Recent research shows that U.S. 15-year-olds are behind their international counterparts in problem solving and mathematics literacy, ranking 24th of 29 nations (Lemke et al. 2004). Therefore, a key concern among policymakers and educators is improving the quantitative and analytical skills of American youth, who face job prospects in an economy…

Using the High School and Beyond 1980 to 1982 Longitudinal Study data base, this paper focuses on cognitive growth as evidenced by changing scores on achievement tests of adolescents during their last two years of high school. The analysis had two major phases: (1) a descriptive analysis which provided a variety of cross tabulations of change in…

A study of the correlates of cognitive achievement in Pennsylvania's Educational Quality Assessment Program was conducted by examining both individual (student level) and ecological (building level) correlations. Analyses were completed for grade levels 5, 8 and 11 for the 1985 state assessment. Twenty-four student derived condition variables or…