The 21st century will require knowledge and skill well beyond the basic levels of reading and arithmetic that American schools know how to produce more or less reliably. Delivering a "thinking curriculum" to all American students requires major reform in the ways schools and districts organize their work. The transformation of the…

Traditionally, state accountability systems have measured school-level achievement gains using cross-sectional data, for example, by comparing scores of one year's eighth graders to scores of the next year's eighth graders. This approach produces extremely volatile estimates of value added from year to year. This volatility suggests that the…

The gap between Blacks and Whites in educational outcomes has narrowed dramatically over the past 60 years, but progress stopped around 1990. The author reviews research suggesting that increasing the quantity and quality of schooling can play a powerful role in overcoming racial inequality. To achieve that goal, he reasons, our knowledge of best…

Value-added models help to evaluate the knowledge that school districts, schools, and teachers add to student learning as students progress through school. In this article, the well-known Education Value-Added Assessment System (EVAAS) is examined. The author presents a practical investigation of the methodological issues associated with the…

Many policymakers feel pressure to claim that No Child Left Behind (NCLB) is boosting student performance, as Congress reconsiders the federal government's role in school reform. But how should politicians and activists gauge NCLB's effects? The authors offer evidence on three barometers of student performance, drawing from the National Assessment…

Educational research is not very influential, useful, or well funded. This article explores why and suggests ways that the situation could be improved. Our focus is on the processes that link the development of good ideas and insights, the development of tools and structures for implementation, and the enabling of robust implementation in…

Discusses features of educational accountability systems, illustrating them using requirements of the No Child Left Behind Act of 2001 (NCLB). Asserts that broadly shared responsibility is needed for accountability systems to contribute to improved education, noting that systems design requires setting ambitious performance standards and…

Notes the need for researcher accountability in qualitative analysis, examining strategies used in working with doctoral students and offering suggestions for assessing and publicly disclosing the methodological rigor and analytical defensibility of qualitative research. Introduces tabular strategies for use in documenting the relationship between…

In an era of heightened teacher and school accountability, what are the implications of standards-based reform for individual Latino children and their democratic self-realization? The educational demography of the fastest-growing and largest ethnic group in the United States suggests that the future of Latino self-realization is in jeopardy.…

Discusses key provisions of the No Child Left Behind Act related to performance standards, adequate yearly progress targets, and the challenges such targets present for states and schools. Notes different states' approaches to assessment and discusses possible uses of results from the biennial state-level administrations of the National Assessment…

Refutes Seymour Papert's premises because they: (1) maintain that computer criticism goes through developmental stages; (2) overlook the fact that the computer's newness in education affects the way people speak of computers; and (3) deny the necessity that teaching LOGO, like other pedagogies, should be accountable to experimental research. (PS)

Agrees with Seymour Papert that conventional experimentation has shortcomings when used to study effects of educational programs. Cites three research methods that, in combination, can compensate for the shortcomings of both conventional research and the computer criticism suggested by Papert. (PS)

Discusses advantages and disadvantages of two types of research methodologies used to study the effect of LOGO in classroom settings: the treatment methodology and computer criticism. Stresses the importance of testable consequences. (PS)

Outlines some of the characteristics of humanistic objectives for education; e.g. humanist objectives are largely holistic, are concerned with affective aspects of learning that determine the expression of information in action; and are directed to the qualities that make us human. (Author/JM)

When student ratings of instruction are used by instructors as a source of feedback on their teaching, some changes are made by the instructor; better interpretation of the results would probably improve this; thus a well-designed student ratings program can benefit more than harm the academic community. (Author/JM)