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If school choice programs are to provide any degree of equitable access to educational opportunities, then useful information about academic quality needs to be available to all participants, not just those who hob knob with the school board members or chat with the superintendent over the backyard fence. This study draws upon a unique data set to identify two information sources (parent websites and school choice enrollment guides) associated with low-income and minority families’ selection of higher quality schools in Denver. The study also highlights two types of information lacked by low-income and minority families who ended up selecting lower quality schools. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Most members of the American public will never read this article. Instead, they will obtain much of their information about education from the news media. Yet little academic research has examined the type or quality of education research and expertise they will find there. Through the lens of gatekeeping theory, this mixed-methods study aims to address that gap by examining the prevalence of news media citations of evidence that has undergone the quality-control measure of peer review and expertise associated with academics generally required to have expertise in their fields. Results suggest that, unlike science or medical journalists, education writers virtually never cite peer-reviewed research. Nor do they use the American Educational Research Association as a resource. Academic experts are also underrepresented in news media coverage, especially when compared to government officials. Barriers between the news media and academia include structural differences between research on education and the medical or life sciences as well as journalists’ lack of knowledge of the definition and value of peer review and tendency to apply and misapply news values to social science research and expertise. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

The purpose of this study was to inform the upcoming and overdue reauthorization of the Elementary and Secondary Education Act (ESEA) by exploring whether rural school districts face disadvantages as they attempt to follow the law's provisions and, if so, if the law's rural-specifi c section ameliorates these disadvantages. The research drew upon interviews and survey results from rural Colorado as well as from a comparison group of non-rural school districts in the state. The fi ndings suggest that rural districts are indeed uniquely administratively disadvantaged when it comes to the law. However, they also share certain challenges with their non-rural counterparts. The article concludes with policy recommendations that address challenges experienced by districts across the rural-urban continuum as well as challenges that are specifi c to the rural context. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This study examines the feasibility of preparing students for both college and careers by analyzing data from a school reform model in which students are encouraged to take rigorous college preparatory courses while also focusing on career concentrations. This study draws upon data from that program, High Schools that Work, to explore the degree to which such "dual enrollers" are able to also attain academic results that are similar to the results of students who focus exclusively on preparing for college. Findings suggest that, collectively, "dual enrollers" achieve lower 12th-grade test scores than their college prep peers. However, these overall results mask the fact that dual enrollers in certain career concentrations actually outperform or equal those who focus exclusively on preparing for college. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]