Since the passing of the No Child Left Behind (NCLB) in 2001, schools receiving federal funding must administer a state standardized assessment annually and meet performance standards in selected grade levels and content areas. Although it seems reasonable to assume frequency of teacher absenteeism affects student achievement, research has not…

Observational methods are increasingly being used in classrooms to evaluate the quality of teaching. Operational procedures for observing teachers are somewhat arbitrary in existing measures and vary across different instruments. To study the effect of different observation procedures on score reliability and validity, we conducted an experimental…

This exploratory correlational study seeks to answer the question of whether a relationship exists between student average test score gains on state exams and teachers' rating of values on the Schwartz Values Survey. Eighty-seven randomly selected Kansas teachers of math and/or reading, grades four through eight, participated. Student test score…

Since 2005, the National Indian Education Study (NIES) has provided educators, policymakers, and the public with information about the background and academic performance of fourth- and eighth-grade American Indian and Alaska Native (AI/AN) students in the United States. NIES was administered in 2005, 2007, 2009, and 2011 as part of the National…

Finland and Singapore are both nations that have excelled in mathematics on international assessments, such as the Programme for International Student Assessment (PISA) and the Trends in International Mathematics and Science Study (TIMSS). Evidence of Finland's educational success emerged with the outcome of the first PISA study in 2000. Since…