This case study focuses on the preferred instructional approaches of integrative STEM education as students encounter authentic problems in their community, analyze data, and share their evidenced-based explanations and solutions with external audiences. As the case unfolds, school leaders encounter tensions among family and community members, and…

With more than two decades of on-the-ground experience impacting 300,000 educators and 3 million students, NIET's success is grounded in research. The success of NIET's work is evident in the positive findings from evaluations of impact. In NIET's 2022-23 Research Summary, we summarize findings from five new studies and highlight selected findings…

The Indiana Commission for Higher Education has for years acknowledged and addressed the equity and achievement gaps that exist in the state's education pipeline. In 2013, the Commission passed a resolution to close Indiana's educational achievement gaps by 2025. In 2021, gaps are closing, but not quickly enough. Data must be the driving force…

In Indiana and Minnesota, career and technical education programs are intended to provide pathways to both postsecondary education and careers after high school. Each state's education agency, higher education agency, and workforce agency collaborated to develop career and technical education courses. These agencies partnered with the Regional…

In 2013, the Indiana Commission for Higher Education passed a resolution to cut the achievement gap in half by 2018 and close the achievement gap by 2025. The College Equity report provides a snapshot of Indiana's college achievement gap progress -- measured by the college-going rate, early success in college and college completion -- for…

Since 2012, the Jack Kent Cooke Foundation has supported educational enrichment in rural areas by awarding over $3.3 million in grants to six outstanding organizations operating in Iowa, Indiana, Mississippi, North Carolina, Tennessee, and Virginia. In this report, the authors combine the experiences of these organizations with findings from the…

This article describes a research group project that included students and faculty affiliated with Indiana University, along with secondary English teachers and administrators at several high schools in Southeast Indiana, as they developed and refined an approach to literacy instruction that embraces an expanded notion of literacy and supports…

The Indiana State University Professional Development Schools (ISU PDS) Partnership sprang from the convergence of two strong needs: (1) the need for real life practice in the way of extended clinical experiences for teacher education students in schools of practice; and (2) the need on the part of the schools in the community to have access to…

There is no denying that combining two schools, or even opening a new school, is loaded with challenges and frustrations as well as high expectations. Principal Tracy Shafer saw a rural school consolidation as an opportunity to use professional development to create a community focused on student learning, meeting the need for high-quality…

This publication reports findings related to "Project ARTS: Arts for Rural Teachers and Students," a collaborative program among Indiana University, New Mexico State University, and Converse College in South Carolina. Seven rural elementary schools in those three states were also selected to participate. This report provides an overview…

Discusses the online activities used in the Teacher Institute for Curriculum Knowledge about the Integration of Technology (TICKIT), a school-based professional development program involving K-12 teachers from rural Indiana schools that was developed by Indiana University. Describes the use of Web-based asynchronous conferencing to post technology…

This publication reports findings related to "Project ARTS: Arts for Rural Teachers and Students," a collaborative program among Indiana University, New Mexico State University, and Converse College in South Carolina. Seven rural elementary schools in those three states were also selected to participate. This report provides an overview…

The demand for efficiency in the schools and for the best possible use of money expended for schools and of the time of the children in school has given rise to a demand for expert supervision by men and women competent to give to all teachers, and especially to young and inexperienced teachers, help in those phases of their work in which they…

Half of all 16,023 U.S. school districts are both small and rural. In a decade of nationwide reform, these "forgotten" school districts must fight for survival rather than substantive reform. Teachers in rural Indiana cannot rely on principals for instructional leadership nor on each other for professional enrichment. Includes four…

The Northern Tier Distance Learning Consortium links six high schools and three colleges in northeastern Pennsylvania. Indiana students participated in an interactive distance-learning program that focused on underwater exploration. (MLF)