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A mixed methodology study measuring the usage rates of Augmented Reality (AR) information overlay mapping time-on-task in informal learning environments at a local art museum. This study investigates whether AR systems provide a uniquely beneficial learning context due to AR's native function to overlay information onto physical spaces at an art museum and the impact on participant perceived self-efficacy and overall engagement within the AR-enhanced environment. Participants also took part in an open-ended survey within the application. The quantitative data collected suggest that participants were highly engaged and utilized the application at the art museum extensively (N = 143); the qualitative results indicated that AR participants were exceedingly motivated and perceived an enhanced sense of engagement with the exhibit sites. [For the complete volume, "Educational Media and Technology Yearbook, Volume 42," see ED600543.]

What are the linkages between school-based governance and instructional change? This paper describes how two ATLAS schools developed the linkage between school-based governance and instructional change. (ATLAS means "communities for Authentic Teaching, Learning and Assessment for all Students"). ATLAS was funded by the New American Schools Development Corporation (NASDC). Data were gathered through interviews with each school's planning and management team and with individuals in school leadership roles. The paper summarizes the chronology of program implementation in each school. A conclusion is that the schools eventually organized around both management and instructional issues, although their approaches were based on the local context and the "home" organizations of the ATLAS facilitators. Both schools ended with stronger instructional programs and stronger planning-management teams. ATLAS functioned as a catalyst for change. The outcomes point to the importance of the school context (factors that affect implementation) and principals with facilitative leadership styles. Two tables are included. (Contains 22 references.) (LMI)

A model for improving school and classroom effectiveness must pay attention to: (1) leadership; (2) school climate; (3) supervision; (4) teacher behaviors; (5) student behaviors; and (6) student achievement. Chapter 1 of this book on effective schools and classrooms introduces these important issues and describes a model incorporating these issues. Chapter 2 reviews research about student and teacher behaviors and how they affect classroom effectiveness. Chapter 3 suggests ways administrators can help teachers promote student involvement, coverage, and success through positive supervision. Research concerning effective schools is the topic of chapter 4, and chapter 5 demonstrates how indicators of effective schools are grouped into the more general categories of school climate and leadership. Chapter 6 uses a hypothetical case study to show how school leadership processes can promote a school climate where there is an academic emphasis, an orderly environment, and expectations for success. The chapter ends with suggestions for superintendents and school boards for improving student achievement. Chapter 7 includes a questionnaire for assessing a school's effectiveness. The eighth chapter discusses principles of the school improvement process. A summary is offered in the ninth chapter, and appendices provide information on monitoring student behavior and the policy statement of a school district on school effectiveness. (JMK)

This study reviews and synthesizes research on factors that are correlated with school effectiveness. Effectiveness may be determined by high achievement on standardized tests; low rates of violence, vandalism, delinquency, and behavior problems; and high attendence. Indicators of effectiveness encompass two levels, classroom and school. Schools that are effective spend more time on task and have a principal who supports an academic focus. Research indicates that a school's social processes (consensus building, modeling, and feedback) determine whether a school will perform above expectations. When students perceived the results of faculty-administration consensus on academics and discipline to be fair, firm, and consistent, school outcomes were better than expected. The dominant model in the school is the principal, his or her behavior will influence students. Consistent feedback which recognizes and supports success is also a significant factor in school effectiveness. The findings further suggest that two fundamental beliefs are correlated with student achievement: student belief that their actions will affect their future, and teacher belief that each child can succeed. (Author/JK)

The curriculum matrix is a tool to help curriculum coordinators, principals, and superintendents specify, justify, and align curriculum and instructional time to district specified standards. The problem the curriculum matrix solves is connecting the curriculum; that is, tracing an idea from initial justification to its placement in the curriculum and to the time allotments and activities used to instruct children. Six basic tasks of curriculum development are described, and uses of the curriculum matrix are suggested for the last four tasks (the first two to be accomplished prior to the use of the matrix): (1) describing existing instruction; (2) constructing district standards for subject areas; (3) aligning and modifying instructional descriptions to meet district standards; (4) managing and assessing instructional units; (5) updating and refining curricula; and (6) deducing the district's philosophy of education. Sample instrumentation is included in the appendix: a content outline for reading/language arts, a set of objectives indexed by content area, and an enumerated list of reading/language arts objectives for grade 1, all from Red Bank (New Jersey) Public Schools, where the curriculum matrix has been successfully implemented. (TE)

This paper analyzes mastery learning as an alternative to curriculum planning and discusses implementation of the strategy in a prekindergarten through eighth-grade school district in Red Bank, New Jersey. The paper briefly describes district schools and circumstances affecting the school board's decision to implement mastery learning; discusses program assumptions; and reviews how curriculum tools ensure increasing congruence among curricular, instructional, student, and organizational outcomes. Curriculum is defined to include all consciously-written plans influencing student outcomes. Assumptions about the learner, teacher, purpose of schooling, and nature of knowledge are explicated. Mastery learning assumes that students become similar to one another in learning ability under favorable conditions. Because most children master the curriculum, reform aspires toward a unified curriculum. Knowledge is transmitted in small increments. The structure of knowledge lends coherence (Piaget 1970); therefore, students apply learned generalizations to diverse contexts. The study presents a model developed at Red Bank with incremental instructional units and a "generic" cycle with corrective activities. As student achievement increases, revised unit objectives accommodate those entering grade levels with more of the skills necessary for mastery. Curriculum committees link budgets with improved student outcomes; personnel policies are reviewed for congruency with goals. Nineteen references are appended. (CJH)

Predictive evaluation of educational software is problematic because such instructional materials should be evaluated only setting by setting. A situated approach suggests that appropriate evaluation can be performed by considering interactions between the three principal actors in the development and use of the software: teacher, designer, and student. The approach is illustrated by evaluating a recent CD-ROM. (PEN)

Site-management designs generally fail to establish structures and processes that help school communities work through cultural change. The Comer School Development Program succeeds because it supports a change in school culture and focuses on children's development, not just their speech, language, and intellectual capabilities. Lessons from Dallas schools are discussed. (12 references) (MLH)

Discussion of the predictive evaluation of educational software, i.e. the evaluation of software prior to its intended use, focuses on a model known as the Jigsaw Model, which attempts to integrate usability and educational issues. Highlights include the failure of checklists for evaluation and two studies that tested the model with practicing teachers. (LRW)

Surveys existing checklists and investigates the extent to which they enable the expression of useful assessments for software selection. Problems and limitations are noted, with an emphasis on predominantly technical attributes of packages at the expense of consideration of broader classroom environments and activities, learning processes, and other education issues. (Author/AEF)

Discusses a new paradigm for choosing educational software, based on the perspectives of the teacher, student, and designer; describes a study of the use of this paradigm by a group of teachers. Results indicated the paradigm helped assessors to articulate a holistic awareness of educational issues, enabling a coherent review of pedagogical, curriculum, and learning issues. (Author/AEF)

We develop integrated instruments and platforms suitable for economical, frequent space access for autonomous life science experiments and processes in outer space. The technologies represented by three of our recent free-flyer small-satellite missions are the basis of a rapidly growing toolbox of miniaturized biologically/biochemically-oriented instrumentation now enabling a new generation of in-situ space experiments. Autonomous small satellites (~ 1 50 kg) are less expensive to develop and build than fullsize spacecraft and not subject to the comparatively high costs and scheduling challenges of human-tended experimentation on the International Space Station, Space Shuttle, and comparable platforms. A growing number of commercial, government, military, and civilian space launches now carry small secondary science payloads at far lower cost than dedicated missions; the number of opportunities is particularly large for so-called cube-sat and multicube satellites in the 1 10 kg range. The recent explosion in nano-, micro-, and miniature technologies, spanning fields from telecommunications to materials to bio/chemical analysis, enables development of remarkably capable autonomous miniaturized instruments to accomplish remote biological experimentation. High-throughput drug discovery, point-of-care medical diagnostics, and genetic analysis are applications driving rapid progress in autonomous bioanalytical technology. Three of our recent missions exemplify the development of miniaturized analytical payload instrumentation: GeneSat-1 (launched: December 2006), PharmaSat (launched: May 2009), and O/OREOS (organism/organics exposure to orbital stresses; scheduled launch: May 2010). We will highlight the overall architecture and integration of fluidic, optical, sensor, thermal, and electronic technologies and subsystems to support and monitor the growth of microorganisms in culture in these small autonomous space satellites, including real-time tracking of their culture density, gene expression, and metabolic activity while in the space environment. Flight data and results will be presented from GeneSat-1, which tracked gene expression levels of GFP-labeled E. coli and from PharmaSat, which monitored the dose dependency of an antifungal agent against S. cerevisiae. The O/OREOS SESLO instrument, which will study the effects of radiation and microgravity upon the viability and growth characteristics of B. subtilis and the halophile Halorubrum chaoviatoris for periods of 0 - 6 months in space, will be described as well. The ongoing expansion of the small satellite toolbox of biological technologies will be summarized.

The purpose of this study was to describe the meaning of supervisors' perceptions of a positive supervisory experience. Unlike most research in supervision, which focuses on specific variables related to the outcomes of supervision, this study seeks to describe the constellation of meanings inherent in the experience of positive supervision. A phenomenological methodology, with its emphasis on fidelity to experience and description of fundamental meanings, was deemed appropriate. An extensive review of the literature on supervision in the fields of teacher and counselor education, social work, and psychotherapy is the basis for the study. Field interviews were conducted with two educational administrators, one social worker, and one counselor; all had responsibility for training and evaluating professionals. The interviews were analyzed using a content analysis procedure involving careful reflection in order to reduce the data into its essential components. These components were integrated into a description of the fundamental structure of supervisors' experiences in positive supervision. It is hoped that this description might suggest appropriate methods for school supervision and also suggest appropriate supervision standards for teacher evaluation, teacher improvement, counseling effectiveness, counselor training, and administrative training, through the description of the supervisor's perceptions of the helping relationship inherent in the teacher-administrator relationship. (Author/JM)

ISSUE: Compared with other high-income countries, the United States spends the most per capita on prescription drugs. GOAL: To compare drug spending levels and trends in the U.S. and nine other high-income countries -- Australia, Canada, France, Germany, the Netherlands, Norway, Sweden, Switzerland, and the United Kingdom; consider potential explanations for higher U.S. spending; and explore patients' exposure to pharmaceutical costs. METHOD: Analysis of health data from the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development, the 2016 Commonwealth Fund International Health Policy Survey, and other sources. FINDINGS AND CONCLUSIONS: Various factors contribute to high per capita drug spending in the U.S. While drug utilization appears to be similar in the U.S. and the nine other countries considered, the prices at which drugs are sold in the U.S. are substantially higher. These price differences appear to at least partly explain current and historical disparities in spending on pharmaceutical drugs. U.S. consumers face particularly high out-of-pocket costs, both because the U.S. has a large uninsured population and because cost-sharing requirements for those with coverage are more burdensome than in other countries. Most Americans support reducing pharmaceutical costs. International experience demonstrates that policies like universal health coverage, insurance benefit design that restricts out-of-pocket spending, and certain price control strategies, like centralized price negotiations, can be effective. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Recent research has called attention to an unexpected rise in death rates among middle-aged, white Americans between 1999 and 2014. The full extent of the phenomenon may be underappreciated, however. If one assumes, based on historical trends, that mortality rates should have declined by 1.8 percent per year, then whites in 2014 had higher-than-expected mortality rates from age 19 to age 65. Furthermore, while increased substance abuse and suicides explain the elevated mortality rates for younger adults, middle-aged whites also seem to be experiencing stalled or rising mortality rates for most ailments and diseases. While a national phenomenon, middle-aged whites face much more adverse mortality trends in certain states and regions. The especially broad reach of these negative mortality trends suggests there is an urgent need for further investigation of its causes and potential remedies. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This analysis draws upon data from the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development and other cross-national analyses to compare health care spending, supply, utilization, prices, and health outcomes across 13 high-income countries: Australia, Canada, Denmark, France, Germany, Japan, Netherlands, New Zealand, Norway, Sweden, Switzerland, the United Kingdom, and the United States. These data predate the major insurance provisions of the Affordable Care Act. In 2013, the U.S. spent far more on health care than these other countries. Higher spending appeared to be largely driven by greater use of medical technology and higher health care prices, rather than more frequent doctor visits or hospital admissions. In contrast, U.S. spending on social services made up a relatively small share of the economy relative to other countries. Despite spending more on health care, Americans had poor health outcomes, including shorter life expectancy and greater prevalence of chronic conditions. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]