Why do some teachers demonstrate great cultural sensitivity in their work with children while others seem mired in stereotypes, perpetuating a view of diversity as exotic or denying that race is an issue in their classrooms? Why is it so difficult to change these dispositions of teachers? And what can we do in teacher education to further the…

A National Commission on Teaching and America's Future report argues that every child deserves a caring, competent, and qualified teacher and every teacher deserves high-quality preparation and professional development. Five major reform areas include professional standards, redesigned training and professional development, aggressive recruitment…

The vision for teacher and student development portrayed in the recent National Commission on Teaching and America's Future report does not match classroom reality. A school's compelling vision and stretch goals demand professional development that is results-driven, standards-based, school-focused, job-embedded, matched to desired instructional…

Three options for competency-based assessment in Australia's national standards system are grades, merit, and end-of-course assessment. Grades are well established; merit has flexibility and provides progressive feedback. All three have advantages and disadvantages. (SK)

Demoralized by disappearing dollars and omission of the arts from national education goals, the arts education community has formed a consortium of professional organizations to write standards and address related issues, such as balance among the arts and multicultural and technological concerns. To anchor the arts firmly in the curriculum, they…

Valid assessment of student learning in nonperformance music classes is important and possible. Grading practices in large ensembles are often questionable, as music teachers often reward attendance and effort over absolute achievement and overemphasize affective or attitudinal goals. Teachers cannot easily rate aesthetic responses, but any…

In a national survey, members from the American School Counselor Association, the National Association of Secondary School Principals, and the National Association of Elementary School Principals were asked the extent to which professional school counselors should emphasize the National Standards for School Counseling Programs (Campbell & Dahir,…

National Board Certification represents one of the most significant reform efforts in the area of teacher quality in the last two decades. Since the National Board for Professional Teaching Standards (NBPTS) certified its first round of teachers in 1995, approximately 32,000 teachers have become certified at a cost to the country of well over $300…

Since Congress passed .08 blood alcohol concentration (BAC) as the national standard for impaired driving in October 2000, 28 U.S. States including Indiana have enacted .08 BAC law. This study investigated perceived impact of the .08 law among Indiana residents and their attitudinal and perceptional changes since the enforcement of the law. The…

For nearly 20 years the National Association for Sport and Physical Education (NASPE) has been conducting the Shape of the Nation Report every few years to summarize information for the profession and the public regarding the status of physical education in the American educational system. The preeminent national authority on physical education…

The leadership of the Arabian Gulf nation of Qatar, like that of many other countries, views education as the key to future economic, political, and social progress. Many have concluded that a country's ability to compete in the global economy and enable its citizens to take full advantage of technological advances relies on upgrading the quality…

This article presents the results on the effects of professional development in context by examining how much average change over time there is in different dimensions of teaching practice. In particular, three years of data on teaching practice are used to describe trends and differences across teachers and schools in the three broad aspects of…

Using literature in science instruction has the potential to increase student motivation and to improve student achievement in both literacy and science. The process of identifying high-quality picture books, however, can be challenging and time consuming for teachers. The authors identified 74 science-based picture books from the annual Teachers'…

A national survey of state-articulated student goals and outcomes led to the analysis of documents from four states for correspondence with the outcomes specified for age 3 in the conceptual model of the National Center on Educational Outcomes for Students with Disabilities (NCEO). In the survey, 36 states (including the District of Columbia)…

A national survey of state-articulated student goals and outcomes led to the analysis of documents from 25 states (including the District of Columbia) for correspondence with the outcomes specified for age 6 in the conceptual model developed by the National Center on Educational Outcomes for Students with Disabilities (NCEO). Of the 36 survey…