Improving School Attendance through Collaboration: A Catalyst for Community Involvement and Change

ABSTRACT

Chronic absenteeism is often referred to as a problem hidden in plain sight (Chang & Romero, 2008). In recent years, more communities around the United States have been intentional on improving student attendance and limiting the impact of chronic absenteeism. Using qualitative interviews, we sought to understand how one community was implementing strategies to engage a variety of stakeholders in an effort to decrease chronic absenteeism. Findings suggest that when it comes to increasing attendance, districts and schools should consider partnering with organizations to leverage their expertise and knowledge. This article concludes with implications for policy and practice, and concludes with a research framework for studying solutions and interventions around chronic absenteeism.     

A follow-up study of dyslexic boys

Over 500 men who attended the Gow School, an independent school for boys with developmental dyslexia, were given a follow-up questionnaire from 1 to 38 years after they left the school. More than half had graduated from college; business was the most frequently chosen major in college; most were employed in managerial or related business positions; and their adult reading habits and attitudes did not compare well with those of other men of similar socioeconomic backgrounds. Socioeconomic status and IQ were not predictive of adult outcome among these men in contrast to their effect in the general population. An important result was that severity of the reading problem upon entrance to Gow and the academic and remedial progress of the men while at the school were highly predictive of adult educational, occupational, and attitudinal status. This work was supported by funds from NIH grant HD00486, the Gow School, and the John F. Kennedy Institute.     

Consulting records management oracles—a Delphi in practice

This article critically analyses the views of a group of international experts on ISO 15489, the international records management standard, during the final phase of a project assessing its impact in the UK. It provides an overview of the entire research project and then focusses on the use of a modified Delphi study in gathering the views of experts. The Delphi technique is a research method not commonly used in records management and archival science research; relevant background to the technique is provided though the purpose of the article is not to provide a comprehensive review of it as a research method. A modified electronic version of the technique was used which was qualitative rather than quantitative and not focussed on the more usual consensus building. The article concludes that a Delphi study is a practical technique for conducting research which seeks to gather views from geographically dispersed participants in a timely, time-effective and convenient manner for all those involved. The use of a modified Delphi study proved to be extremely valuable in facilitating discussions of complex emergent issues about the role, value and nature of standards for records management, in particular ISO 15489, and about the future of ISO 15489, at a higher level of abstraction. The article makes a contribution in two areas: first in terms of the views of a group of leading international records management experts on the first international standard in records management; and second, in terms of the use of a research method which has previously been little used in the records management discipline.

Assessing the importance of cultural capital on post-secondary education attendance in Canada

This paper extends the current literature on access to post-secondary education by investigating the role played by various family background characteristics related to the home environment and family habits and behaviours. Exploiting the extraordinary richness of the Youth in Transition Survey in this regard, we include whether the family ate dinner together, whether they discussed current affairs, and how often their children went to concerts – and if so, what kind of concerts. Many of these factors are found to have a significant relationship with attending post-secondary education, university in particular. Furthermore, these factors are in addition to – and at least to some degree independent of – more conventional influences such as parental education and family income. With appeal to the paradigm of ‘cultural capital’ – which refers to the knowledge, experiences, and connections which help individuals succeed in life – these results indicate how advantages in accessing higher levels of education accrue to those from families that are rich in this kind of asset, while others are left behind.     

Effective e-learning for health professionals and students--barriers and their solutions. A systematic review of the literature--findings from the HeXL project

Introduction: In 2003/4 the Information Management Research Institute, Northumbria University, conducted a research project to identify the barriers to e‐learning for health professionals and students. The project also established possible ways to overcome these barriers. The North of England Workforce Development Confederation funded the project. Methodology: The project comprised a systematic review of the literature on barriers to and solutions/critical success factors for e‐learning in the health field. Fifty‐seven references were suitable for analysis. This review was supplemented by a questionnaire survey of learners and an interview study of learning providers to ensure that data identified from the literature were grounded in reality. Results: The main barriers are: requirement for change; costs; poorly designed packages; inadequate technology; lack of skills; need for a component of face‐to‐face teaching; time intensive nature of e‐learning; computer anxiety. A range of solutions can solve these barriers. The main solutions are: standardization; strategies; funding; integration of e‐learning into the curriculum; blended teaching; user friendly packages; access to technology; skills training; support; employers paying e‐learning costs; dedicated work time for e‐learning. Conclusions: The authors argue that librarians can play an important role in e‐learning: providing support and support materials; teaching information skills; managing and providing access to online information resources; producing their own e‐learning packages; assisting in the development of other packages.     

To Uphold and Resist: Protecting Intellectual Freedom through Progressive Librarianship

Public librarians uphold an ethical commitment to protect the intellectual freedom of their patrons, but when information is accessed online, users become vulnerable to censorship and surveillance. The public library is a democratic institution in which patrons should be able to interact with information free of restriction or judgment, and this right is threatened by the conflict between access and privacy. Librarians should reject the notion that they are neutral and instead adopt a political stance in defense of intellectual freedom; they should actively combat surveillance and limitations on access. A framework for activism can be found within Birdsall’s theory of progressive librarianship.     

An NCME Instructional Module on Using Differential Step Functioning to Refine the Analysis of DIF in Polytomous Items

Traditional methods for examining differential item functioning (DIF) in polytomously scored test items yield a single item‐level index of DIF and thus provide no information concerning which score levels are implicated in the DIF effect. To address this limitation of DIF methodology, the framework of differential step functioning (DSF) has recently been proposed, whereby measurement invariance is examined within each step underlying the polytomous response variable. The examination of DSF can provide valuable information concerning the nature of the DIF effect (i.e., is the DIF an item‐level effect or an effect isolated to specific score levels), the location of the DIF effect (i.e., precisely which score levels are manifesting the DIF effect), and the potential causes of a DIF effect (i.e., what properties of the item stem or task are potentially biasing). This article presents a didactic overview of the DSF framework and provides specific guidance and recommendations on how DSF can be used to enhance the examination of DIF in polytomous items. An example with real testing data is presented to illustrate the comprehensive information provided by a DSF analysis.     

Developing a Best Practices Plan for Tutorials in a Multi-Library System

In 2010, the University of Iowa's library system administration created a task force to conduct a reevaluation of tools and spaces used for video tutorial creation across a multi-library system. Following this effort, a working group was charged with improving documentation and staff awareness of resources for developing video tutorials. The group observed that librarians were often independently creating videos that were variable in quality, lacked consistent branding, and were not often shared with others. This article will describe experiences at the Hardin Library for the Health Sciences at the University of Iowa in selecting video tutorial software, and striving to establish a more structured process, including team-developed guidelines, for tutorial creation in a multi-library system. Project limitations and areas for future work will also be presented.     

Investigating the Relationship between Subject Content Knowledge and Pedagogical Practice through the Analysis of Classroom Discourse

A previous study highlighted the perception among secondary science teachers that they faced considerable challenges to their pedagogical practice when teaching unfamiliar areas of the curriculum; for example, when teaching out of subject specialism. One of the major challenges cited by the teachers was being able to give appropriate and effective science teaching explanations in the classroom. Since talking in order to explain science is at the centre of what science teachers do, this concern is a significant one for teacher educators. This article considers some of the methodological issues about how to investigate the relationship between teachers’ subject content knowledge and their pedagogical practice. The research outlined focuses on a single science teacher’s practice in giving science teaching explanations when teaching in and out of subject specialism. Although the findings from a single case are of limited value in terms of generalisability, this study adds to the discussion about future research into the relationship between teachers’ professional knowledge bases and their pedagogical practices.