. Schools are expected to provide opportunities to teachers for collaborative planning and professional development as well as add time to the school day or year for instructional and enrichment…

In 2004, Kuss Middle School became the first school declared "Chronically Underperforming" by the state of Massachusetts. But by 2010, Kuss had transformed itself into a model for schools around the country seeking a comprehensive turnaround strategy. Kuss is using increased learning time as the primary catalyst to accelerate learning,…

This publication is a series of in-depth case studies to examine how three programs which serve a disconnected youth population are utilizing data as a tool for continuous program improvement and ongoing accountability. The report features the following programs: (1) Roca, an organization in Massachusetts which engages the highest-risk youth in…