Promoting Academic and Social‐Emotional School Readiness: The Head Start REDI Program

Forty‐four Head Start classrooms were randomly assigned to enriched intervention (Head Start REDI—Research‐based, Developmentally Informed) or “usual practice” conditions. The intervention involved brief lessons, “hands‐on” extension activities, and specific teaching strategies linked empirically with the promotion of: (a) social‐emotional competencies and (b) language development and emergent literacy skills. Take‐home materials were provided to parents to enhance skill development at home. Multimethod assessments of three hundred and fifty‐six 4‐year‐old children tracked their progress over the course of the 1‐year program. Results revealed significant differences favoring children in the enriched intervention classrooms on measures of vocabulary, emergent literacy, emotional understanding, social problem solving, social behavior, and learning engagement. Implications are discussed for developmental models of school readiness and for early educational programs and policies.     

Examining charter student achievement effects across seven states

Since their inception, charter schools have been a lighting rod for controversy, with much of the debate revolving around their effectiveness in improving student achievement. Previous research has shown mixed results for student achievement; this could be the consequence of different policy environments or varying methodological approaches with differing assumptions across studies. In our analysis, we discuss these approaches and their assumptions and estimate charter school achievement effects using a consistent methodology across seven locations.     

Learning activities and interactive videodisc: an exploratory study

This article reports the findings of a small-scale study on pupil use of interactive videodisc. The types of learning activity in which the groups of pupils engaged are identified and the proportion of time spent on each is shown. Patterns in the data are analysed by ability of the pupil group and by the number of sessions in which the videodisc had been used. The discussion focuses on two interesting results: the high proportion of time spent on reading, watching and listening; and the greater statistical differences within groups than between groups of pupils.     

Differences in community colleges’ missions: Evidence from California

Using data for 108 colleges in the California Community College System, this paper poses two questions. First, do California community colleges differ in their missions? Second, if they do, can inter-college differences in missions be explained? We address the first question by developing college-specific measures of curriculum mix, which we use to characterize colleges as to their curriculum emphases and specializations. We find that colleges differ in the extent to which they offer a transfer specialization or a nontransferable voc-ed specialization. Turning to the second question, we attempt to explain inter-college differences in curriculum emphasis and specialization with institutional variables including student demographics, labor market characteristics, and community characteristics. While not strong, we view our results as suggesting that curriculum emphases and specializations are related to student demographics and community needs.     

Up to the Job? Graduates’ Perceptions of the UK Higher Education Careers Service

This article investigates graduates' perceptions of their careers guidance needs and the extent to which these are met by the higher education careers service. It reports the findings of a survey conducted by the Employment Studies Research Unit in support of the work of the recent Higher Education Careers Service Review Group chaired by Professor Sir Martin Harris. It places the findings in a context between recent and ongoing research on transitions from higher education to employment and considers the implications of these, and of wider changes in recruitment practices, for the role of the higher education careers service.     

AD/HD: The role of teachers in the assessment of children suspected of having AD/HD

In the light of recent guidance published by The National Institute for Health and Clinical Excellence (NICE) on the diagnosis and management of attention deficit disorders in children, young persons and adults, Gill Salmon, a consultant Child and Adolescent Psychiatrist based in Swansea, South Wales, and Amanda Kirby, Professor of Developmental Disorders in Education based at the University of Wales, Newport, give an overview of the rationale for involving teachers in the assessment of children with AD/HD and the development and implementation of subsequent educational interventions. They also review the resulting training implications; explore some of the obstacles to multi‐agency, multi‐disciplinary working; and examine how current special educational needs policy goes hand‐in‐hand with the tiered approach to provision of child and adolescent mental health services in offering a graduated response to these children.