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The federal adult education program serves over 2 million eligible adults who seek basic literacy and English language skills. Using administrative student-level panel data, this study provides the very first assessment of the relationships between adult education teacher characteristics and student achievement using hierarchical linear modeling design. Results show that students in classes with teachers with a bachelor’s or higher degree have higher post-test scores. Having a part-time adult education teacher was associated with lower odds of students transitioning to postsecondary education. Compared to teachers specialized in English as a second language, having an adult secondary education teacher is correlated with an increase in test score gains as well as higher odds of transitioning to postsecondary education. We also identified student characteristics (age, disability status, attendance hours, race, and employment status) and program characteristics (size, quality, and setting) that are statistically significantly correlated with student learning and students’ transition to postsecondary education.

This goal of this workshop is to bring together researchers working in inclusion, diversity, equity, and accessibility re-search (IDEA) using data mining and machine learning meth-ods. Through this workshop we plan to highlight and discover the various approaches and methods through which IDEA re-search is conducted. Specifically, we aim to explore ways to support this wide research area through data-driven findings.

The impact of California’s transitional kindergarten program on Spanish-speaking dual language learners was examined through two studies. Participants in the two studies included: (1) the statewide population of students who met study inclusion criteria (n = 45,010) and took the California English Language Development Test (CELDT), and (2) a sample of students (n = 1868) in 20 school districts. Findings indicate that TK had moderate to large effects on English proficiency; smaller but statistically significant effects on language, literacy, and math skills; and no effects on social–emotional skills or executive function. The transitional kindergarten program provides participating Spanish-speaking dual language learners with an academic advantage at kindergarten entry, as compared to Spanish-speaking dual language learners who do not attend.

Using the overlap sample of about 3500 students who participated in both the High School Longitudinal Study of 2009 and the 2013 grade 12 National Assessment of Educational Progress (NAEP) mathematics assessment, this study investigates the relationships of mathematics identity, efficacy and interest to mathematics achievement in high school. Role identities, such as having a mathematics identity, as well as mathematics efficacy and interest are hypothesized to be important motivators of role-related behavior. Using a structural equation modeling approach, measures of these constructs at grades 9 and 11 are related to grade 12 NAEP mathematics achievement, simultaneously taking into account grade 9 mathematics achievement, high school mathematics coursetaking, educational expectations at grades 9 and 11 and student and school background factors. The results indicate that a mathematics identity and educational expectations at grade 11 are statistically and substantively significant predictors of grade 12 mathematics achievement in the presence of these other factors, whereas neither of the other two motivation factors—grade 11 mathematics self-efficacy and mathematics interest—were shown to have direct effects on grade 12 mathematics achievement. However, mathematics self-efficacy at grade 9 was shown to have an indirect effect on grade 12 mathematics achievement through grade 11 mathematics identity. The implications of these findings for identity theory are discussed.

This study reports findings from studies examining potential read-aloud accommodations on standardized reading comprehension assessments for students with decoding difficulties. Three types of accommodations were evaluated: question stems and answer options read aloud; question stems, answer options, and proper nouns read aloud; and full read-aloud. Drawing from a sample of 207 fourth-grade students with and without decoding difficulties, we used 3-level hierarchical linear modeling to assess whether there were significant differences between students with and without decoding difficulties in the effect of each accommodation relative to no accommodation. Analyses showed that, for the students with decoding difficulties, all 3 read-aloud accommodations had significant effects when compared with no accommodation at all, and these effects were significantly larger than for average readers (effect sizes: 0.49, 0.55, and 0.50, respectively). When non–individualized education program students were excluded from the group of students with decoding difficulties, the effect sizes became notably larger.

The relationship between reading skills in earlier grades and achieving Proficiency on the National Assessment of Educational Progress (NAEP) grade 8 reading assessment was examined by establishing a statistical link between NAEP and the Early Childhood Longitudinal Study (ECLS) grade 8 reading assessments using data from a common sample that took both assessments. The link allowed a comparison between NAEP grade 8 achievement levels in reading and the finer grain and developmentally descriptive ECLS reading proficiency levels. Reading skills students need to master in earlier grades to later reach NAEP’s Proficient level at grade 8 were identified. Results showed that, in terms of ECLS reading proficiency levels, to have about a 50% chance of reaching Proficient in NAEP’s grade 8 reading assessment students need to be at level 5 (reading words in context) or higher by spring term of first grade, at level 7 (extrapolation) or higher by spring term of third grade or at level 8 (evaluation) or higher by spr...