This topic paper details how dual and concurrent enrollment programs can help states overcome workforce readiness and postsecondary access and completion challenges and how governors can strengthen these programs by using their bully pulpit, agenda setting authority and budgetary authority to do so. It concludes with a number of examples of how…

This article explores issues of school choice in Spain and the United States by examining the roles and functions of "centros concertados," publicly funded private schools in Spain, and public charter schools in the United States, to provide key insights into the similarities and differences between them. After making a national…

This report calls upon Michigan's state leaders to quickly develop and implement solution-based approaches to both support the long-term recovery of student learning, as well as address the longstanding inequities and underperformance that have plagued Michigan's education system for decades. Building upon last year's recommendations, which called…

American public higher education is in trouble. Besieged by declining state and Federal support for more than 30 years, public colleges and universities are facing a "game-changing" set of challenges that threaten to alter the very nature of the institutions. As two recessions withered state budgets in the first decade of the 21st…

This report examines the problem of school facility disparities in Michigan and the prospects of litigation to address this problem. First, the authors briefly review evidence of the important impact of school facilities on students, teachers, and communities. They then provide an overview of litigation aimed at state school finance systems across…

Virtual learning is not for every student, but it's not science fiction, either. Right now in Michigan, it's being used by thousands of students in hundreds of virtual courses in urban, rural and suburban school districts. In fact, Michigan has been seen as a national leader in virtual learning. This study analyzes the financial costs and academic…

Explores the public's misconception about lotteries' intended purpose and actual use. To avoid attacks on its legitimacy (and bloated bureaucratic structure), government is relying on lotteries as policy tools. Generating public funds through lotteries appears to meet education's needs while masking the relative drop in tax-based public finance.…

"Straight A's: Public Education Policy and Progress" is a biweekly newsletter that focuses on education news and events both in Washington, DC and around the country. The following articles are included in this issue: (1) Bush Budget Proposes Spending Freeze for U.S. Department of Education: Title I, Striving Readers, Statewide Data…

In "Durant v. State of Michigan," resulting in a $212 million settlement to 83 districts, the Michigan Supreme Court addressed state deficiencies in funding special education. This article examines implications of "Durant" for other educational programs. Michigan is still trying to shun responsibility for educating disabled…

Discusses the position of leaders in higher education and state and federal government toward coordination, statewide planning, centralization, role definition, finance, and enrollment as they relate to Michigan postsecondary education in general and community colleges in particular. Includes results of a survey of voters and postsecondary…

The proceedings of the IMHE Special Topic Workshop in Institutional Performance Assessment, held in Paris, December 10-12, 1980, are summarized. The themes of the workshop (self-evaluation, government role, finance) are discussed and participants comments are outlined. (Author/MLW)

This document reviews programs and policy options for states concerned with methods of financing medical education. An introductory section considers the current climate for medical education and the health care workforce, noting the rapid movement to managed care and the need to increase the number of primary care physicians. The next section…

Information gathered in the 1974 statewide survey of Tennesseeans' opinions on higher education is compared with similar information gathered in other states. Questions asked concerned confidence in institutions, freedom to teach, quality of education and college type, favorability to increased spending, favorability to institutional expansion,…