The impact of employment on academic achievement and college-going is readily evaluated within the literature, primarily through a quantitative lens. In such studies, youth employment is commonly found to negatively affect high school grades, persistence, and the likelihood of attending college. This qualitative study responds to the dominant…

In 1906, the Carnegie unit, or credit hour, was introduced to standardize U.S. public education. It defined the precise number of minutes students needed to learn a particular subject and the number of credit hours required to earn a high school or college degree. At the dawn of the 20th century, the Carnegie unit served the important purpose of…

Researchers examined seven schools in Alberta undergoing high school redesign, including the removal of the Carnegie Unit, a time-based metric for awarding course credits. A mixed methods convergent parallel design was used to gather data from leadership teams in the schools and to examine evidence of the impact on student learning. Qualitative…

Much of the research on first-generation college students (FGS) tends to focus on comparing this population of students to its continuing-generation peers and focuses on in-college experiences. This research looks to answer: (1) are there demographic and pre-college characteristic differences between full-time, FGS at different institutional…

This article describes how the Alberta Education High School Flexibility Enhancement Pilot Project allowed 16 high schools in Alberta, Canada, to remove the restrictions of the Carnegie unit, the seat time per credit requirement that has been widely used since 1906. The two purposes of the project were to determine whether the Carnegie unit should…

"Continuous Improvement in High Schools" gives educators and policymakers an accessible, actionable framework to address one of the nation's most important educational priorities: improving high school graduation and postsecondary preparedness rates. Martha Abele Mac Iver and Robert Balfanz, national experts in dropout prevention, apply…

This case was developed as part of a doctoral course for educational administration students who were specializing in K-12 educational administration. It could be used in a leadership, special education, or policy course for future school leaders or teachers. Currently, most educational institutions use Carnegie Units to structure how students…

The Science Posse program at Brandeis University aims to increase the recruitment and retention of students from disadvantaged and underrepresented backgrounds in STEM (science, technology, engineering and mathematics) disciplines. A grant from Carnegie Corporation helped support the development of the program, which has brought 50 students from…

The goal of Carnegie "Challenge" papers is to lift up ideas and issues in a way that elevates them to the nation's agenda. This paper is a "Challenge" paper, and serves as a call to realize the full power of the Common Core by redesigning and reshaping schools to support teachers and maximize key resources, rather than…

The progression of research on school-based agricultural education (SBAE) has been limited, in part, due to a lack of nationwide, student data detailing the effectiveness of SBAE. Using an ecological systems perspective, the relationships between SBAE enrollment; graduation rates; postsecondary science, technology, engineering, and mathematics…

In 2006 Jeanette Wing, a professor of computer science at Carnegie Mellon University, proposed computational thinking (CT) as a literacy just as important as reading, writing, and mathematics. Wing defined CT as a set of skills and strategies computer scientists use to solve complex, computational problems (Wing 2006). The computer science and…

When does a community create and sustain a truly innovative "next generation" high school that not only remains innovative, but also relevant? According to the Carnegie Corporation, this means seizing the opportunity to redesign schools to promote personalized learning. So far, much work has gone into retooling many of these (reform)…

In 2017, the Committee for Economic Development (CED) embarked upon a "listening tour" of business leaders and parents to discuss firsthand information about workplace demands and aspirations for high school graduates. With generous funding from the Carnegie Corporation of New York, the listening tour made stops in five communities over…

In 2017, the Committee for Economic Development (CED) embarked upon a "listening tour" of business leaders and parents to discuss firsthand information about workplace demands and aspirations for high school graduates. With generous funding from the Carnegie Corporation of New York, the listening tour made stops in five communities over…

Through analyses of three dissertations completed by graduates of our Carnegie Project for the Education Doctorate-influenced program, this article offers insights into both the doctoral students' inquiries into their problems of practice and their faculty advisors' roles and expectations for them. Studying student dissertations provided the…