The State of Alaska, by some measures the United States' most rural state, has long supported correspondence schools, a popular school choice option available to all students statewide and used primarily by homeschooled students. This paper first explores Alaska correspondence schools in historical context, and then quantifies capture rate,…

There is a growing body of research that suggests the first year of high school is a critical transition point for students. It also finds course-taking and successful completion of those courses in 9th grade to be valuable predictors of students' success in high school. The Every Student Succeeds Act (ESSA) provides states an opportunity to…

Youth Leaders Program (YLP) is a health intervention implemented in a rural Alaskan school district, which utilizes natural helpers and peer leaders to increase protective factors such as school engagement and personal/cultural identities, and to reduce risks associated with drug/alcohol abuse, violence, and bullying. Through these means, the…

Alaska's School Climate and Connectedness Survey (SCCS) is a statewide survey developed by American Institutes for Research (AIR) in partnership with the Association of Alaska School Boards (AASB) in 2006. Through student and staff responses, it measures positive school climate, how connected students feel to adults and peers, social and emotional…

The hypothesis that native students from small villages perform better academically in classes with teachers who use informal techniques was tested using 40 native students in the Rural Boarding Home Program. (FF)

The study was conducted among secondary schools in Alaskan communities where large numbers of rural native students are enrolled through the Boarding Home Program. It was assumed that village teachers often did not send student records which would have provided a basis for placing students in appropriate academic programs. It was believed that,…

A non-verbal science test was constructed to overcome a partial language barrier. Validation was achieved through tape-recorded interviews with the examinees on each test item to determine the clarity of the item and why choices among four possible answers were made. Ninth grade students at three boarding schools conducted by the Bureau of Indian…

STARS (Secondary Training for Alaskan Rural Students) materials resulted from extensive rewriting of the Vocational Adult Secondary Training (VAST) materials produced by the British Columbia Department of Education, after those materials had been used with the 9th and 10th graders on Kodiak Island. Revision was done by teachers who had been using…

STARS (Secondary Training for Alaskan Rural Students) materials resulted from extensive rewriting of the Vocational Adult Secondary Training (VAST) materials produced by the British Columbia Department of Education, after those materials had been used with the 9th and 10th graders on Kodiak Island. Revision was done by teachers who had been using…

The STARS (Secondary Training for Alaskan Rural Students) materials resulted from extensive rewriting of the Vocational Adult Secondary Training (VAST) materials produced by the British Columbia Department of Education, after those materials had been used with the 9th and 10th grades on Kodiak Island. Revision was done by teachers who had been…

To address the lack of academic and social preparation that many rural Alaskans have when they first arrive at college, in 1985 Sheldon Jackson College (Sitka, Alaska) initiated the Early College Incentive Program (ECIP) to expose junior high students to college learning and living requirements, reduce cultural shock (Sheldon Jackson's student…