This study aimed to compare the perception of short vs. long vowel contrasts in Japanese and Modern Standard Arabic (MSA) by four groups of listeners differing in their linguistic backgrounds: native Arabic (NA), native Japanese (NJ), non-native Japanese (NNJ) and Australian English (OZ) speakers. The NNJ and OZ groups shared the first language…

The aim of this paper is to explore the phonetic nature of vowels in Modern Standard Arabic (MSA). Although Arabic is a Semitic language, the speech sound system of Arabic is very comprehensive. Data used for this study were elicited from the standard speech of nine informants who are native speakers of Arabic. The researchers used themselves as…

The Maryland School Assessment (MSA) is administered annually to students in grades 3-8 in reading and math. MSA data are used to meet federal No Child Let Behind (NCLB) requirements. This paper presents how Maryland students' reading and mathematics MSA scores continued to improve in 2009, and the achievement gaps among special services and…

If your child attends a Maryland public school, you may already be aware that he or she will take a test called the Maryland School Assessment--MSA for short. But what is the Maryland School Assessment, and how can you help your child prepare for it? What subjects will the test cover, and what do the questions look like? This publication answers…

As public school accountability for student achievement has continued to increase, prior to and as a result of the No Child Left Behind Act of 2001, schools have sought ways of bringing new instructional services to their students to raise their levels of achievement. Some Pennsylvania public high schools have attempted to improve student…

The provision of toilets and menstrual supplies appears to be a promising strategy to promote adolescent girls' school attendance and performance in less developed countries. In this article, we use the first round of the Malawi Schooling and Adolescent Survey (MSAS) to examine the individual- and school-level factors associated with…

National testing standards have increased pressure on school personnel to identify and implement instructional practices that facilitate the academic achievement of at-risk students. No Child Left Behind legislation currently mandates that reading programs at the middle school level receiving federal funding must use scientifically validated…

In November 1998, the Attorneys General of 46 states, the District of Columbia and five U.S. territories signed an agreement with the five largest tobacco manufacturers, known as the Master Settlement Agreement (MSA). The MSA arose out of a number of separate state lawsuits against tobacco manufacturers seeking reimbursement for their Medicaid and…

Objective: To assess the association between rurality and depression care. Methods: Data were extracted for 10,319 individuals with self-reported depression in the Medical Expenditure Panel Survey. Pharmacotherapy was defined as an antidepressant prescription fill, and minimally adequate pharmacotherapy was defined as receipt of at least 4…

This study sought to investigate the relationship between middle school principals' instructional leadership behaviors and student achievement. In particular, this study investigated the specific principal leadership behaviors of middle level principals that promote student achievement in school. A secondary variable for consideration was student…

In all the elementary schools in the county, benchmark assessments were given six times a year in math and three times in reading; they were modeled after the questions anticipated on the Maryland School Assessment (MSA). Although results were sent to the school board, there were no cosmic consequences for the hourlong tests; they were supposed to…

The purpose of this study was to adapt the creativity fostering teacher index scale into Turkish. For the language equivalence, firstly, the English version of the scale was translated by 30 English lecturers and then the Turkish version of the scale retranslated by the same lecturers. Later, the scale was applied to 288 teachers working in Nigde…

The face of the American landscape is overwhelmingly metropolitan, making metro areas important spaces for philanthropy to explicitly consider when crafting postsecondary funding strategies. This is the case for two primary reasons. First, metropolitan areas are drivers of economic activity and innovation. Second, four out of every five…

The aim of this study is to determine fifth-grade students' metacognitive knowledge and skills and its relationship with mathematics achievements. A total of 242 primary school students from six different schools were participated in the study. Turkish version of Metacognitive Knowledge and Skills Assessment (MSA-TR) was used to measure…

In four years, Anne Arundel County Public Schools (AACPS) increased sixth and seventh grade student achievement on the Maryland State Assessment (MSA) by 20% at Bates Middle School, a low performing school that had been targeted for restructuring by the state. This improvement positively correlates with the implementation of the arts integration…