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This article explores ways to improve the use and usefulness of four large and independently developed U.S. Education Department (ED) school-based data collections: the annual EDFacts’ stud...

The report, Evaluation of the National Assessment of Educational Progress, provides a number of recommendations for addressing validity concerns about NAEP. This article identifies actions that could be taken by the Congress, the National Center for Education Statistics, and the National Assessment Governing Board— which share responsibility for NAEP's validity— in responding to those concerns.

A useful evaluation of an education program is one that adds to the body of timely, relevant evidence to increase the likelihood that policy decisions improve program performance. This definition focuses on performance rather than change and recognizes that studies can’t guarantee the use of their findings but can only increase the likelihood of such use. Adding to the body of sound program evidence is the evaluators’ main method for influencing programs. Unprecedented congressional demand for scientifically sound evaluation evidence will lead investigators to conduct experiments and systematic reviews to rigorously answer causal program questions. But not all questions related to improving education program performance are causal, and other useful methodologies utilize scientifically valid, large-scale surveys and case studies to evaluate program outcomes and better understand implementation. The experience of the U.S. Department of Education demonstrates that well-designed, timely evaluations using scientifically valid methodologies tailored to important questions can make important contributions to legislative, budget, and administrative decisions to improve the performance of government-funded programs.

A new administration that advocates budget reductions, program consolidations, and deregulations in domestic policy is bringing major changes to the federal Department of Education. Created just a year ago, the department administers many programs that were forged in the 1960s and 1970s to increase equity and quality in the nation's schools. While the authors strongly endorse the purposes of these programs, it is contended that the prospect of reforming the overall program structure should be welcomed since it offers a chance to make the federal role more effective. Several new conditions suggest a need for reform: new social and fiscal problems have revealed the inflexibility of existing programs; many state governments are now addressing concerns that were once exclusively federal; the proliferation of programs and controls may impede effective educational practice; and research findings have challenged old beliefs about how to influence the schools. These arguments for reform are reviewed, and four str...

In this paper, we use the nationally representative “High School and Beyond” ( National Center for Education Statistics [NCES], 1983 ) data to examine the relationship between a wide range of values that stress the notion of responsibility and high school students’ achievement test scores, grades, discipline problems, and dropout status. We also examine the extent to which students’ behaviors outside of school (e.g., watching television, doing homework, reading, and working for pay) mediate the relationship between values and high school outcomes. Two structural equation models—one using attainment levels as outcomes and one using change scores as outcomes—are analyzed. Results from both models show that when students, their parents, and their peers believe in values and accompanying behaviors that stress responsibility, students have a better chance of achieving success in high school. Values are found to have both direct effects on school outcomes and indirect effects through out-of-school behaviors. The effect of values as a whole is consistently larger than the effect of socioeconomic status (SES) when predicting both level of student performance and changes in student performance.

The High School and Beyond Survey was used to describe young men who are at risk of becoming teenage fathers and examine the causal process leading to early fathering for young men. Bivariate results show that men who are at risk of fathering children at a young age have unique attitudes and family, school, and dating experiences. Multivariate analyses suggest that the most cogent factors affecting teenage fathering include being black, going steady, and having unorthodox views about parenting outside of marriage.

This study explores reform strategies which the Department of Education has introduced to improve the quality and use of its evaluations. These reforms respond to concerns identified in major reports that were extremely critical of the department's methodological and managerial approach to conducting evaluation studies. Four types of reforms are examined: (1) organiza tional changes to improve operations, (2) expanded design approaches to strengthen method ological practices, (3) new standards to ensure evaluation quality, and (4) shifts in fiscal support to promote underfunded evaluation activities. The article also discusses the importance of developing a mutually supportive relationship between evaluators and policymakers.

In 1984 the wall chart of State Education Statistics broke the historic silence on reporting state-by-state comparisons of student performance. Prior to its release, chief state school officers and the education establishment had been protected from disclosure of poor performance by the states in education. The wall chart, by laying out the facts in straightforward detail, exposed our national shortcomings in education and focused attention on the states where much of education policymaking takes place. This article reports on the history of the wall chart, addresses the criticisms that followed its release, and assesses its impact. It goes on to propose recommendations for improving the usefulness of state-by-state rankings. The insights it offers on designing state education comparisons may be particularly helpful as the nation and states undertake the expansion of the National Assessment of Educational Progress to report on student performance at the state level.

The effect of changes in state revenue, property wealth, and enrollment from 1969–1970 to 1976–1977 on the equality of total educational revenue was investigated for nineteen states with available data. An exploratory two-stage methodology allowed a simulation of the effects of holding each of these factors at their 1969–1970 values and comparing the result with 1976–1977 predicted values. It was found that changes in state revenue were most equalizing, while changes in property wealth and enrollment were disequalizing. In addition, it was found that the change in the behavioral relationship between state revenue, property wealth, and enrollment, and local revenues from 1969–1970 to 1976–1977 was equalizing in twelve of the states and was larger than the change in the value of the most important of these factors (state revenue) in seven of the states.

This paper presents new research on the effects of mother's employment and living in a one-parent family on children's achievement. We take advantage of two nationally representative data bases of students from two age groups and demonstrate the importance of model specification to the determination of effects. Results show that mother's employment and living in a one-parent family can have negative effects on school achievement but that these effects differ by age, race, and family structure. The results also demonstrate the importance of mediating variables such as income and time use.

Data from approximately 10, 000 never-married females in the sophomore cohort of the nationally representative High School and Beyond Survey are used to examine the impact of two factors-knowledge and attitudes-on teenage out-of-wedlock childbearing. Results show that knowledge, as measured by sex education courses and self-reported birth control knowledge, has no effect on the chances that a black or white female will experience an out-of-wedlock birth as a teenager. However, when adolescents and their parents hold values that stress responsibility, the adolescents' chances of experiencing an out-ofwedlock childbirth are significantly reduced.

This paper examines the relationship between student misbehavior and academic performance and the effects offamily structure and mother's employment on misbehavior and performance. Using panel data on high school sophomores from the High School and Beyond (HSB) survey, we estimate a number of linear panel models. The findings indicate that sophomores with low grades misbehave more as seniors than those with high grades. Academic achievement in the sophomore year has little effect on changes in misbehavior. Misbehavior, however, has negative effects on changes in grades and achievement test scores. Finally, living in a single-parent family and mother's employment negatively affect both achievement and behavior.

The current study used a nationally representative sample of elementary school students to investigate the effect of language and other home background on achievement level and learning for both reading and math. Results show that socioeconomic status and racelethnicity variables were more important than language in explaining low achievement among language-minority students. Spanish-language background was more strongly related to reading than to math achievement deficits. The language effect was also much stronger for pre-existing achievement levels than for learning over the school year. Implications of the study findings for government policy are briefly discussed.