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We leverage data on 1,857 families in 140 rural cocoa-growing communities of Côte d'Ivoire to report on child work activities and schooling decisions. We distinguish between unpaid domestic labor and unpaid agricultural child labor activities reported by children in 2021 during the COVID-19 pandemic. We find that more than 80% of children participate in at least one household work activity and more than 50% in at least one agricultural work activity, with differences between boys and girls. Older boys performed more unpaid agricultural work activities, and girls performed more domestic work activities. Thirty-five percent of children were engaged in unpaid agricultural child labor, a rate similar to a national estimate of child labor in cocoa-growing communities of Côte d'Ivoire in 2018/19. Agricultural child labor and schooling are predicted by a child's age and gender, household factors such as parental age, family size, multidimensional poverty, and community factors, especially community-level child labor rates. Social protection and education programs targeting older boys could improve their schooling outcomes and reduce agricultural child labor. Likewise, addressing acute poverty with multifaceted programs reducing consumption-based poverty, poor parental education, and improving community infrastructures could reduce child labor.

Our team previously conducted an efficacy evaluation of "Zoology One: Kindergarten Research Labs," a kindergarten curriculum that integrates literacy instruction and science exposure. Two cohorts of kindergarten students and their teachers participated in a randomized controlled trial (RCT) during the 2016-17 and 2017-18 school years. In each of those school years, kindergarten teachers assigned to the "Zoology One" condition were expected to implement the "Zoology One" curriculum and received training, coaching, and materials to support their implementation. Findings revealed that "Zoology One" students outperformed control students in reading comprehension, letter naming-fluency, and motivation to read. The study discussed here aims to better understand teachers' continued use of the curriculum one year after their participation in the RCT. We surveyed 28 teachers and interviewed 19 of those teachers from the treatment group in the spring one year after their participation in the RCT. Surveys and interviews asked teachers about the extent to which they continued to use various components and materials from the "Zoology One" curriculum. We also used data about teachers' fidelity to "Zoology One" collected during the RCT, as well as teachers' years of teaching experience to examine the extent to which these variables predicted sustainment.

After eighteen months of school closure and disrupted learning, civic leaders, researchers, and educational leaders are getting a clearer picture of how students fared through the pandemic, and what new reality school systems face as they return to in-person schooling in 2021-22. Increases in community infection rates and parent hesitancy have thrown districts back into uncertainty, making it all the more critical to ensure continuity of learning and well-being for students who may not be able to return to classrooms as quickly as planned, and may face continued disruptions due to quarantines. As students return to a third year of disrupted learning, school and system leaders cannot lose sight of our schools' most critical charge this year: addressing unfinished learning and restoring student well-being. While gauging the academic impacts of the pandemic through spring 2021 has been challenging, a body of evidence is emerging from a range of public and private institutions studying this question from different angles. The best interpretations of the most reliable information available underscore a few critical observations: (1) the average student mastered less academic content this year because of the pandemic and associated disruptions to schooling; (2) the pandemic's average impacts on academic achievement, while significant, mask substantial variation in impacts across subjects, grades, demographic groups, and geography; (3) the evidence to date likely understates both the average academic impacts of the pandemic and the opportunity and achievement gaps it has produced; and (4) declines in student well-being indicators could diminish future conditions for successful learning. We propose the following six principles, some of which districts are already applying, to ensure students experience a positive, healthy, and restorative schooling experience this year: (1) provide each student an individualized, three-year instructional plan that uses data to address their academic, social, and emotional needs; (2) prioritize strategies that honor and re-engage students most impacted by the pandemic; (3) use tutoring, extended learning time, and early diagnostic systems to strengthen student foundations in math and early literacy; (4) provide at least one quality remote option while safely reopening schools in person; (5) pilot new structures for learning, such as flexible schedules, prioritizing content mastery over seat time, and new ways of structuring school; and (6) create coherent, aligned systems of support for educators and families. This moment demands new, bold leadership from all of us who touch the lives of students--from civic leaders to policymakers to system leaders to educators. Fast action and transformative change can prevent long-term harm. [The COVID Collaborative contributed to this report.]

The aim of this essay is to advance understandings of current efforts to democratize disciplined approaches to educational innovation and improvement in the US and other countries, with a specific focus on the macro-level policy contexts of improvement research in education. In the US, earlier analyses examined these policy contexts from a contemporary perspective, with an emergent improvement movement in tension with an institutionalized evidence movement. By contrast, this essay provides an historical perspective through a "geological analysis" of US education reform. This analysis has the improvement movement atop macro-level policy contexts that are layers-deep, and as potentially integral to a public education enterprise that has been evolving for centuries: at the policy level, from "resource-forward" to "practice-forward" innovation and improvement; at the local level, from "school systems" to "education systems" to "learning systems." This analytic approach and framework suggest the need for a new discourse about efforts to democratize disciplined approaches to educational innovation and improvement in the US, as well as possibilities for comparative and international research examining parallel developments in other countries. This essay was prepared as a contribution to "The Foundational Handbook on Improvement Research in Education."

Teacher leadership is increasingly recognized as a promising strategy to improve the quality of instruction in U.S. schools. Despite the rising number of teacher leadership programs in the country, there is a paucity of knowledge about the work that teacher leaders (TLs) engage in, how educators experience teacher leadership and the impacts of these efforts on teacher leaders themselves and on districts, schools, teachers, and students. In response, the Nellie Mae Education Foundation (NMEF) supported the Consortium for Policy Research in Education (CPRE) to investigate educators' experiences with teacher leadership and describe the impacts of this improvement strategy.

Districts providing strong centralized COVID-19 responses approached the crisis from a top-down leadership and guidance model which constrained school flexibility to act outside of the district's direction. This is one of a series of briefs that focused on a 'critical incident' surrounding school closure and offers pragmatic suggestions to educational leaders as they continue to grapple with the disruptions of the pandemic.

When the school buildings closed in the spring, educators and families faced unknown challenges of supporting students remotely and continuing to provide the necessary resources for student learning and well-being. Principals responded with advocacy and compassion. This is one of a series of briefs that focused on a 'critical incident' surrounding school closure and offers pragmatic suggestions to educational leaders as they continue to grapple with the disruptions of the pandemic.

As schools begin to fully or phase into re-opening, they should ensure that the 3 "I"s that have emerged during COVID-19 in education; infrastructure, interaction, and instruction (both in-person and online) are adequately addressed.

This inquiry found that the lack of external accountability pressures neither appeared to negatively impact teachers' efforts, commitment to relevancy and rigor in their classrooms, or their responsiveness to families. This is one of a series of briefs that focused on a 'critical incident' surrounding school closure and offers pragmatic suggestions to educational leaders as they continue to grapple with the disruptions of the pandemic. A project overview is included in the brief.

Principals formulated their responses to the pandemic in terms of a hierarchy of needs: they understood that their students and staff had to feel physically and psychologically safe before they would be successful in the classroom. This is one of a series of briefs that focused on a 'critical incident' surrounding school closure and offers pragmatic suggestions to educational leaders as they continue to grapple with the disruptions of the pandemic.

The Shelby County iZone is a district-led effort to dramatically improve, or "turn around," 23 of the lowest performing schools in Tennessee in the 15th largest district in the country. Despite circumstances that have derailed many past reforms, iZone schools have made statistically significant and educationally meaningful gains in mathematics and English language arts (ELA) (Zimmer, Henry, Kho, & Viano, 2015). This report presents the findings of a multi-year research project that examined the evolution of the iZone as it shifted its strategy from school-level autonomy to one that featured a common curriculum, shared pedagogy, and collegial learning. The analysis delves into the challenges that iZone leaders, principals, and teachers confronted in coping with the needs of a student population mired in intergeneration poverty, rigorous performance standards, and a stringent accountability system. The results illuminate the importance of multi-level system re-design, continuous improvement, and compromise and negotiation among key stakeholder groups.

Helping young children become proficient readers is a critical goal. Research tells us that students who experience difficulty reading in the early years of school often struggle to catch up (Stanley, Petscher, & Catts, 2018; Ozernov, Palchik et al., 2016; Cunningham & Stanovich, 1997; Francis, Shaywitz, Stuebing, Shaywitz, & Fletcher, 1996). This study focuses on an innovative curriculum for kindergarten that closely integrates literacy instruction and science exposure. The research study combines a rigorous randomized controlled trial with in-depth cost and implementation studies to investigate impacts.

In partnership with the Consortium for Policy Research in Education, RFA has been studying Philadelphia schools' take-up of an instructional reform that has demonstrated positive impacts on teacher knowledge and student learning in math. The Ongoing Assessment Project (OGAP) is designed to deepen teachers' understanding of foundational concepts in math and engage them in regular formative assessment of their students' problem-solving strategies. Implementing an ambitious educational reform such as this one is notoriously challenging, as project staff, district personnel, and school leaders struggle to move from initial professional development--where so much money is invested--to deep, routine engagement in schools and classrooms. Teachers' instructional practices are difficult to change, and it is particularly hard to engender reform ownership in contexts full of competing demands. In our 2019 study of OGAP in Philadelphia, one school's engagement with the project offered key lessons in how to successfully approach such a reform. School faculty and project staff layered supports and distributed leadership in unique ways, and they carved out space for teachers to learn, practice, and take ownership of OGAP. This brief shares six lessons from this school for those who wish to facilitate deep ownership of an ambitious instructional reform, including reform developers/staff, district leaders, and school leaders. The brief concludes with tables of questions that readers in each of these roles can ask themselves when designing and/or implementing similar reforms.

In 2019 the Pennsylvania Treasury launched a state-wide children's savings account (CSA) initiative, Keystone Scholars. Keystone Scholars provides $100 in college savings to eligible families - all children born or adopted in Pennsylvania after January 1, 2019. In this introductory research brief, we describe how CSAs are an important tool for families to increase educational expectations and asset accumulation, particularly for college savings, offer a preliminary look into college savings accounts in Pennsylvania, and explore how the Pennsylvania Treasury is using data-driven insights to encourage college savings of Pennsylvanian households.

School leadership is broadly acknowledged to be the lynchpin for school success. Yet, amongst the countless demands that school leaders face, making wise leadership choices is increasingly challenging. On what should leaders focus their attention and how should they prioritize their improvement efforts? How can they identify, understand, and make headway on the difficult challenges that will substantially enhance the educational experiences of their students, and how can they bring their faculty together with commitment around these improvement efforts? In this essay we lay out a research-informed framework for advancing meaningful school improvement using a distributed leadership approach. This report was funded by the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation. Opinions in this paper reflect those of the authors and do not necessarily reflect those of the Consortium for Policy Research in Education (CPRE), the University of Pennsylvania Graduate School of Education, that of the funder.

This brief provides a summary of the results of a project designed to help build the collective capacity and increase the impact of programs working to improve K-3 reading outcomes in New York City public elementary schools (the "K-3 reading improvement sector"). The first phase of this project identified all of the programs working in the sector in 2015 and then examined the extent to which a sample of programs have the goals, resources, personnel to improve K-3 reading outcomes across New York City. In 2016-17, the second phase of this project mapped the relationships among a sample of sector programs, the sources they rely on to support their work, and the NYC schools with whom they partner. Making these relationships visible shows to what extent students from different backgrounds and schools get access to valuable information, resources, and expertise, and the extent to which programs are in a position to increase their collective impact through coordination and collaboration. [To view the full report, "Mapping the Reading Improvement Sector in New York City: The Role of External Support Providers in Improving K-3 Reading Outcomes," see ED597882. Additional support from the Brooke Astor Fund for New York City Education.]

This report shares the results of a project designed to help build the collective capacity and increase the impact of the external support providers working to improve K-3 reading outcomes in New York City public elementary schools. In the first phase of the project, we identified all the programs in what we call the K-3 reading improvement sector in NYC 2014-15. In the second phase, we examined the extent to which a sample of these programs have the goals, resources, and personnel to improve reading outcomes system-wide. In the third phase, we mapped the relationships among a sample of programs in the sector in 2016-17, the sources they rely on to support their work, and the NYC schools with whom they partner. Making these relationships visible shows the extent to which students from different backgrounds and schools can get access to information, resources, and expertise, and the extent to which programs are in a position to increase their collective impact through coordination and collaboration. Among the findings: (1) Over 100 programs are working in the K-3 Reading Improvement Sector in NYC; (2) The sample programs in the sector focus on a wide range of reading-related goals, but a limited number of programs have demonstrated effectiveness; (3) Twenty-six sample programs are connected to 161 different schools comprising 16% of all elementary schools in NYC (including 28% of the elementary schools in the Bronx and 26% of the elementary schools in Manhattan); and the programs are partnering with schools with relatively high levels of need in terms of both performance and poverty; (4) Just over half of the sample programs describe themselves as collaborating or partnering with at least one other sample program, but almost half were not in regular contact with any other sample program; and (5) Sample programs received support from 57 different funders and 75 different sources for literacy expertise with little overlap These results suggest that sector programs have the goals, services, and personnel that could help improve K-3 reading outcomes in New York City; they have the connections to share resources and expertise with a large percentage of elementary schools; and several clusters of connected programs could serve as a powerful force for increased focus and collaboration in reading improvement across the city. However, the collective impact of the sector suffers from the evidence that goals vary considerably. Student and teacher programs differ in terms of their goals and personnel, and only a few programs have had formal outside evaluations completed. In addition, many of the sample programs in the sector are working in isolation from other sample programs and are informed by a wide range of sources of funding and expertise that are themselves likely to be only loosely connected. Although the clusters of collaborating and frequently connected programs could serve as a basis for expansion within the sector, the unconnected programs and the disparate sources of funding and expertise suggest that explicit strategies will need to be developed to support greater coherence in the sector and to increase the effectiveness of the sector overall. [To view the brief, "The Role of External Support Providers in Improving K-3 Reading Outcomes in New York," see ED597883. Additional support from the Brooke Astor Fund for New York City Education.]

Education leaders are perennially seeking new ways to build the capacity of teachers to enhance learning experiences for all students. Teacher leadership, which we define as teachers' support of the improvement of teaching and learning beyond their own classroom, has long been a source of interest and experimentation (Wenner & Campbell, 2017; York-Barr & Duke, 2004). Teacher leadership recognizes teachers' instructional expertise as an asset for educational improvement, capitalizes upon teachers' relationships with their colleagues to support change, and may provide career advancement opportunities to improve job satisfaction and the professionalization of teaching. For these and other reasons, states, districts, funders and teachers themselves have become increasingly interested in the promise of teacher leadership. In this study, we map the landscape of teacher leadership programs across the U.S. and identify commonalities and distinctions amongst the range of programs. Using a variety of search approaches to capture publiclyavailable information, we document 285 state, local, university, and foundation-sponsored programs that use a variety of techniques to support teachers as leaders. We then categorize the forms of support, attending to program models, objectives, sponsorship, and audience. We identify three major forms of support provided by teacher leadership programs: (1) preparation of teachers with knowledge and skills that can help them to lead; (2) positioning of teachers in leadership roles to capitalize upon their expertise; and (3) recognition of teachers as leaders through awards and other forms of appreciation or acknowledgement. While some programs focus only on one of these approaches, most employed a combination of these forms of support. Based on this, we define seven types of teacher leadership programs and provide an interactive depiction of this typology, with examples, to illustrate the variation within each of the seven types. While there are undoubtedly programs that escaped our view, as well as homegrown and informal initiatives that we could not document, this systematic search is the broadest scan of the teacher leadership program landscape conducted in the Unites States to date.

This study explored how teachers interpreted and responded to their own student work during the process of formative assessment. The study involved a purposefully selected sample of 32 teachers in grades K-5 who had been trained by the Ongoing Assessment Project (OGAP) to use learning progressions to analyze and respond to evidence in student work. Since formative assessment is fundamentally an interpretive process, involving continually eliciting and interpreting evidence of student thinking from student work in order to inform teaching and learning (Black & Wiliam, 2009), the study analyzed data collected through semi-structured interviews. The study found variations in the way teachers make sense of their student work for formative assessment that were related to their underlying goals for student learning. Teachers with an achievement orientation tended to focus on performance goals: giving formative assessment items to gauge student performance on problems that reflected what had recently been taught and focused on singular or multiple components of performance to make a binary judgment (i.e. students who "get it or don't get it"). Teachers with a learning orientation gave items to learn more about what students were able to do on different types of problems and focused on student strategies as an indicator of underlying understanding and development. These orientations also had implications for the instructional response teachers developed; as teachers looked beyond surface features of student work and binary distinctions, they developed more differentiated responses that built on students' knowledge and their ability to develop more sophisticated understanding. In between these two extremes, we found three categories of hybrid approaches to formative assessment, demonstrating a push-and-pull between achievement and learning orientations at different decision points during the steps of the formative assessment process. Those decision points -- the teachers' purpose in giving an item, the evidence focused on, the interpretive framework used to analyze the evidence, and the focus of the instructional responses -- offer multiple footholds in the formative assessment process where teachers can begin to try out new approaches that reflect a shift in orientation to student learning. The study shows that using formative assessment is not simply a matter of taking up new practices and using new tools. The variations in understanding and use of the ideas that were offered in professional development, as reflected in teachers' actual practices, suggests that it is important to provide opportunities for sustained learning and supported use over time.

The City of Philadelphia has identified improving early literacy as a key civic priority. The goal is to support children's literacy development in school, at home, and in the community--regardless of where students live or attend school in Philadelphia. For this reason, civic efforts have sought to engage families, communities, and the city's public and private schools. From the public education sector, representatives from both traditional public schools and charter schools provide leadership for Read by 4th, the citywide campaign to promote grade-level reading by fourth grade. Charter schools enroll about one third of all public school students in Philadelphia, and more than half of Philadelphia's charter schools are independent. This study is an initial inquiry into the need and opportunity for cross-school professional learning for educators at Philadelphia charter schools. It focuses on independent charter schools that are not part of a charter management network. In the 2018 report, "Supporting Early Readers: A Scan of K-3 Literacy Practices in Philadelphia Charter Schools," representatives from nine independent charter schools reported that they could benefit from additional professional learning opportunities for implementing best practices in early literacy instruction. For the current study, the authors interviewed early literacy leader at the nine independent charter schools to describe how they use information and external professional learning resources to improve their early literacy programs. They also asked about factors that constrain their access to these professional learning resources, additional professional learning that would support early literacy instruction, and the conditions under which those resources would be most useful. [For the 2018 report, see ED613800.]

New Classrooms Innovation Partners was awarded an Investing in Innovation (i3) grant from the U.S. Department of Education to implement its "Teach to One: Math" (TtO) model in five schools in Elizabeth, New Jersey, for three academic years, beginning in September 2015 and continuing through June 2018. The Consortium for Policy Research in Education (CPRE) at Teachers College, Columbia University, recently concluded a four-year evaluation of these efforts. The evaluation had two primary strands: (1) a methodologically rigorous quantitative study of TtO's impact on student mathematics performance; and (2) a systematic qualitative analysis of TtO's implementation processes, combined with yearly New Classrooms and school staff interviews, student focus groups, and classroom observations in each of the five TtO schools. This report describes the results of the first strand, focusing exclusively on the quantitative impact results. Performance patterns across the five TtO treatment schools were quite inconsistent, and the TtO estimates for each of the three implementation years were statistically non-significant.

Has the elementary and secondary teaching force changed in recent years? And, if so, how? Have the types and kinds of individuals going into teaching changed? Have the demographic characteristics of those working in classrooms altered? This report summarizes the results of an exploratory research project that investigated what trends and changes have, or have not, occurred in the teaching force over the past three decades. Our main data source was the Schools and Staffing Survey (SASS) and its supplement, the Teacher Follow-Up Survey (TFS)--collectively the largest and most comprehensive source of data on teachers available. SASS/ TFS are collected by the National Center for Education Statistics (NCES), the statistical arm of the U.S. Department of Education. We took advantage of both the depth and duration of these data to explore what changes have taken place in the teaching force and teaching occupation over the three decades from 1987 to 2016. The results show that the teaching force has been, and is, greatly changing; yet, even the most dramatic trends appear to have been little noticed by researchers, policy makers, and the public. The report summarizes seven of the most prominent trends and changes; we found that teaching force to be: (1) Larger; (2) Grayer; (3) Greener; (4) More Female; (5) More Diverse, by Race-Ethnicity; (6) Consistent in Academic Ability; and (7) Unstable. For each of the trends, we explore two large questions: (1) Why? What are the reasons for and sources of the trend?; and (2) So what? What difference does it make? What are the implications and consequences of the trend? [For the previous report "Seven Trends: The Transformation of the Teaching Force. Updated April 2014. CPRE Report. #RR-80," see ED566879.]

In this report, we describe the results of a rigorous two-year study of the impacts of a mathematics initiative called Ongoing Assessment Project (OGAP) on teacher and student learning in grades 3-5 in two Philadelphia area school districts. OGAP is a mathematics program which combines teacher formative assessment practices with knowledge of student developmental progressions to build deeper student understanding of mathematics content. OGAP includes teacher professional development, classroom resources, school-based routines for regular practice, and ongoing school-based supports. The study was conducted in 61 schools during the 2014-15 and 2015-16 school years, with OGAP randomly assigned to 31 schools and the remaining 30 serving as comparison sites. The results of this study showed that OGAP produced meaningful impacts on both teacher knowledge and student learning.

In Philadelphia, civic and education leaders have identified early literacy programming as critical for overall education improvement. Charter schools enroll about one third of all public school students in Philadelphia. This study seeks to understand how Philadelphia charter schools support their early readers and writers, in order to contribute to knowledge-sharing across schools and identify areas for investment. Researchers invited Philadelphia charter schools and charter management organizations serving kindergarten to third grade students to identify a single representative to participate in a 30-minute interview. The authors interviewed 38 school representatives and charter management organization (CMO) leaders about K-3 literacy practices in their school(s). The authors asked these school representatives to describe their literacy programming, the strengths and challenges of their chosen program, and the additional resources that would most help their school's literacy program. The study found that: (1) Philadelphia charter schools report a broadly similar set of approaches to early literacy programming; (2) Charter schools identified staff capacity for high-quality early literacy instruction as a key lever for improvement; (3) Despite consistency in broad approaches to literacy, charter schools varied widely in their specific resources and strategies; and (4) Certain elements of early literacy programming are both strengths of and challenges for charter schools.

Digital tools and technology-based activities offer new and promising opportunities for students to actively explore mathematical concepts and ideas in ways supported by current reforms and visions of mathematics instruction. This report provides an in-depth look at the implementation of SunBay Digital Mathematics (SunBay Math) during the second year of an i3 validation project, in two large Florida districts. SunBay Math is a set of middle-school curriculum replacement units centered on the use of technology-based, dynamically linked representations to learn core mathematical concepts. We focus specifically on patterns and relationships between instructional practices and instructional quality in 26 videotaped lesson enactments that were purposefully collected to represent variation in implementation.

Decades of research have emphasized the need for engaging, accessible ways to help students learn fundamental mathematical concepts. Research also shows that teacher beliefs about teaching and learning have an outsized influence on the quality and effectiveness of curricular interventions. This article reports results of an independent evaluation of the i3 implementation of SunBay Digital Mathematics, a middle-school math intervention, and examines the program's impacts on both student progress and teachers' beliefs about math instruction. Prior studies have demonstrated the efficacy of SunBay Math for students of varied levels of prior achievement. This independent evaluation included a randomized controlled trial in 60 Florida middle schools during the 2015-16 school year and a mixed-methods implementation study. No impact on student achievement was observed overall; however, the evaluation did reveal positive impacts on teachers' classroom practices and beliefs about the use of technology in math instruction. Inadequate implementation of instructional units and lack of impact on teachers for targeted beliefs about math instruction likely contributed to lack of overall program effects.

Expanding school vouchers is a central component of the Trump Administration's education agenda. However, the extent to which the Administration can fully realize this policy goal may hinge, in part, on the level of public support or opposition for the voucher method of reform and on the particular components of any proposed voucher system. In this policy brief, we report on a randomized survey experiment we conducted to identify how two key dimensions of school voucher systems--source of funding and scope of coverage--affect public opinion across various sectors of the American public.

This report presents the results of an exploratory study of suspension, discipline, and climate in K-5 and K-8 schools in the School District of Philadelphia (SDP). The study was conducted between January 2016 and October 2017 by the Consortium for Policy Research in Education (CPRE) at the University of Pennsylvania, in close partnership with SDP and with research support from Research for Action, a Philadelphia-based research organization. Chapter 1 of the report describes the context and need for this study. The following research questions are addressed: (1) What disciplinary practices are used by SDP schools serving students in kindergarten through eighth grade?; (2) What factors support or hinder schools' alignment with the district's climate and suspension-reduction goals?; (3) What patterns are evident in SDP K-5 and K-8 schools' approaches to discipline and climate?; (4) Are schools' approaches to discipline and climate related to suspension and academic outcomes?; and (5) How are different approaches to discipline and climate manifested in individual schools? Chapter 2 presents the research methods and findings related to research questions 1 and 2. Chapter 3 details the statistical methods used to address research questions 3 and 4, and presents the findings of these analyses. In response to research question 5, four case studies of individual schools are presented in Chapter 4. Chapter 5 highlights the implications of the study's overall findings. The authors conclude that climate-improvement efforts like Positive behavioral interventions and supports (PBIS) hold great promise for improving student outcomes as well as the experience of school for staff, students, and families in SDP.

This working paper summarizes the results of a study of leadership in elementary and secondary schools. The study focused in particular on instructional leadership -- the extent to which school leaders focus on the core activities of teaching and learning -- and teacher leadership -- the extent to which teachers have input into school decision-making. This paper is drawn from the full report of the study, entitled "School Leadership Counts" (Ingersoll, Dougherty and Sirinides 2017), available at www.newteachercenter.org. [This research was supported by a grant to the New Teacher Center from the Carnegie Corporation.]

Under the Every Student Succeeds Act (ESSA) of 2015, states have considerably more flexibility and authority in K-12 education than they had under the previous federal education law, No Child Left Behind (NCLB). The Trump administration and the Republican Congress, meanwhile, moved in 2017 to further loosen federal accountability rules and give states even more control over their school systems. With this increased power for states comes the increased responsibility to support the improvement of educational outcomes for every student. Leaders at the helm of state education agencies (SEAs) find themselves in a moment of both great change and great opportunity, as many agencies move away from a predominant focus on compliance with federal regulations and programmatically dictated uses of funds, and toward a broader focus on supporting districts and schools. For many advocates of low-performing students, it is also a moment of potential peril if states fail to embrace their new responsibilities or weaken their commitment to improving educational opportunity and outcomes. This paper contains two major components: (1) after a brief overview of the evolving role of SEAs, the authors introduce and examine several of the critical issues in organizing and resourcing SEAs for success under ESSA; and (2) they examine the range of essential and potential roles for SEAs in the ESSA era. The goal of the paper is not to emphasize how states should comply with ESSA, but rather to analyze the ways in which SEAs can support the work of schools and districts in the ESSA era.

Drawing on a review of literature and telephone interviews of state agency staff in 25 states, the paper identifies traditional and emerging forms of state differential treatment of districts. The author discusses potential benefits and disadvantages of various approaches to differential treatment and suggests areas for further research. [This report was written with assistance from Patti Fry. It was presented at the La Follette Conference on Choice and Control in American Education held at the University of WIsconsin-Madison, May 17-19, 1989. It is a reissue of the December 1989 CPRE Research Report RR-016 under the same title (ED315903).]

Uses data on eleventh grade students from the 1983-84 National Assessment of Progress (NAEP) as a baseline for examining the effects of changing state policies on student course taking and on the relationship between course taking and student characteristics. [This document is a reissue of the September 1989 CPRE Research Report RR-013 under the same title (ED311568).]

This paper examines the effects of school characteristics on both the probability of dropping out and the strongest predictor of dropping out -- absenteeism. The authors employ a sub-sample from the High School and Beyond (HS&B) database which contains results of background questionnaires and standardized achievement tests given in 1980 to approximately 30,000 sophomores in 1,100 public and private schools. The students, both those still in school as well as those who had dropped out, were resurveyed two years later. Supplemental data were also obtained from principal questionnaires. The analysis reveals: (1) absenteeism is less prevalent in schools where faculty are interested and engaged with students, and where there is an emphasis on academic pursuits; (2) schools that respond to diversity in the student body by differentiating program and curriculum have higher absenteeism rates; and (3) students are more likely to graduate from schools where there is an emphasis on academic pursuits, an orderly environment, and less internal differentiation. [This document is a reissue of the February 1989 CPRE Research Report RR-012 under the same title (ED304755).]

Outlines features of an "Accelerated School," a transitional elementary school designed to bring disadvantaged students up to grade level by the end of sixth grade. Several schools across the nation are piloting the model. [This document is a reissue of the September 1988 CPRE Research Report RR-010 under the same title (ED300143).]

This paper addresses the demands for change in the teaching and learning of mathematics in the schools of America. Many of the demands stem from the way rapid changes in information technology have altered our economic and social culture. In particular, these technological changes have changed both mathematics and its applications. Given these circumstances, this report outlines the National Council of Teachers of Mathematics proposal, "Curriculum and Evaluation Standards" (1987). Also discussed are the implications for instruction of the adoption of a curriculum based on these Standards. Next, the problem of developing appropriate indicators to determine the effectiveness of a school mathematics program based on these curricular and instructional changes is presented, and a domain knowledge strategy proposed. Finally, the problems of implementing these changes in the schools are identified. While not easy to accomplish, a professional development strategy is described which, if followed, has promise in bringing about the reforms in the teaching and learning of mathematics which are being proposed. [This document is a reissue of the September 1988 CPRE Research Report RR-007 with a slight title variation (ED300278).]

A number of recent policies have tried to improve science learning by increasing the number of science courses required for high school graduation or admission to higher education institutions. But it is highly unlikely that these mandates alone will materially affect the amount and quality of science education for students. Any effort to improve the outcome of science education must carefully consider the effectiveness of the science curriculum. This paper examines options for improving the science curriculum based on research, best extant practices and experience in other countries. Although the word "curriculum" has acquired many different meanings, both in the professional literature and in lay usage, this paper defines curriculum as the intended substantive and pedagogic content of science education to be presented to students in order to develop their knowledge and skills. [This document is a reissue of the July 1988 CPRE Research Report RR-006 under the same title (ED297956).]

Proposes the establishment of a uniform definition of school dropout which would help to more accurately measure the extent of the dropout problem. The report describes elements of dropout measures and examines factors that account for variation in measures from city to city and state to state. [This document is a reissue of the October 1987 CPRE Research Report RR-003 under the same title (ED298184). Information on original record varies. The original content in ERIC contains additional pages that provide sponsor and audience information.]

Acknowledging that clear standards and strong incentives alone are not sufficient to dramatically change teaching and learning, policymakers and policy analysts have started to talk about and implement "capacity-building" strategies. "Capacity" in this policy context refers to the wherewithal needed to translate high standards and incentives into effective instruction and strong student performance. This study examines capacity-building strategies used in eight states and analyzes their promise and continuing challenges. The eight states represent various approaches to systemic improvement. They include California, Colorado, Florida, Kentucky, Maryland, Michigan, Minnesota, and Texas. The study asks the following questions: (1) What are common patterns in the ways states currently build capacity for education reform, and why? (2) What are promising directions, as well as challenges, that emerge from these policy strategies? and (3) What related matters should policymakers consider when they use these strategies? [This document is a reissue of the 1998 CPRE Research Report RR-41 under the same title (ED426490).]

This report grew out of an effort by the Consortium for Policy Research in Education's (CPRE's) Center on Continual Instructional Improvement (CCII) to extend its evaluation of the usefulness of the concept of "Learning Progressions" for the fields of mathematics and science education, to include literacy teaching and learning. Herein, the authors offer a relatively simple graphic model describing how literate communication seems to work, in order to identify the functions or the dimensions along which change and improvement might be observed as students become more effective and sophisticated in using the tools of literate communication. They go on to consider whether the idea of progressions is relevant to understanding this learning, and, if so, what that implies for instruction. Finally, they offer suggestions about what thinking about literate communication in this way may imply more generally for instruction, for education policy, and for assessment. [Additional funding for this research was provided by Pearson Educational Foundation. This document is a reissue of the May 2017 CPRE Research Report RR 2017-2 under the same title.]

As states continue to implement college and career ready standards, state education agencies (SEAs) are providing professional development and curricular resources to help districts and teachers understand the standards. Because all states have adopted college and career ready standards, and most states continue to implement some version of the Common Core State Standards (CCSS), many SEAs can now share resources with each other and draw on materials from the numerous organizations providing CCSS resources. However, little is known about the resources SEAs endorse, the states and/or organizations sponsoring these resources, and how states and organizations are connected. For example, SEAs may provide resources created within the state, or by other SEAs, literacy organizations, CCSS organizations, or some combination of these approaches. Understanding the landscape of possible approaches to supporting state standards allows SEAs to make intentional choices about how to best select and disseminate resources to districts and teachers. To understand the approaches that SEAs are taking to standards implementation, this study created a database of the 2,023 secondary English/language arts (ELA) resources provided on the websites of all 50 SEAs and Washington, DC. Resources were downloaded between August 2015 and March 2016. Resources were coded for their purpose, type, contentarea emphasis, and sponsoring SEAs or organization(s). Social network analysis was used to visualize the relationships between SEAs and resource sponsors, and descriptive analysis was used to understand the nature of the resources SEAs are providing.

This report presents school leadership development policies and practices across all 50 states and select U.S. territories. Researchers Bobbi Newman, Jonathan Supovitz, and Greg Collins from the Consortium for Policy Research in Education (CPRE), in collaboration with National Association of State Boards of Education (NASBE) staff, interviewed state board members and staff members from state education agencies to learn about their states' school leadership development policies and practices and identify the organizational and individual supports that states have established. This new analysis provides a wealth of information for state leaders interested in learning about promising policies and programs across the country that support the school leadership pipeline. [The following is a companion piece to this report, "Successful Leaders for Successful Schools: Building and Maintaining a Quality Workforce. Report of the NASBE Leadership Development Study Group," see ED582121.]

Research increasingly links low literacy levels in the early grades with a range of poor outcomes; for instance, students who read below grade level at the end of third grade are about four times less likely than their higher-achieving peers to graduate from high school (Annie E. Casey Foundation, 2010, 2011; Balfanz, Bridgeland, Bruce & Fox, 2012). In a four-year study, researchers from the Consortium for Policy Research in Education (CPRE) at the University of Pennsylvania and the Center for Research on Education and Social Policy (CRESP) at the University of Delaware examined the effectiveness of Reading Recovery at helping struggling early readers catch up. The study's findings offer promise for intensive early literacy intervention.

Numerous countries suffer from a shortage of technicians and skilled workers, particularly in the STEM fields (science, technology, engineering, and mathematics), due to a mismatch between the skills and interests of the students graduating from or leaving the current education system and the needs of the labor market. Often, parents and students place a high priority on entering and completing university, and as a consequence, many students pursue academic education in secondary schools in order to gain entrance to university, only to find themselves entering the job market lacking the skills they need for employment and advancement. Further, in some countries, the vocational school system is not well-respected by the public and focuses heavily on preparation of youth for specific jobs in one firm rather than preparing them for careers within an industry as a whole. This literature review aims to synthesize the research evidence about the effectiveness of various strategies used by national governments, non-governmental organizations, technical schools, and industries to strengthen both the quality of the technical workforce, as well as the avenues through which individuals can access career and technical programming.

The past three decades in mathematics education policy and research have seen a considerable focus on algebra and its place in secondary schools. Access to and success in the first high school course, most often termed Algebra I, has been framed as a civil rights issue, a harbinger of college success, and a lynchpin to global competitiveness. Policymakers have targeted access to Algebra I through universal enrollment policies at specific grade levels, while educational researchers and policy analysts have investigated the efficacy of such policies in improving student outcomes. [This document is a reissue of the April 2016 CPRE Research Report RR-86 under the same title.]

This report presents the final results of a four-year independent external evaluation of the impacts and implementation of the scale-up of Reading Recovery, a literacy intervention targeting struggling 1st-grade students. The evaluation of Reading Recovery includes parallel rigorous experimental and quasi-experimental designs for estimating program impacts, coupled with a large-scale, mixed-methods study of program implementation under the Investing in Innovation (i3) scale-up. The primary goals of the evaluation are to: (1) Provide experimental evidence of the short- and long-term impacts of Reading Recovery on student learning in schools that are part of the i3 scale-up; and (2) Assess the implementation of Reading Recovery under the i3 grant, including fidelity to the program model and progress toward the scale-up goals. The impact evaluation includes a multi-site randomized controlled trial (RCT) for estimating immediate impacts, a regression discontinuity study (RD) for estimating longterm impacts, and an implementation study for assessing fidelity of implementation and exploring program implementation in depth. The RCT includes nearly 7,000 randomized students in more than 1,200 schools over four years. The RD study measures Reading Recovery's impacts at the end of first grade and in third grade, and replicates the RCT's immediate post-treatment findings in a separate sample of students. The implementation study involves a combination of qualitative and quantitative research executed on a large scale over the same four-year timeframe. The evaluation's key findings pertain to the following topics: (1) Scale-Up Processes, Challenges, and Outcomes; (2) Immediate Impacts of Reading Recovery; (3) Sustained Impacts of Reading Recovery; and (4) Implementation Fidelity. The authors' analysis revealed strong fidelity to the program model in all of these areas and all years of the scale-up. This suggests that the intervention was delivered as designed to the students in the scale-up, and that teachers delivering Reading Recovery lessons were properly trained. In total, the results of the fidelity analysis support the validity of their impact findings. Three appendices are included. [To view the brief for this report, "Evidence for Early Literacy Intervention: The Impacts of Reading Recovery," see ED586802.]

High-quality care in the earliest years of life has been shown to relate to positive developmental outcomes for children, including improved early academic skills, social-emotional competencies, and cognitive functioning. Unfortunately, the early care experiences of many children are not always high quality; rather, research suggests that high-quality care is the exception. The growing evidence relating quality care to improved outcomes, the variability in quality across care settings, and the failure of existing approaches to improve child care have led to a national call to enhance the quality of early care and education programs. In response to this call, states have created "Quality Rating and Improvement Systems" (QRISs). The ultimate goal of a state QRIS is to assist service providers in the delivery of quality early care and education in order to improve children's developmental outcomes. Pennsylvania's QRIS, Keystone STARS, was one of the first systems in the nation. A team from the University of Pennsylvania was funded by the William Penn Foundation to conduct an inquiry of "Keystone STARS." The goal of this inquiry was to provide a broad look at Keystone STARS to inform future revisions and evaluation of the system as part of Pennsylvania's Race to the Top Early Learning Challenge grant (2013-2018). The inquiry focused on providing an overarching look at Keystone STARS with respect to three major areas: (1) "Child outcomes": Examined the relations between Keystone STARS and children's overall developmental competencies; (2) "Quality components": Inquiry investigated the extent of evidence from theory, empirical research, and practitioner expertise linking each of the Keystone STARS quality components to child outcomes; and (3) "Systems approach to rating quality and guiding improvements": Examined overall features of the system that could be improved to enhance the effectiveness and efficiency of the system. The research report presents a detailed review of the data and findings for each of the three aspects of the inquiry. The report concludes with an overview of the lessons learned and points to promising areas of reform for improving Keystone STARS for the children of Pennsylvania. The following are appended: (1) Examination of WSS, (2) Provider Survey, (3) STARS interview protocol, and (4) Logic models.

In a 2012 paper for the Center for American Progress, "The State of Evaluation Reform," Patrick McGuinn (Drew University) identified the opportunities and challenges facing education agencies in Race to the Top (RTTT) grant-winning states as they prepared for the implementation of new teacher evaluation systems. The 2012 study undertook in-depth comparative case studies of six states: Tennessee, Colorado, Delaware, New Jersey, Rhode Island, and Pennsylvania. For this paper the individuals interviewed in those states two years ago (or their replacements if necessary) were re-interviewed to understand how and why their efforts differ today. By analyzing state implementation efforts at two different points in time, the new study utilizes a longitudinal qualitative approach that can reveal the extent to which states are learning and adapting in this work over time. Rather than the detailed state case studies of State Education Agency (SEA) implementation work provided in the 2012 paper, this report uses a more thematic approach that will synthesize the lessons that have emerged from the field. This paper serves 2 purposes: (1) To provide a snapshot in time (Jan 2015) of SEA implementation efforts around new teacher evaluation systems; and (2) To contrast more recent implementation efforts with those two years earlier to understand the ways in which SEAs have (and have not) learned and adapted their implementation work over time. More specifically, the paper will address the following questions: What kinds of capacity--financial, personnel, technical--have SEAs added to support the implementation of new teacher evaluation systems? What kind of capacity is still lacking? How rapidly and how effectively are states implementing their new teacher evaluation systems? Why do some states appear to be having more success/smoother implementation than others? How are states approaching this implementation work differently from one another--do some approaches appear to be more or less effective than others? What challenges are emerging and how are states addressing these? What lessons can be learned from these "early adopter" states that can inform teacher evaluation reform in the rest of the country? How are states approaching the training of evaluators and the principals and teachers who are supposed to use the evaluations to improve personnel decisions and classroom instruction? How well are new teacher evaluation systems being aligned with other reforms such as the move to Common Core and new assessments? How are states dealing with the challenge of measuring student achievement in non-tested subjects? The following is appended: Interviews Conducted As Part of Research.

It has been three years since Race to the Top grant-winning states piloted new teacher evaluation systems and many of them have made considerable progress, yet according to media coverage and a Government Accountability Office (GAO) report published in April 2015, struggles remain and most grantees have asked to extend the timetables for completing this work. Given the enormous importance and complexity of these reforms--and the fact that states vary widely in the timing, approach, and success of their implementation work--this is an excellent opportunity to assess the progress that has been made and identify where challenges persist. It is imperative that states learn from one another during this implementation stage, and this brief serves to facilitate the discussion by highlighting what is and is not working in the Race to the Top states.

In 2007, the Columbia University Middle East Research Center (CUMERC), with the support and patronage of Her Majesty Queen Rania Al Abdullah, facilitated the founding of the Queen Rania Teacher Academy (QRTA) to help advance education in Jordan and throughout the Middle East. Through CUMERC, QRTA and Teachers College, Columbia University (TC) formed a new partnership whose goal was to use high quality in-service training to improve the quality of the public schools in Jordan. The Consortium for Policy in Education at TC (CPRE) took on this work and began collaborating with QRTA to engage current educators in the adoption and use of evidence-based instructional practices in Jordan's elementary and secondary schools. This initiative became known as the School Networks Learning Project and supported networks of schools in different regions of the country as vehicles for providing professional development of teachers in English, mathematics, and science as well as leadership training for principals and education supervisors to support the desired changes in classroom practice. Five core practices were emphasized during the professional development with the goal being that teachers would focus on these practices and take them back to their classrooms. Schools and teachers made a 2 to 3 year commitment to the project. At the time of the writing of this report, three cohorts have completed the Project and two additional cohorts have begun the Project. Across the three completed cohorts, 2,158 teachers, 894 school leaders, and 104 other educators participated in the School Network Project, totaling 3,130 participants over the almost six years of the Project's implementation.

The flat structure of American schools is ill-suited to meet today's increasing demands for educational improvement. Even with unprecedented pressure to raise performance, America's schools are still largely organized the way they were a century ago--with a single principal presiding over a largely egg-crated faculty. Is such a thin veneer of instructional leadership sufficient to build the capacity of teachers at each grade level and content area to develop students to reach high expectations? Historically, American schools have addressed this deficit in instructional support with a patchwork of poorly defined roles and responsibilities--under-utilized department chairs, fitful coaching models, and informal teacher leaders who generally lacked the training and authority to influence the practice of their peers. How exactly do these roles fit into contemporary schools' strategies for improving teaching and learning? How can we more systematically build the capacity of school leaders to engage with and overcome the challenges of continuous school improvement? One place to look for fresh ideas about leadership development is England. Over the past 15 years, educational leaders in England have made several important revisions in the ways leadership is organized in schools, how leaders are developed, and how leadership is integrated into the larger educational infrastructure. There is much that American policymakers might learn from these experiences. This policy brief examines the evolution of the educational leadership development system in England to see what ideas American leaders and policymakers might take from looking transnationally. The brief is based on a more in-depth examination of that leadership development system described in a Consortium for Policy Research in Education (CPRE) research report entitled "Building a Lattice for School Leadership: The Top-to-Bottom Rethinking of Leadership Development in England and What It Might Mean for American Education.Research Report #RR-83" (see ED558763). The research report was based upon a year of research on school leadership in England that included extensive background research, site visits to schools and leadership programs, and over 20 interviews with government officials, teachers and school leaders, university researchers, union officials, and both for profit and non-profit school leadership providers. Implications for policy makers are presented.