The effect of student mobility on student outcomes has garnered much attention by researchers and policy-makers over the past few decades. The extant research relies on annual tests, typically measured each spring, to estimate the effect of structural moves on student achievement. The current literature does not allow researchers to evaluate…

A positive school climate is characterized by a supportive, orderly, and fair interpersonal climate. Children's perceptions of interpersonal climate and school safety are associated with several academic and behavioral adjustment outcomes. The current study has two goals: (1) to better understand the contribution of school interpersonal climate to…

In 2002, the No Child Left Behind Act (NCLB) called for "highly qualified" teachers in every classroom in order to increase student outcome and provide equitable learning opportunities to all students including poor and minority students. content and pedagogical knowledge before they come into the classrooms. However, research evidence…

A growing body of research has shown that high quality early care and education (ECE) is positively related to the development of children's social and academic skills (e.g., Barnett, 2011; Lamb & Ahnert, 2006; NICHD ECCRN, 2006). There is evidence that high quality ECE experiences can improve children's levels of social adjustment (Bierman et…

Observation measures of instructional quality tend to fall into two broad categories--those for use across subject areas and those intended for use in specific subject areas. The move toward content-specific measures is a result of research suggesting that effective teaching looks different across subject areas and that both content knowledge and…

In this poster presentation, the authors examine the impact of Chicago School Readiness Project (CSRP) on students' academic achievement in elementary school. First, they provide upper- and lower-bound estimates of the impact of CSRP on students' academic achievement, taking into account their subsequent nonrandom selection into higher versus…

The authors' goal was to evaluate the potential of Math Recovery (MR), a pullout, one-to-one tutoring program that has been designed to increase mathematics achievement among low-performing first graders, thereby closing the school-entry achievement gap and enabling participants to achieve at the level of their higher-performing peers in the…

This presentation capitalizes on a three-year, longitudinal, school-randomized trial of the 4Rs Program, a comprehensive, school-based social-emotional and literacy program for elementary schools, to test intervention induced changes in features of classroom climate and key dimensions of teacher affective and pedagogical processes and practices…

Randomized controlled trials (RCTs) are considered the "gold standard" for evaluating an intervention's effectiveness. Recently, the federal government has placed increased emphasis on the use of opportunistic experiments. A key criterion for conducting opportunistic experiments, however, is that there is relatively easy access to data…

Because digital tutoring is rapidly expanding, more rigorous, independent evaluations of their effectiveness is critical to inform federal, state, and local policy decisions that influence their role and application of technology in educating underserved students. The in-depth observations and vignettes in this paper illustrate the challenges in…

The Massachusetts Expanded Learning Time (ELT) initiative provides grants to selected schools to redesign their schedules by adding 300-plus instructional hours to the school year to improve outcomes, broaden enrichment opportunities, and provide teachers with more planning and professional development time. The Massachusetts Department of…

This research investigated the effects of two contrasting pre-k curricula, relative to practice as usual, on subsequent academic achievement. One curriculum had a strong literacy focus, the other was a less didactic "developmentally appropriate" curriculum that allowed children to have more influence on classroom activities. The purpose…

Teachers are generally recognized as the schooling factor accounting for the highest proportion of student learning outcomes (Aaronson et al., 2007; Hanushek, 1986). This implies the quick and dramatic improvement in school performance observed in turnaround (TA) schools was associated with a major change in the performance of its teachers. This…

The 4Rs Program (Reading, Writing, Respect and Resolution) is a "dual focus" whole school universal intervention designed to promote literacy development and social-emotional learning, that is currently being rigorously evaluated using a school-randomized trial of 18 elementary schools (9 intervention, 9 control) in New York City. The…

Over the last two decades, developmental science has made significant progress in understanding children's trajectories toward social-emotional and academic outcomes. At the same time, there has been dramatic growth in the design, implementation, and rigorous evaluation of school-based interventions to promote positive social-emotional development…