Promoting Adolescents' Comprehension of Text (PACT) is a text- and discourse-based set of instructional practices that engage students with disciplinary texts as a means of building content knowledge and improving reading comprehension. PACT)s "efficacy" has been the subject of extensive previous trials. The purpose of this study was to…

Reading Apprenticeship is a model of academic literacy instruction designed by the Strategic Literacy Initiative (SLI) at WestEd to improve student literacy skills and academic achievement. Based on understandings of the close relationship between curricular reform and professional development, Reading Apprenticeship includes an instructional…

Using a national sample of students' writing from the National Study of Writing Instruction, this study examines the current state of writing in the mathematics classroom and the extent to which enactments align with the intentions established in the research base and curricula articulated by NCTM and the CCSS-M. Over 3,000 writing assignments…

This study examines the use of cross-classified random effects models (CCrem) and cross-classified multiple membership random effects models (CCMMrem) to model rater bias and estimate teacher effectiveness. Effect estimates are compared using CTT versus item response theory (IRT) scaling methods and three models (i.e., conventional multilevel…

Despite policy efforts to encourage multiple measures of performance in newly developing teacher evaluation systems, practical constraints often result in evaluations based predominantly on formal classroom observations. Yet there is limited knowledge of how these observational measures relate to student achievement. This article leverages the…

Recent years have seen the convergence of two major policy streams in U.S. K-12 education: standards/accountability and teacher quality reforms. Work in these areas has led to the creation of multiple measures of teacher quality, including measures of their instructional alignment to standards/assessments, observational and student survey measures…

In this study, we examined how the relationships between one observation protocol, the Protocol for Language Arts Teaching Observation (PLATO), and value-added measures shift when different tests are used to assess student achievement. Using data from the Measures of Effective Teaching Project, we found that PLATO was more strongly related to the…

California, Florida, Illinois, New York, and Texas enroll close to 40 percent of the nation's public school students. The importance of these "Mega-States" goes beyond the sheer size of their population. They now serve more than half of the nation's English language learners (ELL), as well as some of the largest concentrations of…

Making robust and reliable information about schools accessible is one of the most powerful ways to foster engagement and promote informed decisions that will shape our communities. Though education data is frequently collected and aggregated at the state level, data is rarely synthesized across cities. This report provides comparable information…

NAEP Trial Urban District Assessment (TUDA) results in mathematics and reading are based on representative samples of 1,100 to 2,300 public school students at grade 4 and 900 to 2,100 public school students at grade 8 in each participating urban district in 2013. Twenty-one urban districts participated in the 2013 assessments. The assessments…

The Nation's Report Card[TM] informs the public about the academic achievement of elementary and secondary students in the United States. Report cards communicate the findings of the National Assessment of Educational Progress (NAEP), a continuing and nationally representative measure of achievement in various subjects over time. Results from the…

The National Assessment of Educational Progress (NAEP), in partnership with the National Assessment Governing Board and the Council of the Great City Schools (CGCS), created the Trial Urban District Assessment (TUDA) in 2002 to support the improvement of student achievement in the nation's large urban districts. The TUDA focuses attention on urban…

Score equity assessment is an important analysis to ensure inferences drawn from test scores are comparable across subgroups of examinees. The purpose of the present evaluation was to assess the extent to which the Grade 8 NAEP Math and Reading assessments for 2005 were equivalent across selected states. More specifically, the present study…

In 2006 4-H National Headquarters at the U.S. Department of Agriculture and National 4-H Council introduced a new initiative aimed at increasing the number and quality of science, engineering, and technology programs that 4-H offers around the country, and increasing the number of youth involved in these programs. By engaging youth in informal…

The disparity between the results of state accountability tests in reading and the fourth-grade National Assessment of Educational Progress (NAEP) has left many educators dismayed and concerned. In this article the authors describe a comparison of assessment approaches evident in NAEP to the approaches taken in a sample of state tests. The authors…