Education Policy Analysis Archives (EPAA)
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Democratic Education Across School Types: Evidence for the U.S. from NHES99
Clive R. Belfield
This article reports on the differences in democratic education across school types, using the US National Household Education Survey (NHES) of 1999. We replicate the estimation approach of Campbell (1998) and find a strongly positive effect from attendance at Catholic school or private independent schools on community service participation, civic skills, civic confidence, political knowledge and political tolerance. The results are reasonably robust to alternative specifications. We consider the implications of these results for policy.
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Chronic Teacher Turnover in Urban Elementary Schools
Kacey Guin
This study examines the characteristics of elementary schools that experience chronic teacher turnover and the impacts of turnover on a school’s working climate and ability to effectively function. …
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Co-Education and Gender: The End of the Experiment?
Ian Clark
This article has two inseparable aims: (a) to analyze the relative merits of single-sex and co-educational constructs on self-concept, academic performance and academic engagement; (b) to investigate the manner in which each type of schooling interacts with the individual student; student “peers,” close family, and teachers.
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Concepciones Sobre Curriculum, El Contenido Escolar y El Profesor En Los Procesos De Elaboración De Textos Curriculares En Argentina
Alejandra Amantea, Graciela Cappelletti, Estela Cols, and Silvina Feeney
This work analyzes curriculum development processes that have taken place in Argentina during the period 1980-2000. The purpose of this article is to identify the main trends in the conceptions used by the key actors/designers of curriculum for school content, curricular texts and teachers ́ place as interpreters of curricular texts. ...
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Voices from the Frontlines: Teachers' Perceptions of High-Stakes Testing
Brett D. Jones and Robert J. Egley
The purpose of this study was to investigate whether teachers perceived Florida’s high-stakes testing program to be taking public schools in the right direction. More importantly, we sought to understand why teachers perceived the tests to be taking schools in the right or wrong direction. ...
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Qualidade e Eqüidade na Educação Básica Brasileira: A Evidência do SAEB-2001
José Francisco Soares
This work uses data from SAEB–National System for Evaluation of Basic Education–to describe the cognitive achievement of 4th, 8th and 11th grade Brazilian basic education students. The achievement is measured on a scale that is the same for all grade levels. The test items are chosen to cover a synthesis of the curriculum frameworks of all Brazilian states. The achievement level of the great majority of the students does not meet the officially recommended levels. ...
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The Influence of Socioeconomic Factors on Kentucky's Public School Accountability System: Does Poverty Impact School Effectiveness?
Robert Lyons
... Results of this study showed that 39.9% to 55.5% of the variance of the CATS [Commonwealth Accountability Testing System] indices was shared by school socioeconomic factors. Analysis of this interim target model for the 2000-2002 biennium showed that for elementary and middle schools this model negated the biasing effects of socioeconomic factors, but not for high schools. ...
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Reclassification of English Learners
James B. Grissom
Ron Unz, originator of Proposition 227, claimed, prior to the passage of Prop. 227, that the five percent annual reclassification rate of English learners to fluent English proficient indicated bilingual education was a failure. Critics of Prop. 227 have countered that the annual reclassification rate has changed little since the passage of Prop. 227, indicating the new legislation had no effect on reclassification rates. Unfortunately, the annual reclassification rate does not provide a clear indicator of how long it takes students to be reclassified after entering the school system. To better estimate reclassification rates for English learners in California, cohorts were created to track the same groups of students over time. ...
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Factores Predictivos del Rendimiento Escolar, Deserción e Ingreso a Educación Secundaria en una Muestra de Estudiantes de Zonas Rurales del Perú
Santiago Cueto
The educational system in Peru has many challenges to conquer, among them providing student populations in high poverty areas with quality service. Rural students are one of the groups that represent an important challenge, because they often speak an indigenous language and study in classrooms that combine a wide variety of ages and grades under a single teacher. This study used a longitudinal design to follow a group of students in 20 public schools in two rural areas. ...
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Southern Association of Colleges and Schools Accreditation: Impact on Elementary Student Performance
Darlene Y. Bruner and Lance Lamar Brantley
Currently, 848 Georgia public elementary schools that house third- and fifth-grades in the same building use the Southern Association of Colleges and Schools (SACS) accreditation as a school improvement model. The purpose of this investigation was to determine whether elementary schools that are SACS accredited increased their levels of academic achievement at a higher rate over a five-year period than elementary schools that were not SACS accredited as measured by the Iowa Test of Basic Skills (ITBS). ...
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Interrogating the Generalizability of Portfolio Assessments of Beginning Teachers: A Qualitative Study
Pamela A. Moss, LeeAnn M. Sutherland, Laura Haniford, Renee Miller, and David Johnson
This qualitative study is intended to illuminate factors that affect the generalizability of portfolio assessments of beginning teachers. By generalizability, we refer here to the extent to which the portfolio assessment supports generalizations from the particular evidence reflected in the portfolio to the conception of competent teaching reflected in the standards on which the assessment is based. ...
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Reasonable Decisions in Portfolio Assessment: Evaluating Complex Evidence of Teaching
Aaron Schutz and Pamela A. Moss
A central dilemma of portfolio assessment is that as the richness of the data available to readers increases, so do the challenges involved in ensuring acceptable reliability among readers. Drawing on empirical and theoretical work in discourse analysis, ethnomethodology, and other fields, we argue that this dilemma results, in part, from the fact that readers cannot avoid forming the data of a portfolio into a pattern—a coherent "story" or "stories"—in order to evaluate it. ...
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Colorado's Voucher Law: Examining the Claim of Fiscal Neutrality
Kevin G. Welner
Colorado's voucher law was declared unconstitutional by the Colorado Supreme Court on June 28, 2004. Voucher supporters have begun drafting revised legislation designed to address the legal problem. This article calls into question the key financial claim of revenue neutrality—a claim that was central to the promotion and passage of the departing voucher law. ...
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Modeling School Choice: A Comparison of Public, Private-Independent, Private-Religious and Home-Schooled Students
Clive R. Belfield
U.S. students now have four choices of schooling: public schooling, private–religious schooling, private–independent schooling, and home-schooling. … Here, we use two recent large-scale datasets to assess the school enrollment decision: the first is the National Household Expenditure Survey (1999), and the second is micro-data on SAT test-takers in 2001. ...
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High-Stakes Testing in the Warm Heart of Africa: The Challenges and Successes of the Malawi National Examinations Board
Elias Chakwera, Dafter Khembo, and Stephen G. Sireci
… The purposes of this paper are to (a) familiarize the measurement community in the US about Malawi’s assessment programs, (b) discuss some of the unique challenges inherent in such a program, (c) compare testing conditions and test administration formats between Malawi and the US, and (d) provide suggestions for improving large-scale testing in countries such as the US and Malawi. ...
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Gender-Segregated Education in Saudi Arabia: Its Impact on Social Norms and the Saudi Labor Market
Roula Baki
This article examines the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia's gender-segregated higher education system and how it is used to transmit the Kingdom's traditional societal expectations to the employment sector. …
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Educación en Valores y Diferencia Sexual: Realidad y políticas educativas en el contexto español
Isabela Carrillo
This article deals with the policies promoted during the conservati Spanish government of the partido popular and the changes implemented by the 2002 Act of Educational quality and their impact on gender issues, in particular women’s human rights. ...
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Do EMO-operated Character Schools Serve Disadvantaged Students?: The Influence of State Policies
Natalie Lacireno-Paquet
… By combining data from the US Department of Education’s Schools and Staffing Survey with data on the characteristics of state charter school policies, this article examines how different types of charter schools respond to the policy and market signals established by state charter legislation, and the impact of such signals on the willingness and ability of charter schools to serve disadvantaged student populations. ...
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Growth and Financing of Elementary Education in Uttar Pradesh: A Province in India
P. Geetha Rani
The present article attempts to study financing patterns of elementary education in Uttar Pradesh. ...
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Effective Technology Delivery in Nigerian Polytechnics: Need for Academic Manpower Development Policy
J. K. Adeyemi and E. E. Uko-Aviomoh
[T]eacher adequacy is a function of many factors, which include funding, student enrollment overtime, and staff turnover. This article, however, revealed a mismatch between enrollment and available teachers, with huge staff shortfall over the years when the student enrollment was matched with the available teachers, using the ideal teacher-student ratios. ...
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The Influence of School Policy and Practice on Mathematics Achievement During Transitional Periods
Janet K. Holt and Cynthia Campbell
In this study, the effects of school policies and practices on math achievement growth, as students transitioned from middle to high school, were examined while controlling for school contextual variables. …
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The Effects of Performance Budgeting and Funding Programs on Graduate Rate in Public Four-Year Colleges and Universities
Jung-cheol Shin
This study was conducted to determine whether states with performance budgeting and funding (PBF) programs had improved institutional performance of higher education over the five years (1997 through 2001) considered in this study. ...
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Income and Financial Aid Effects on Persistence and Degree Attainment in Public Colleges
Alicia C. Dowd
This study examined the distribution of financial aid among financially dependent four-year college students and the effectiveness of different types of financial aid in promoting student persistence and timely bachelor's degree attainment. …
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Un Estudio Multinivel Sobre los Factores de Eficacia Escolar en Países en Desarrollo: El Caso de los Recursos en Brasil
José Luis Gaviria, Rosario Martínez-Arias, and María Castro
Classic research on school effectiveness ensures that the material resources of schools do not have any relevant effects on the academic performance of the pupils. Such research was carried out in developed countries, with no serious economic problems. This research is based on a secondary data analysis from the evaluation of basic education in Brazil in 1995. ...
