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Several states had an assessment that they considered to be an alternate assessment based on modified academic achievement standards (AA-MAS) in place, or in development, when the April 2007 federal regulations on modified achievement standards were finalized. This article uses publicly available information collected by the National Center on Educational Outcomes to analyze changes in states' AA-MAS between 2007 and 2008. The article compares across the 2 years the number of states that had an assessment they considered to be an AA-MAS, states' participation guidelines, and the characteristics of these assessments. We also provide information about the number of students who participated in this assessment option during the 2006-07 school year. In 2007, six states (Kansas, Louisiana, Maryland, North Carolina, North Dakota, Oklahoma) either had or were in the process of developing an assessment they considered to be an AA-MAS. In 2008, California, Connecticut, and Texas also offered this assessment option. Six of the nine states that have been early implementers of the AA-MAS were states that had offered an out-of-level testing option until federal policies required that option to be phased out. Most states had fewer items on their AA-MAS than on their regular assessment. States that had participation guidelines for the AA-MAS in 2007 developed them prior to finalization of the federal regulations, and some changes between 2007 and 2008 in states' participation guidelines appear to have been made to better align the guidelines with the regulations. The characteristics of the assessments states consider to be AA-MASs are changing rapidly and will probably continue to change rapidly over the next few years as more is learned about the advantages and limitations of this assessment. (Contains 5 tables and 4 footnotes.)

Given the significant growth rate and geographic expansion of private school choice programs over the past two decades, it is important to examine how traditional public schools respond to the sudden injection of competition for students and resources. Although prior studies of this nature have been limited to Florida and Milwaukee, using multiple analytic strategies this paper examines the competitive impacts of the Louisiana Scholarship Program (LSP) to determine its achievement impacts on students in affected public schools. Serving 4,954 students in its first year of statewide expansion, this targeted school voucher program provides public funds for low-income students in low-performing public schools to enroll in participating private schools across the state of Louisiana. Using: (1) a school fixed effects approach; and (2) a regression discontinuity framework to examine the achievement impacts of the LSP on students in affected public schools, this competitive effects analysis reveals neutral to positive impacts that are small in magnitude. Policy implications are discussed.

This paper examines the effects of a comprehensive performance pay program implemented in high-need schools using administrative data from Louisiana. Exploiting the within-student variation in the timing of implementation, we find a large and significant effect beginning with the second year of the program on math achievement. Similar but generally insignificant point estimates are observed in social studies. As for English Language Arts and science, there are no effects of the program. We provide evidence against changes in the composition of teacher workforce and postadoption student sorting as potential explanations for our results. We then show aggregate findings from a web-survey that teachers may have altered their teaching practices following performance-based compensation. Finally, under certain assumptions, we calculate the net present value of earnings impact to be close to a million dollars per school-year for math.

Several factors contribute to the college retention rates of black students. There could be issues related to the student's own personality attributes, personal and/or family circumstances, financial factors, background events, social factors, as well as a myriad of institutional factors associated with the school system and/or a particular school itself. This paper identifies a set of 14 retention variables and categorizes them into three composite units, which are then used to address the issue of whether the various retention parameters affect black male students differently as much as they affect black female students in regard to their continuity decisions.

Education is an investment to development and poor study methods should not compromise the mandate of higher education institutions to generate, preserve and disseminate knowledge and produce high quality graduates. Universities admit students with varying backgrounds in terms of learning/study styles, levels of preparedness and concepts of university education. Some were "drilled", spoon fed, taught for exams, or have wrong purposes/values of university learning. These negatively impact on their study skills and achievement. In complementing the role played by academic staff, students need to be conscious of their personality and study ethics as they influence studying. It is futile to teach well while students lack the fundamentals to conceptualize and internalize the new knowledge. This paper proposes a paradigm shift in study methods and suggests strategies for both the lecturers and the students in universities towards improved learning and performance. The paper is based on the "distributed learning approach" to adequately cater for individual differences that exist among the students. The model is significant for university students, most of whom begin serious studying on realization that examinations are around the corner. This causes stress, confusion and tendency to cheat in examinations. Distributed learning model will address the study space needs and the efficiency and effectiveness of study methods. (Contains 1 figure.)

In the past few years, four states have established programs that provide public financial support to students who choose to attend a private school. These programs--a tax-credit-funded scholarship initiative in Florida and voucher programs in Indiana, Louisiana, and Ohio--offer a glimpse of what expansive statewide choice might look like. What have we learned about the students and schools who choose to participate in these programs? What academic outcomes have students reaped? And what does research tell us about how states should design and oversee voucher programs--if indeed they should do so at all? In this forum, we hear from Patrick J. Wolf, education policy professor at the University of Arkansas, Douglas N. Harris, professor of economics at Tulane, and the trio of Mark Berends, professor of sociology at the University of Notre Dame, R. Joseph Waddington, assistant professor at the College of Education, University of Kentucky, and Megan Austin, researcher at the American Institutes for Research, Chicago.

Purpose: This paper aims to discuss the methods that were used to do egalitarian research with ten Historically Black Colleges and Universities (HBCUs). Rather than doing research "on" these institutions, the authors worked with them to understand their successes and build upon their capacity in the science, technology, engineering and math (STEM) areas. Through this process, the authors aimed to bring exposure and interest to the practices that HBCUs use to increase and nurture success in African American students--practices that are rarely used in mainstream STEM programs and, in fact, run counter to well-established practices across STEM. The goal is to challenge traditional methods for pursuing STEM education research as the authors offer alternative methods the uplift and empower HBCUs. Design/methodology/approach: The authors used the constant comparative method in developing, testing, and writing-up the HBCU success stories. The constant comparative method collects data in a systematic way by engaging in ongoing exploration and verification of findings with key stakeholders (in this case, the teachers, students and staff at the HBCUs). Across the ten HBCUs in the sample, at least one success story or model at each institution was identified; in some instances, there were more. Findings: The research project had several implications for the social and economic health of society. First, supporting the work of HBCUs contributes to the diversification of the STEM fields and addresses the severe drought in the STEM workforce. It is without doubt that a diverse workforce--the unique perspectives and backgrounds of each individual--has a positive and significant influence on progress and innovation in any field. Despite increasingly growing minority communities across the country, many Blacks continue to face roadblocks that impede their opportunities and abilities in the K-20 pipeline and STEM education, specifically. Because HBCUs have a long history and record of tearing down those roadblocks and contributing Black students to the STEM workforce, they are prime and optimal sites for long-term investment. Second, improving the abilities of HBCUs to support student success in STEM also increases the likelihood of greater STEM minority teachers and faculty. A significant factor in the success of minority students in STEM is the opportunity to be taught and mentored by faculty members that look like them and/or deeply understand their personal background and struggles. For many Black students, the presence of a Black science professor can improve and retain student interest and aspiration in STEM. But with so few Black STEM faculty members, many students can easily fall through the cracks. Third, aside from the nation's security and health, supporting HBCUs' work in STEM student achievement represents immeasurable benefits for the individual and his/her family for many generations to come (i.e. society overall). Occupations in STEM are plentiful and fruitful for those who achieve the required credentials. Increasing opportunities for Black students to pursue these STEM careers can establish a path toward upward social mobility. The realization of these benefits is contingent upon the investment in early achievement in STEM courses. Research limitations/implications: Several research based outcomes are scheduled to result from this project, including a major policy report on HBCUs and their approaches to STEM education (co-constructed with the HBCU representatives); several peer reviewed articles (authored by us as well as the HBCU representatives); a national convening (showcasing both the best practices and the results of the HBCUs' funded capacity building projects with the HBCU representatives as the primary speakers rather than us); a website featuring the work of the 10 HBCUs, active use of social media to disseminate the findings of the project; several op-eds written for a general audience and co-authored with HBCU representatives; and an authored book published by a university press. Practical implications: Best practices gleaned from this project are being shared in a scholarly manner, but they will be shared in ways that are accessible to practitioners, including presidents, faculty, academic advisors, student success staff and other HBCU practitioners. In addition, best practices will be shared with majority colleges and universities to strengthen and improve practices more broadly in STEM. The authors are working with organizations such as the Association of American Universities, Association of Public Land Grant Universities and the American Association of Colleges and Universities to showcase the work of HBCUs and disseminate information. Social implications: Conducting research projects in which the research inquiry is co-constructed and the resulting research products are also co-constructed and even co-authored is an empowering and collaborative way to work across institutional types. More importantly, this approach brings attention to those researchers and teachers at HBCUs that are doing the day-to-day work with students, training them to be scientists, doctors and professors. Too often, only those conducting studies on STEM are credited with "discovering" success models for student learning. The authors think that those who have created these models and use them should be recognized and included in the research and dissemination process, and the authors encourage others to think more broadly and openly about collaborative research that engages the voices of HBCU researchers and students. Originality/value: This project also has much to teach others about collaborating through research. First, collaborating when conducting research related to STEM is essential, as it encourages collaboration within STEM and among STEM researchers. HBCU researchers that were a part of our project--biologists, physicist and chemists--were encouraged to work across disciplinary lines and together to understand their own STEM education practices more fully.

As the city with the largest charter-school market share in the United States, New Orleans, Louisiana exemplifies market-oriented models in education. For a city that is so "drenched in the past," the reform movement in New Orleans typically neglects historical context, often dismissing the education system pre-Katrina as simply corrupt and dysfunctional. This is an incomplete story. While national narratives and news media tend to downplay these features, there is no local consensus on the reforms. There is mistrust on both sides of the debate, and a growing opposition movement, which arises from decades of racial and political struggles, corrupt public officials, and previous experiences with the state exerting power over locally elected school boards, which disenfranchised African-Americans in New Orleans in particular. Although the new, post-Katrina educational system significantly altered political dynamics, it has not eradicated politics altogether. In this paper, I conduct a policy history of education reforms in New Orleans, connecting the historical and political context to current reform efforts. As researchers evaluate the effectiveness of the new reforms in terms of student achievement, it is important also to examine their impacts on communities and the democratic control of schools, as well as how they reproduce or break from historical patterns of political struggle and inequality.

Although school performance feedback is available in schools all over the world, there is a dearth of information about the use made of feedback and about the effects of its use. This paper presents case study research into the use of school performance feedback and its perceived effects. All schools used the feedback in writing school improvement plans, but the extent of genuine school improvement varied across schools as did the perceived effects of the use of performance feedback. The results highlight various factors which may promote or impede the use of school performance feedback and its effects. (Contains 1 figure and 7 tables.)

Preliminary research indicates that summer enrichment programs may have a positive impact on overall student development K-12, including academic motivation and engagement. The majority of this research has focused upon gifted students, although there is a burgeoning body of research detailing the impact of summer programs on at-risk or economically disadvantaged youth. This paper describes Summer Learning Camps, an innovative summer-based intervention developed and conducted by Louisiana Gaining Early Awareness and Readiness for Undergraduate Programs (LA GEAR UP) and Louisiana Tech University that targets students of low socioeconomic status attending low-performing schools. The overall purpose of the Summer Learning Camps is to motivate students to plan and prepare to enter post secondary education upon graduation from high school. Preliminary data concerning the impact of this approach on participating students are discussed. (Contains 2 tables.)

Among the academic community, there is a perception that there is an upward shift in grade point average over an extended period of time without a corresponding increase in achievement. This trend has become an alarming topic among educators, industry and the general public. Some attribute increases in GPA to improvements in student quality while others point to the emergence of a consumer-based perception of education that unjustly awards high grades. The objective of this paper is to review various opinions regarding grade inflation, investigate whether grade inflation exists in engineering curricula, and analyze the related factors. Using eight years of detailed course data from a college of engineering, we seek insight into recent grading practices within each engineering discipline. The results indicate an upward trend in grade point average and an increasing prevalence of "A" grades. However, both trends match increases in student achievement potential as measured by ACT composite score. The results also show different grade outcomes among the engineering departments and the importance of class size as a predictor of grades. (Contains 4 tables and 8 figures.)

In this article, the author observes how a combination of interrelated elements are currently changing the face of the civilizing traditions of the U.S. education and forming a new culture of childhood. These include: (1) the standardization of education; (2) the dissolution of traditional spontaneous play; and (3) the growing specter of poverty in the United States and around the world. The author compares the effects of these elements to the perfect storm. Each element has contributed its destructive force, which created an enormous potential for failure and damage to children--a sociopolitical system out of control. As such, the author suggests that reactive, standardized learning should be replaced with creative, thoughtful, introspective, interactive learning. He explains that the engine that drives high-stakes testing, dismisses the value of children's play, and ignores the poor is a political engine. The author further contends that if everyone will speak out, this storm will pass and good sense and a confluence of cultural creativity will return to the classrooms.

This paper examines the effects of a comprehensive performance pay program implemented in high‐need schools using administrative data from Louisiana. Exploiting the within‐student variation in the timing of implementation, we find a large and significant effect beginning with the second year of the program on math achievement. Similar but generally insignificant point estimates are observed in social studies. As for English Language Arts and science, there are no effects of the program. We provide evidence against changes in the composition of teacher workforce and postadoption student sorting as potential explanations for our results. We then show aggregate findings from a web‐survey that teachers may have altered their teaching practices following performance‐based compensation. Finally, under certain assumptions, we calculate the net present value of earnings impact to be close to a million dollars per school‐year for math. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

As the city with the largest charter-school market share in the United States, New Orleans, Louisiana exemplifies market-oriented models in education. For a city that is so ‘drenched in the past,’ the reform movement in New Orleans typically neglects historical context, often dismissing the education system pre-Katrina as simply corrupt and dysfunctional. This is an incomplete story. While national narratives and news media tend to downplay these features, there is no local consensus on the reforms. There is mistrust on both sides of the debate, and a growing opposition movement, which arises from decades of racial and political struggles, corrupt public officials, and previous experiences with the state exerting power over locally elected school boards, which disenfranchised African-Americans in New Orleans in particular. Although the new, post-Katrina educational system significantly altered political dynamics, it has not eradicated politics altogether. In this paper, I conduct a policy history of education reforms in New Orleans, connecting the historical and political context to current reform efforts. As researchers evaluate the effectiveness of the new reforms in terms of student achievement, it is important also to examine their impacts on communities and the democratic control of schools, as well as how they reproduce or break from historical patterns of political struggle and inequality. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

Louisiana's performance-based funding (PBF) policy is one of the most recent implementations of performance funding established by a state for accountability purposes. Instead of examining direct academic outcomes, this study focuses on tuition increase as an (un)intended outcome of PBF implementation. We use data from multiple sources to create a panel dataset of public postsecondary institutions across the United States from 2005 to 2013. Applying Difference-in-Differences and propensity score analyses procedures to estimate the causal relationship between PBF implementation and tuition levels at public institutions in Louisiana, our results indicate that treated community colleges responded to PBF by increasing tuition levels statistically significantly above that of their counterfactual institutions. While in-state tuition and fees rose statistically significantly faster at public universities in Louisiana after PBF implementation, out-of-state tuition and fees charged by the treated 4-year institutions did not significantly differ from the increases experienced at counterfactual institutions in non-PBF states. We explore possible explanations for the findings and provide implications for practices and future research. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This chapter examines one of the nation's most rigorous high stakes testing programs, the Louisiana Educational Assessment Program (LEAP). Archival data was collected and analyzed to construct a historical record of the LEAP. Results show the purpose of Louisiana's high stakes testing program was to target promotion and graduation rates following the desegregation period. Results are used to examine these lasting implications on student achievement. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

ABSTRACT BACKGROUND Recent evaluations of school choice school reforms have focused on improving academic achievement but have ignored associations with adolescent health and the risk of interpersonal violence. The innovative school choice model implemented in post-Katrina New Orleans provides a unique opportunity to examine these effects. METHODS Using a sample of approximately 1700 students from the 2009 School Health Connection Survey, the relationships between the type of school attended and depression, suicide planning, absences attributable to fears for personal safety, and threats of violence at school are examined. Multivariate regression analysis adjusting for self-selection into the type of school attended-a city-run high-performing school, a state-run failing school, or an independent charter school-estimates the effects of school type on student health. RESULTS Relative to students at state-run schools, students who choose to attend city-run schools are less likely to plan for suicide or to miss school because they are afraid of becoming victims of violence. These beneficial effects tend to be larger for students traveling from higher violence neighborhoods. The effects for charter schools are similar but less robust. CONCLUSIONS Local school jurisdictions that implement reforms allowing adolescents and their families greater freedom in school choice may also improve adolescent health. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In 2005, Hurricanes Katrina and Rita forced many children to relocate across the Southeast. While schools quickly enrolled evacuees, families in receiving schools worried about the impacts on incumbent students. We find no effect, on average, of the inflow of evacuees on achievement in Houston. In Louisiana we find little impact on average and we reject linear-in-means models. Moreover, we find that student achievement improves with high achieving peers and worsens with low achieving peers. Finally, an increase in the inflow of evacuees raised incumbent absenteeism and disciplinary problems in Houston's secondary schools. (JEL I21, Q54) [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Background: Little is known about the relationship between medical student participation in service and performance outcomes. Purpose: To examine relationships between involvement in required service learning and measures of academic and professional achievement and specialty choice. Methods: Using preexisting, self-reported data for Tulane University School of Medicine`s class of 2004, we categorized students as low, moderate, or high on commitment and involvement in service learning (CISL) and compared to multiple outcomes: class rank; election to the Alpha Oinega Alpha (AOA)Honor Society; election to the Gold Humanism in Medicine Honor Society; total percent scores on 2 multistation, structured, clinical examinations; and specialty choice per 2004 residency match results. Results: Service learning involvement was related to class rank. There was a marginal relationship between CISL and election to AOA but no association with election to the Gold Humanism in Medicine Honor Society, Year 2 or 3 clinical skills examination results, or specialty choice. Conclusions: High participation in service learning and service learning leadership identify a group of students less likely to be in the top quartile of their class yet who are making important contributions to the community and profession. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Examines the effect of school population socioeconomic status on individual academic achievement of high school students in Louisiana. Effects of family social status; Reasons for the correlation between the poverty level of the peer environment and academic achievement; Association of the disadvantages of economic standing with the disadvantages of race.

The article cites a study that investigated the consequences of teacher-student cognitive style matches and mismatches on student achievement in biology in Maryland and Louisiana. The cognitive style variable of field dependence-independence (FDI) was selected for examination of teacher-student compatibility. FDI has been extensively studied and has been shown to have definite implications for the teaching-learning process. The question of the consequences of cognitive style match-mismatch on student achievement remains open because of its complexity.

This study investigated the impact of inservice teacher training in economics on the achievement and opinions of participants and the students in subsequent economics classes that they teach. A comparison design was used, with the teacher group consisting of participants in seven inservice workshops offered by the Louisiana Council on Economic Education during the summer of 1981. In addition, each economics teacher was asked to select one of his fall, 1981 economics classes for the study. Achievement and opinions instruments were administered to teachers at the start and close of the workshops and to their students at the start and close of their fall semester economics course. Ordinary and two stage least squares regression revealed a significant direct impact of the workshops on teacher participants' achievement and opinions and an indirect impact on achievement and opinions of their students. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Phase III of the Louisiana School Effectiveness Study (LSES-III) was designed to provide rich, qualitative and quantitative data on the characteristics of more and less effective schools. Data were gathered on eight matched outlier pairs of schools. Unbeknownst to the authors at the beginning of LSES-III, four of the eight historically ineffective schools were engaged in school improvement efforts. None of these efforts was guided from the state or district. This serendipity provided an opportunity to observe improvement efforts which were of the ‘naturally occurring’ — as opposed to externally developed, mandated or otherwise offered — variety. The four projects are described, complete with five year follow-up data. The efforts are seen as falling along two dimensions: technical changes designed to raise achievement test scores; and efforts focused on a point along a continuum ranging from orderliness to excellence, and designed to raise students' academic achievement. Comparisons are made to more formally planned school improvement efforts. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]