Male Program Assessment for College Excellence (M-PACE): Content Validation Summary

This article describes the development and content validation of the Male Program Assessment for College Excellence (M-PACE). The M-PACE is an outcomes based assessment tool designed to assess and improve the effectiveness of programs and initiatives serving men of color in the community college. The instrument was developed to serve as a standardized outcomes assessment tool to determine the efficacy of minority male initiative (MMI) interventions and enhance program models.     

Curriculum‐Based Measurement of Oral Reading fluency (CBM‐R): An objective orientated evaluation study

The knowledge and practices associated with improved outcomes for readers have yielded converging evidence about practices associated with improved reading outcomes for primary students. This considerable intervention knowledge can be beneficial for English teachers working with struggling secondary readers. Fluency is one critical element that becomes increasingly important for many older students with reading difficulties as they strive to read large quantities of text written at challenging levels, with sufficient speed, accuracy and understanding to keep up with class content and demands. This objective‐orientated evaluation study examined the effects of Curriculum‐Based Measurement of Oral Reading (CBM‐R), a prevention‐orientated approach designed to identify readers at risk of not achieving adequate outcomes, on 94 second‐grade students from a primary school in New South Wales, Australia. Results indicate that teachers found CBM‐R to be a reliable and easily implemented prevention‐orientated system, which has the capacity to raise awareness of fluency abilities to guide differentiated practice and reduce the risk of failure in English.     

Importance of adequate gross anatomy education: the impact of a structured pelvic anatomy course during gynecology fellowship

Medical education underwent standardization at the turn of the 20th century and remained fairly consistent until recently. Incorporation of a patient-centered or case-based curriculum is believed to reinforce basic science concepts. One negative aspect is a reduction in hours spent with cadaveric dissection in the gross anatomy laboratory. For those entering a surgical career, limited anatomical exposure leaves knowledge deficits that must be corrected during further education during residency training. The benefit of providing formal anatomy education to residents and surgical fellows is described in the literature, specifically noting improvement in written test scores and surgical application.     

Use of Social Emotional Learning Skills to Predict Future Academic Success and Progress Toward Graduation

This study evaluated the degree to which a range of social emotional learning skills—academic self-efficacy, academic motivation, social connections, importance of school, and managing psychological and emotional distress and academic stress— could be used as an indicator of future academic outcomes. Using a sample of 4,797 from a large urban school district, we found that high school students classified as performing in the lowest 25% of their grade reported lower social emotional skills than students classified in the top 25% of academic performers by the end of the 8th grade. Two variables, perceived importance of attending college and psychological and physical stress, accounted for nearly 26% of the variance in cumulative high school GPA after controlling for 9th-grade GPA. Finally, the results indicated that a combination of 5 social emotional learning subscales effectively discriminated between students making positive progress towards high school graduation and those identified as having dropped out of or failed more than 14% of their courses.