The charter school movement encompasses many school models. In Massachusetts in the 2010's, the site of our study, urban charter schools primarily used "No Excuses" practices, whereas nonurban charters had greater model variety. Using randomized admissions lotteries, we estimate the impact of charter schools by locality on college…

This study leverages naturally occurring lotteries for oversubscribed Boston Public Schools prekindergarten program sites between 2007 and 2011, for 3,182 children (M = 4.5 years old) to estimate the impacts of winning a first choice lottery and enrolling in Boston prekindergarten versus losing a first choice lottery and not enrolling on…

School District Effectiveness Research (SDER) works to identify unusually effective organizations for in-depth qualitative study that significantly outperform peer districts over multiple years. Yet, critiques of SDER include a focus on cross-sectional data, individual states, and percent proficient metrics. Here, we analyze the Stanford Education…

This study leverages naturally occurring lotteries for oversubscribed Boston Public Schools prekindergarten program sites between 2007 and 2011, for 3,182 children (M = 4.5 years old) to estimate the impacts of winning a first choice lottery and enrolling in Boston prekindergarten versus losing a first choice lottery and not enrolling on…

This case study explores the utility of Expectancy Value Theory (EVT) as a framework for studying elementary teachers' beliefs and motivations with respect to reformed mathematics instruction. A model for coding and evaluating qualitative data using EVT is proposed and illustrated using interviews with three primary school teachers in an urban…

Decades after the 1954 "Brown v. Board of Education of Topeka" unanimous decision to desegregate schools, the ideology of Black people having equal educational opportunities has not been realized; Black people continue to lag in educational attainment. However, the inequalities in life experiences between Black and White people limit the…

The purpose of this study was to examine the difference in the results of English language learners in English language programs compared with those students who refuse services as measured by the ACCESS for English language learners and the Partnership for Assessment of Readiness for College and Careers (PARCC) in both Mathematics and English…

Academic achievement disparities based on parental education are robust during the middle school years. The current study examined whether cross-class friendship (i.e., reciprocal relationships between peers with different levels of parental education) decrease class-based achievement differences during a developmental phase when friends are…

The Housing Choice Voucher program is currently the largest federally funded housing assistance program. Although the program aims to provide housing assistance, it also could affect children's educational outcomes by stabilizing their families, enabling them to move to better homes, neighborhoods, and schools, and increasing their disposable…

Physics, as a foundational science, has particular importance in predicting the postsecondary success of students who major in science, technology, engineering, and mathematics. This quasiexperimental, observational study examined teacher-level and school-level predictors of student performance in physics, with a focus on isolated teachers. A New…

Urban public school districts in the U.S. vary in quality. Educational policies, distribution of resources, and the challenges that students bring to the classroom differ substantially across localities. Little surprise, then, that academic outcomes--such as high school graduation rates and average school performance on standardized…

Purpose: Scholars who advocate for equity-oriented educational practices have argued that the accountability era in the USA, now in place for two decades, has failed in its intended goal to improve student performance for traditionally marginalized student populations. This study aims to use a sociocultural lens to trace how a century-old…

Between 1994 and 2014, New York City engaged in a historic overhaul of its publicly funded high schools. This included the opening of charter high schools (made possible by a 1999 state law) and the creation of new, smaller district high schools that would, in time, replace many of the city's large, traditional, comprehensive, and vocational high…

School leaders and teachers are confronted with federal, state, and local mandates that must be followed to ensure all students reach their fullest academic potential. To this end, the challenge has been raised to teachers and administrators to have younger students in the lower elementary grades prepared for standardized student testing.…

A mixed methods study is used to investigate the effectiveness of a professional development program intended to enhance teacher knowledge and student learning so as to systematically improve student achievement in elementary literacy. In this study, a large urban school district partnered with a local university to provide intervention in a Title…