Motivation is a fundamental educational challenge for adolescents in the United States, and particularly for immigrant youth. The motivation to achieve, especially in mathematics, declines during adolescence. Most of what is known about motivation is based on studies of predominately middle-class White students; yet the influx of immigrants over…

The purpose of this study was to investigate whether middle school teacher attitudes on personal teaching efficacy and responsive teaching and their descriptions of their principal's leadership behaviors in the areas of leader social relationships, leadership/goal setting, and collaboration for learning differ for high- and low-achieving Grade 8…

There are many advantages supporting the use of computers as an alternate mode of delivery for high stakes testing: cost savings, increased test security, flexibility in test administrations, innovations in items, and reduced scoring time. The purpose of this study was to determine if the use of computers as the mode of delivery had any…

An investigation of the relationship between background knowledge and reading comprehension performance on standardized reading tests (the California STAR Test) was conducted with sixth, seventh, and eighth-grade ethnic minority children from low-income backgrounds (N = 68). Predictor variables examined included perceived background knowledge…

The issue of underrepresentation of women in science, technology, engineering, and mathematics (STEM) careers is especially important to the future of the United States in current times when STEM careers play an increasingly important role in the global economy (Toulmin & Groome, 2007; United States Department of Labor, 2007). The pool of…

The purpose of this study was to investigate the impact of a Web-based mathematics program, Education Program for Gifted Youth (EPGY) Stanford Math, on mathematics achievement of fourth- through eighth-grade students in a metropolitan school district. Few studies have researched a Web-based mathematics program that provides an individualized,…

The purpose of this phenomenological study was to explore why some low-income minority students were academically successful in school using a three-tiered approach to research including individual student interviews, classroom observations, and photographs and follow up interviews on photographs to identify factors contributing to academic…

The purpose of this "post hoc," summative evaluation was to evaluate the effectiveness of classroom-embedded, individualistic, computer-based learning for middle school students placed at academic risk in schools with a high proportion of Title I eligible students. Data were mined from existing school district databases. For data (n = 393)…

The purpose of this exploratory two-group pretest-posttest comparative survey study was to determine the effect of a team adviser-advisee academic, behavior, and character mentoring program on the achievement, school engagement, and behavior outcomes of eighth grade students determined to be above (n = 21) and below (n = 15) eligibility guidelines…

This study examines the participation of culturally and linguistically diverse (CLD) students with labels of Learning Disability (LD) in their English, Math, and Social Studies classes. The conceptualization of LD as a biological pathology in the dominant special education discourse has contributed to normative perceptions and reductionistic…