What difference does education make for young adults' engagement in politics and social issues? This study is part of the OECD's Centre for Educational Research and Innovation (CERI) project on "Measuring the Social Outcomes of Learning" (SOL). It discusses relevant international research, with special attention to studies in the Nordic…

The Canadian Bureau for International Education (CBIE) regularly evaluates the experience of international students in Canada through a benchmarking survey. Canada First 2009 represents the fourth time CBIE has conducted this research. Previous editions appeared in 1988, 1999 and 2004. This year's survey used a revised questionnaire similar to…

Students' orientations to learning, their perceptions of gain from their studies at Great Britain's Open University, and their development as learners were studied. Thirty students were followed from their first university course, the Social Science Foundation Course, through their two subsequent years of study, using in-depth interviews to…

A study was conducted at Northern Virginia Community College (NVCC) to determine the relationship between student educational objectives and retention/attrition rates. The study followed 4,502 students who came to the college for the first time in winter 1985 for five quarters, through winter 1986. The students were asked to indicate their…

Academic and career plans and experiences of students in their freshman and senior years were compared. The 280 students first entered the State University of New York at Buffalo (SUNY/B) in the fall semester of 1976 and graduated in the spring of 1980. Students were administered the College Student Perceptions Survey and a followup survey, which…

The relative influence of gender, coursework, affect, and other hypothesized determinants of mathematics achievement among high school seniors was examined, using data from the High School and Beyond (HSB) database. The HSB base-year survey used a multi-stage sampling scheme. Complete data on the variables of this study were available for 16,358…

This report uses motivation theory, social and cognitive development theory, and a construct, Definition of Reality (DOR), to explain why the black students of the District of Columbia Public Schools (DCPS) do less well on the Comprehensive Tests of Basic Skills as they progress from elementary school into high school. The report is divided into 8…

Research on grades 9-12 in an elite, coeducational private school in an urban area examined the effects of the school's social organization on students' commitment to educational goals and their sense of academic purpose. The author gathered data through 2 years of participant observation as a teacher-researcher and through questionnaire…

A representative sample of 987 entering freshmen (45 percent male and 55 percent female) at the University of Maryland, College Park (UMCP), were surveyed regarding their attitudes and demographic characteristics during two-day summer orientation sessions. The typical UMCP freshman was from an upper-middle class home, earned at least a B average…

A total of 903 seventh grade students in Detroit, Michigan responded to a questionnaire that was designed to measure the impact of the city's desegregation plan on their attitudes. The questionnaire focused on several areas including educational aspirations, student racial relations, attitudes toward race, and school conditions which affect…

It is often suggested that black girls may have a somewhat harder time adjusting to desegregated schools than black boys but that just the opposite is true for white children. This conclusion is based on a relatively small number of studies which have focused on assessing the impact of desegregation on factors such as students' self-esteem or…

In the spring of 1975, a manpower survey was conducted to determine the educational, occupational, and career plans of college students in Indiana who were about to complete the requirements for an associate degree. Fifty percent (1,467) of the expected associate degree recipients from public institutions, and all 623 of the expected reciPients…

In order to determine the preferences and perceptions of Native Alaska students attending Bureau of Indian Affairs (BIA) boarding schools, a survey instrument was devised to reveal the BIA student's background; future plans; and his projected feelings relative to school facilities, personnel, curricula, and interpersonal relationships. Respondents…

Standord University's Institute for Communication Research was asked in 1968 to conduct an evaluation of a new instructional television (ITV) system in El Salvador: to study the effects of ITV on El Salvador's school system; to derive conclusions from the experience that might help guide other nations interested in applying instructional…

A follow-up study of the first students to finish the Third Cycle (grades 8, 9, and 10) under El Salvador's Educational Reform Program interviewed 400 students. It assessed their educational and career plans, examined the Reform's influence on them, and measured their attitudes toward their experience. Results showed that 90 percent were…