City Year is a learning organization committed to the rigorous evaluation of its "Whole School Whole Child" model, which trains and deploys teams of AmeriCorps members to low-performing, urban schools to empower more students to reach their full potential. A third-party study by Policy Studies Associates (PSA) examined the impact of…

The purpose of this study was to identify the principal behaviors that would define an instructional leader as being a data-driven school administrator and to assess current school administrators' levels of being data-driven. This research attempted to examine the relationship between the degree to which a principal was data-driven and the…

Educational leaders are charged with making informed decisions regarding various aspects of schooling that affect the overall achievement of students. Numerous legislative ideas, funding initiatives, programming standards, and practicing guidelines for early childhood education programs have been introduced (Buyssee & Wesley, 2006). Early care…

An early warning system is a data-based tool that helps predict which students are on the right path towards eventual graduation or other grade-appropriate goals. Through such systems, stakeholders at the school and district levels can view data from a wide range of perspectives and gain a deeper understanding of student data. This "Statewide…

Intelligent tutors have become increasingly accurate at detecting whether a student knows a skill, or knowledge component (KC), at a given time. However, current student models do not tell us exactly at which point a KC is learned. In this paper, we present a machine-learned model that assesses the probability that a student learned a KC at a…

"Taking Stock and Pushing Forward" (2014) reports states' progress toward the Challenge to Lead 2020 Goals for Education. State-specific documents report on student achievement as well as essential state policies to improve it. Among the many metrics: how states are improving achievement on NAEP [National Assessment of Educational…

Each year, South Carolina students participate in testing as part of the South Carolina assessment program. Students in grades 3 through 8 take the Palmetto Achievement Challenge Tests (PACT) in English/Language Arts and Mathematics. Students in grade 10 take the High School Assessment Program (HSAP) in English/Language Arts and mathematics. These…

This paper presents the appendices to the "High-Stakes Testing and Student Achievement: Problems for the No Child Left Behind Act" report. It contains the following appendices: (1) Example of Context for Assessing State-Level Stakes Sheet--Connecticut; (2) Example of Completed Rewards and Sanctions Worksheet--Connecticut; (3) Directions…

Under the federal No Child Left Behind Act of 2001 (NCLB), standardized test scores are the indicator used to hold schools and school districts accountable for student achievement. Each state is responsible for constructing an accountability system, attaching consequences--or stakes--for student performance. The theory of action implied by this…