Schott Foundation's 2009 report on Opportunity to Learn

The most recent report from the Schott Foundation, Lost Opportunity: A 50 State Report on the Opportunity to Learn in America , "employs a state-by-state comparison of academic proficiency as illustrated by the percentage of students scoring at or above proficiency on the eighth-grade National Assessment of Educational Progress reading exam and access to high-performing schools as measured by the Opportunity to Learn Index (OTLI)." Unfortunately, Nevada falls into the lowest category (with 8 other states and the District of Columbia) that " provide neither a moderately proficient school system nor equitable access to the systems' best schools or resources." (from the web site: http://www.otlstatereport.org/national/summary/intro#staterankings)

US News will start ranking teacher prep programs

Couple of articles describing U.S. News & World Report's intentions to start a survey of 1,000 teacher prep programs, utilizing the National Council on Teacher Quality methodology.

From PR Newswire:
http://www.prnewswire.com/news-releases/us-news--world-report-and-national-council-on-teacher-quality-launch-comprehensive-review-of-nations-teacher-preparation-programs-114163659.html

From Inside Higher Ed:
http://www.insidehighered.com/news/2011/01/19/qt#248429

College rankings--what's important?

Looking at several of the major college ranking bodies (e.g., U.S.News and World Report, Kiplinger, Forbes, Times Higher Education, Washington Monthly) the Chronicle (Aug. 29, 2010)  found few factors that most--or even a few--would agree upon.

Two new reports from College Board on college completion

Two new reports have been issued by the College Board on college completion. The first, "College Completion Agenda: 2010 Progress Report,"  provides data on issues related to college completion rates: associate and beyond,  internationally as well as state by state, breakdowns by age and race, etc...with 10 detailed recommendations. The second is a briefer set of policy recommendations, "The College Completion Agenda: State Policy Guide."

Newest data on 100 largest public school districts (2007-08)

Clark County is 6th in size and Washoe is 57th. Data on high school completion rates, students eligible for school lunch program, students with IEP's, racial breakdown of student population, revenue sources, expenditures per pupil, etc.
Summary and link to full report is here: http://nces.ed.gov/pubs2010/2010349.pdf

The Trouble with Impact Factors

More and more we're being asked to rank journals...and rank our scholarship based on where it's published. One of the most widely used metrics to rank journals is the "impact factor," created by Eugene Garfield in the middle of the 20th century. "Mr. Garfield, though, now compares his brainchild to nuclear energy: a force that can help society but can unleash mayhem when it is misused." There are many flaws with using impact factors to rank journals and those problems magnify when attempting to use them to evaluate individuals. There is a good article in the Chronicle of Higher Education from Oct. 14, 2005 by Richard Monastersky, where he notes"... relying on impact factors to evaluate a person is statistically dimwitted, say critics of its spreading influence. The measurement is just an average of all the papers in a journal over a year; it doesn't apply to any single paper, let alone to any author." I encourage you to read the whole article before you fasten onto this approach for ranking anything. ("The number that's devouring science.")

Ranking higher education journals

The paper, "Status of journals in the field of higher education," by Bray and Majors was recently presented at ASHE. The research questions they addressed were:

1. Which journals do higher education faculty consider to be the top five in the field?
2. In which tiers do higher education faculty believe that specific journals fall?
3. With which journals do higher education faculty members exhibit the most familiarity?
4. Which journals do higher education faculty read the most frequently?
5. Which journals do higher education faculty cite the most frequently?
6. Using a weighted average of faculty perceptions of prestige and their knowledge and use of journals, into which tiers do specific higher education journals fall?

I'll be happy to send you a copy of the paper if you're interested.