California's Commission on Teacher Credentialing (Commission) requires all programs of preliminary multiple and single subject teacher preparation to use a Commission-approved Teaching Performance Assessment (TPA) as one of the program completion requirements for prospective teacher candidates. Three TPA models were approved by the Commission: (1)…

Measures of student disadvantage--or risk--are critical components of equity-focused education policies. However, the risk measures used in contemporary policies have significant limitations, and despite continued advances in data infrastructure and analytic capacity, there has been little innovation in these measures for decades. We develop a new…

The present article considers a fundamental question in evaluation research: "By how much do program effects vary across sites?" The article first presents a theoretical model of cross-site impact variation and a related estimation model with a random treatment coefficient and fixed site-specific intercepts. This approach eliminates…

Libraries have become increasingly interested in studying the use of spaces within their buildings. Traditional methods for tracking library building use, such as gate counts, provide little information on what patrons do once they are in the library; therefore, new methods for studying space usage are being developed. Particularly promising are…

The authors describe several types of classroom assessment techniques (CATs) and cognitive scaffolding procedures that they have developed over the years. They then bring the procedures together in a sample lecture/group learning class presentation.

Background: Evaluations of substance use screening and brief intervention (SBI) curricula typically focus on learner attitudes and knowledge, although effects on clinical skills are of greater interest and utility. Moreover, these curricula often require large amounts of training time and teaching resources. This study examined whether a 3-hour…

The study sought to determine effects of leadership activity on emotional intelligence in preadolescents. Ninety-two Central California Valley sixth grade students in two schools and four classes were assessed on emotional intelligence. Treatment and comparison groups were identified. A Two-Way Repeated Measures ANOVA examined change over time…

Contemporary perspectives on age differences in risk taking, informed by advances in developmental neuroscience, have emphasized the need to examine the ways in which emotional and cognitive factors interact to influence decision making. In the present study, a diverse sample of 901 individuals between the ages of 10 and 30 were administered a…

This paper reports the results of a descriptive study on the use of a technology-enhanced formative assessment system called Accelerated Math (AM) for ELLs and their native-English-speaking (NES) peers. It was comprised of analyses of an extant database of 18,549 students, including 2,057 ELLs, from grades 1 through 8 across 30 U.S. states. These…

As one set of responses to the increasing demands of adequate yearly progress exerted by the No Child Left Behind Act, schools have been using professional learning communities as a tool to improve academic performance. The researcher conducted this descriptive quantitative study to query principals from 40 high- and 40 low-performing elementary…

This study focuses on how the treatment effects of a teacher professional development initiative in science differed by school capacity. In other words, the authors are primarily concerned with treatment effect heterogeneity. As such, this paper complements ongoing evaluation of the average treatment effects of the initiative over time. The…

Colleges and universities in California may be accredited or approved by four different agencies to offer approved programs of teacher education: the State Department of Education's Office of Private Postsecondary Education (OPPE) (for private institutions); the Western Association of Schools and Colleges (WASC); the Commission on Teacher…

Measuring the progress of students toward completing their college education is an important gauge of how well California's postsecondary education systems are meeting the needs of students and the public. This report provides an assessment of persistence as a measure of student success at California's public universities and is one of a series of…

A revised methodology for calculating faculty salary and fringe benefit cost comparisons for California public higher education for 1985-1986 to 1994-1995 is discussed. The history of the California Postsecondary Education Commission's salary reports and the work of its Technical Advisory Committee is also traced. The following aspects of the…

To determine whether students who indicated success on the job evaluated the overall Cooperative Education Program at Los Angeles Valley College differently from those students who did not indicate job success, data were collected from 249 students who had completed the program (41 percent female and 59 percent male). Questionnaires were answered…