In Michigan, schools and educators are held accountable for performance more than ever before. Charter school authorizers--the entities responsible for opening and overseeing new and existing charter schools--face almost no accountability for their performance. In Michigan's current charter landscape, the enormous responsibility of authorizing has…

With the release of Ohio's state test score data each August, one recurring question is how well have the state's large sector of charter schools performed relative to their counterparts in traditional districts? The Thomas B. Fordham Institute commissioned Public Impact to conduct an analysis of the 2009-10 data in this report. Using public…

The release of the latest results of the Programme for International Student Assessment (PISA) garnered all the usual headlines about America's lackluster performance and the rise of competitor nations. To be sure, the findings--that America's fifteen-year-olds perform in the middle of the pack in both reading and math--are disconcerting for a…

Computer games are purported to be effective instructional tools that enhance motivation and improve engagement. The aim of this study was to investigate how tertiary student experiences change when instruction was computer game based compared to lecture based, and whether experiences differed between high and low achieving students. Participants…

Redistributing highly effective teachers from low- to high-need schools is an education policy tool that is at the center of several major current policy initiatives. The underlying assumption is that teacher productivity is portable across different schools settings. Using elementary and secondary school data from North Carolina and Florida, this…

The core work of the National Center on Scaling Up Effective Schools consists of four stages: identifying practices of highly effective high schools, designing interventions and transfer of practices, evaluating the intervention's implementation and effects, and evaluating implementation at scale. The purpose of this report is to describe the…

This study investigates the possibilities of estimating value added as a performance indicator in senior secondary vocational education. Value added is interesting in this context because it is considered as a reliable tool for comparing the effectiveness of educational institutions. Although value added indicators have been developed since the…

This article contains the results of a study which showed men who had participated in intercollegiate athletics had fared as well or better in their ability to earn money than those men who had not taken part in the intercollegiate athletic program. (RC)

Title I provides extra instructional services designed to raise achievement for low-performing students in schools with relatively high poverty rates, and for all students in many of the nation's highest-poverty schools. To learn more about how well Title I students are performing academically, the Center on Education Policy (CEP) compared…

Reviews international academic achievement differences and argues that poor U.S. performance in math reflects curricular focus and teaching deficiencies, not inadequate sampling techniques. Reveals that U.S. student achievement has been weak for decades, suggesting fundamental school reform is warranted. (GR)

Argues against Gerald Bracey's following assertions (1996): (1) U.S. students do far better on international academic comparisons than reported; and (2) the government and popular press have led the country into a false achievement crisis. Suggests that U.S. participation in international studies of this type relies on a strong and independent…

Responds to David Baker's critical essay (1996) concerning G. W. Bracey's arguments that a false academic achievement crisis had been government engineered and that U.S. students were, in fact, comparing well to their international counterparts. Discusses shared issues between L. C. Stedman (1993, 1996) and Baker, and explores data and contentions…

Addresses the issue of comparing U.S. with student academic achievement in other countries and argues that there is cause to be concerned. Reveals a consistently poor academic achievement record for U.S. students that spans 50 years. Such evidence suggests that U.S. schooling and learning are seriously deficient, warranting fundamental reform. (GR)

For more than 50 years, the International Association for the Evaluation of Educational Achievement (IEA) has been conducting comparative studies of educational achievement in a number of curriculum areas, including mathematics and science. TIMSS 2011 represents the fifth cycle of the Trends in International Mathematics and Science Study (TIMSS),…

The academic standings of provisionally admitted high school graduates and matched controls (regular admissions) at a state university were analyzed after one to three years. The results revealed highly significant differences in favor of the controls. The criterion was academic status at the university. Analysis of covariance controlling the…