Over the last five years, the U.S. Department of Education (USED) is requiring states to provide more and better evidence supporting the quality and validity of their assessment and accountability systems. Notably, states are asked to explain more fully how the proposed design of their systems will provide accurate and reliable information that…

Nebraska's Educational Service Units (ESUs) are under threat of de-funding, consolidation, and even elimination. For too long, the ESUs have been an invisible asset to school districts, providing equity to our rural schools, and expertise to our more urban schools. ESUs work from the expectation of efficiency and effectiveness, to be good stewards…

This paper examines and critiques the accountability movement, high-stakes testing, and their relationship to the achievement gap. Analyzing the issues in the context of Texas, the paper discusses dropout rates that were incorrectly identified and reported, the role of courts and specific court cases in high-stakes testing, ethical considerations,…

Education policy has the potential to eradicate opportunity and achievement gaps. For those on the ground enacting policy, however, it can be difficult to translate it into optimal strategies for helping all students achieve. The Every Student Succeeds Act (ESSA) is a way for state education agencies (SEAs), local education agencies (LEAs), and…

The current NCLB/ESSA-generation [No Child Left Behind/Every Student Succeeds Act] of pre-service teachers in the U.S. received their K-12 schooling during the standardized test-focused education accountability era. There is little research exploring how they perceive the disconnect between their K-12 teacher-centered, test-focused school…

The federal Race to the Top initiative signified a shift in American education policy whereby accountability efforts moved from the school to the teacher level. Using administrative data from Tennessee, we explore whether evaluation reforms differentially influenced mobility patterns for teachers of varying effectiveness. We find that the rollout…

Replication research provides evidence to establish, refute, or support evidence-based practices. Systematic replications are also necessary to determine "what works for whom when." The purpose of this study was to conduct a conceptual systematic replication to evaluate the effectiveness of a multicomponent treatment package on…

With more rigorous standards and testing at the forefront of educational reform across the nation, the rural school district in this study developed a strategic compensation plan with bonus pay based on student test scores as a teacher success incentive. A causal-comparative study was conducted to examine the effect of teacher merit pay levels on…

The rapid emergence and authorization of statewide, fully online, virtual charter schools has resulted in the need for states to identify potentially inequitable effects of disability service funding policies. This article describes state funding policies and the designation of responsibilities regarding the provision of special education services…

Courts have long held that public school teachers are "state actors" when they carry out the duties of their job. Despite this, very few teacher preparation programs include an education law class. In order to understand teachers' legal literacy, a survey was given to 300 public school teachers in Indiana. The survey assessed knowledge…

The current study explores how principals (n = 568) experience a new teacher evaluation model under Race to the Top. Findings suggest that principals felt the least confident in their ability to identify teacher behaviors associated with student achievement gains and placed the least value on student achievement data. Evaluation experience…

As an early Common Core booster, Michael Petrilli had hoped that by now--10 years after most states adopted the standards--the nation's schools would have logged tangible improvements in teaching and learning that resulted in higher student achievement. In this article, Petrilli reviews what Common Core is and discusses the work ahead that is…

Parent involvement in a child's education has been demonstrated to increase child maintenance and generalization of skills taught in early intensive behavioral intervention (EIBI) settings to their home environments, improve parent-child relationships, and decrease parent stress. Parent coaching is a way to support parents' development of…

One of the biggest challenges that states and local intermediaries face in setting up and scaling high-quality youth apprenticeships is gathering relevant, accurate and actionable data. High-quality data is an essential ingredient for a strong youth apprenticeship program because it equips state and local leaders to evaluate impact, monitor…

The Pathways for Academic Career and Employment (PACE) program is established to provide funding to community colleges for the development of programs that will lead to gainful, quality, in-state employment for members of target populations by providing them with both effective academic training to ensure gainful employment and customized support…