Purpose: District effectiveness research (DER) is an emerging field concerned with identifying the organizational structures, administration, and leadership practices at the school district level that help districts find success with all of their students across the schools within the system. This work has mirrored much of the early school…

The purpose of this review is to learn from rigorous evaluations of alternative technology applications how features of using technology programs and characteristics of their evaluations affect reading outcomes for students in grades K-12. The review applies consistent inclusion standards to focus on studies that met high methodological standards.…

The purpose of this project was to explore the decision-making approach and types of data that school psychologists use in determining special education classification. There were three research objectives: (a) to investigate the types of conditions and measures needed to test the use of the representativeness heuristic and assessment data, (b) to…

This Special Section of the "Journal of Consulting and Clinical Psychology" focuses on research that extends beyond documenting the efficacy and effectiveness of specific psychological treatments or preventive interventions for children and youths. In the past 30 years, there have been remarkable advances in the development and evaluation of…

Rhode Island's proficiency-based high school diploma system requires high school graduates to demonstrate proficiency in standard-based content and applied learning skills through at least two performance assessment measures (RIDE, 2003). To meet these requirements, 12 of Rhode Island's 39 school districts are using ePortfolios as one of their…

For most of the last 50 years, teachers and administrators have perceived professional development and the instructional role primarily in terms of what one individual does with classes of others. Teachers, like their students, were considered to be rather passive acceptors of the instruction, rather than active modifiers. Thus, there was very…

Cross country investigations have repeatedly demonstrated the disappointing math performance of students in the United States (Beatty, 1997; Ferrini-Mundy & Schmidt, 2005). The National Council of Teachers of Mathematics (2000) listed failure to rapidly recall basic facts as a common problem associated with disabilities in mathematics and…

A descriptive quantitative study design was used to determine the impact of induction and mentoring on the success, satisfaction, and retention of new and novice school principals. Three research questions addressed the types of induction experiences new and novice principals reported, the types of support given to new and novice principals, and…

When measuring outcomes in corporate training, the authors recommend that it is essential to introduce a comprehensive plan, especially when resources are limited and the company needs are vast. The authors hone in on five critical components for shaping a measurement plan to determine the success and ROI of training. The plan's components should…

Across the country, a growing number of recent high school graduates are participating in summer bridge programs. These programs provide accelerated and focused learning opportunities in order to help students acquire the knowledge and skills needed for college success. The state of Texas has given particular attention to summer programs as a way…

This review examines 105 empirical studies that investigate students' views of the nature of science (VNOS), effects of curricular interventions on changing students' VNOS, and relations between VNOS and demographics, majors, and learning of science. The reviewed studies can be categorized into three theoretical frameworks: the unidimension, the…

There is a lack of research on the practice of curriculum looping and student achievement. The purpose of this study was to examine academic achievement between students in looping classes and those in nonlooping classes. The theoretical model of this study was based on the social cognitive theory of Bandura and Maslow's hierarchy of needs theory.…

This study developed a Mobile Plant Learning System (MPLS) that provides instructors with the ways and means to facilitate student learning in an elementary-school-level botany course. The MPLS represented in this study was implemented to address problems that arise with the use of a didactic approach to teaching and learning botany, as is…

This article examines the power analyses for the first wave of group-randomized trials funded by the Institute of Education Sciences. Specifically, it assesses the precision and technical accuracy of the studies. The authors identified the appropriate experimental design and estimated the minimum detectable standardized effect size (MDES) for each…

The present paper reports results of a longitudinal research project studying the contribution of cognitive skills and other factors to proficiency in a foreign language (L2) in the Hungarian educational context. The larger project aims to describe the levels of L2 proficiency of school-aged populations in order to explore the conditions and…