While there are many factors that affect the quality of teacher education programs, one specific related factor, a culture of accountability, will be addressed in this reflection of Haberman's work. A systematic review of faculty performance with specific rubrics and increasing expectation based on earned faculty rank is a necessary step in…

Focus group discussions offer participants time to discuss particular topics. This article discusses some results of several graduate students' attempts to implement focus group research. After a brief review of literature reflecting the use of focus groups and recommendations for their use, the author reports their reactions and their…

The purpose of this study was to determine how counselors and administrators who had taken counseling courses and were now practicing in their respective roles perceived the role of the school counselor. Education 603 Leadership and School Transformation was designed to prepare future counselors and administrators to participate in collaborative…

Education leadership is possibly the most important single determinant of an effective learning environment. Change leaders must understand procedures and processes that create the conditions necessary for organizational improvement. Building principals must be able to assess and evaluate the impact and perceptions of their leadership styles.…

The use of the Internet is expected in foreign-language classrooms. The present study investigated and evaluated the effectiveness of a language course supplemented with online material for college-level Japanese learners. The study compared exam scores from students enrolled in traditional inclass instruction taught 5 consecutive days for 50…

This study focused on the initial reasons individuals enter and complete the teacher education program, and pass the state test. These same individuals do not enter the public school classroom. This study identified meaningful categories for incidents reported as effective or helpful to successfully facilitating their decision to enter and…

The author discusses factors considered on how to become a teacher educator. Most colleges and universities consider the academic alliance of teaching, scholarship, and service to be an interdependent trilogy. Some institutions place more weight on one area than another. In many universities, teaching is the area of emphasis although the other two…

As one of the nation's top virtual university systems, the Tennessee Board of Regents' Online Degree Programs (RODP) has a great story to tell. And at Tennessee Tech University, Kevin Liska and students in the Business-Media Center specialize in telling great stories through technology. Together, the two groups will soon release marketing…

This article examines the practices of home-school communication in the Early Childhood Development (ECD) phase in South Africa. The aims of this qualitative investigation were to determine the nature and effectiveness of home-school communication practices and to make recommendations on how communication can be improved to facilitate better…

Educators of professionals often want to determine the quality of student performance and its impact on those they serve. Performance assessment in the education of teachers, medical practitioners, and counselors, for example, currently receives much discussion and debate in the literature (Vaugh & Everhart, 2004; Howley, 2003; and, Urbani et al.,…

There is a dearth of literature on multicultural aspects of play therapy, particularly for Mexican-American children. According to Landreth (2002), it is of utmost importance that children be able to communicate in a way that is most natural to them. The literature currently reflects a playroom based mostly on middle class European-American…

Schools are currently receiving increased funds for multimedia software for classrooms. There is a need for good software in the schools, and there is a need to know how to evaluate software and not naively rely on advertisements. Evaluators of multimedia software for education must have the skills to critically evaluate and make decisions not…

Academic subject selection goes beyond just deciding what is best for students to learn; factors such as school finances, staff training and skills, local traditions, and community and parental support also impact such decisions. Various subjects have had a centuries old stability in the schools such as mathematics, reading, science, English, and…

In view of the current emphasis on teachers' contextual assessment of emergent literacy skills, we need to determine the degree to which such assessments are valid judgments about children's early literacy skill development. One approach to this issue would be to examine closely the relationship between teacher ratings of literacy skills and…

Homework had been a mainstay teacher strategy since education first began. When used properly, study after study show that homework, from the elementary through the university level, is an effective method for reinforcing educational learning goals. Studies that include original research, surveys, interviews, and literature reviews, conducted by…