To see how well U.S. schools do at producing high-achieving math students, the authors compare the percentage of U.S. public and private school students in the graduating Class of 2009 who were highly accomplished in mathematics in each of the 50 states and in 10 urban districts to percentages of high achievers in 56 other countries. Their…

Many authors have posited that agricultural education curriculum in middle schools may enhance student performance in science. To determine the effect that agricultural education curriculum has upon Georgia middle schools' student performance in science, this descriptive study compared science knowledge among middle school students in Georgia who…

Although the Federal No Child Left Behind program judges the effectiveness of schools based on their students' achievement status, many policy analysts argue that schools should be measured, instead, by their students' achievement growth. Using a ten-year student-level panel data set from North Carolina, the authors examine how school-specific…

In this study we observed college students' behavior on two self-tailored, multiple-choice exams. Self-tailoring was defined as an option to omit up to five items from being scored on an exam. Participants, 80 undergraduate college students enrolled in two sections of an educational psychology course, statistically significantly improved their…

The participation of large numbers of countries in current international assessments involving reading literacy--40 in PIRLS 2006 (administered to students in Grade 4 in primary schools) and 57 in PISA 2006 (administered to 15-year-olds in post-primary schools)--suggests that governments and other bodies find the outcomes to be useful. This…

People not only use social comparisons to evaluate their abilities, they also engage in dimensional comparisons, comparing their own achievement in different domains. Processes of dimensional comparison have contrasting effects on subject-specific self-concepts: downward dimensional comparisons result in higher self-concept in the…

Background: In the debate on inclusive education, students without special educational needs (SEN) are an important topic. However, there is a lot unknown about differences between these typical students in inclusive and non-inclusive classes. For example, the neutral results that are often found in earlier research could be caused by positive…

Induction support for new teachers is widespread, particularly in the form of mentoring, but research evidence of effectiveness is limited. The majority of existing research has focused on the impact of induction on teacher retention. Of greater interest is the potential impact on student achievement, and on which forms of support are the most…

School vouchers provide funds to parents to enable them to enroll their children in private schools and, as a result, are one of the most controversial education reforms in the United States. Among the many points of contention is whether voucher programs in fact improve student achievement. Most evaluations of such programs have found at least…

This article describes a quasi-experimental comparison of two master's level social work classes delivering content on human behavior in the social environment. One class, delivered face-to-face, was largely synchronous. The other class, delivered using distance technologies, was more asynchronous than the first. The authors hypothesized that…

The present meta-analysis examines the effect of grade retention on academic outcomes and investigates systemic sources of variability in effect sizes. Using multilevel modeling (MLM), the authors investigate characteristics of 207 effect sizes across 22 studies published between 1990 and 2007 at two levels: the study (between) and individual…

In this study, the authors examine the differences between two groups of students--those enrolled in either an independent section of a first-year seminar and those enrolled in a first-year seminar embedded in a learning community. In particular, the authors focused on the extent to which course/program outcomes were being met, as reported by…

Consolidated Regional High Schools (RHSs) have replaced traditional Community High Schools (CHSs) in many nonmetropolitan communities. Consolidation purports to offer cost savings that, in theory, enable nonmetropolitan districts to provide a wider array of instructional opportunities to their students. Nonetheless, critics argue that the benefits…

In a pilot study of the Technology Immersion model, high-need middle schools were "immersed" in technology by providing a laptop for each student and teacher, wireless Internet access, curricular and assessment resources, professional development, and technical and pedagogical support. This article examines the fidelity of model…

Many articles and reports have reviewed, researched, and commented on international assessments from the perspective of exploring what is relevant for the United States' education systems. Researchers make claims about whether the top-performing systems have transferable practices or policies that could be applied to the United States. However,…