Education Commons^™

Australia: Pisa Australia—Excellence And Equity?, Sue Thomson

OECD Programme for International Student Assessment (PISA) Australia

Australia’s education system reflects its history of federalism. State and territory governments are responsible for administering education within their jurisdiction and across the sector comprising government (public), Catholic systemic and other independent schooling systems. They collaborate on education policy with the federal government. Over the past two decades the federal government has taken a greater role in funding across the education sector, and as a result of this involvement and the priorities of federal governments of the day, Australia now has one of the highest rates of non-government schooling in the OECD. Funding equity across the sectors has become a …

Integrating The Findings From The National Assessment Of Student Achievement Into The Policy Process: An Experience From Nepal, Lekha Nath Poudel, Gopal Prasad Bhattarai

Assessment and Reporting

This paper presents the experiences from Nepal on how the findings from the National Assessment of Student Achievement (NASA) have been integrated into policy processes. The purpose of this brief paper is twofold: to give an overview of the process of the National Assessment of Student Achievement, and to describe how the results were disseminated to different stakeholders to incorporate the findings into the design of policy processes. In doing so, the case study highlights how the assessment findings have been used to design and implement policies and programs in education.

Bridging The Gap: Transitioning Information Literacy Skills For Student Success, Jennifer L. Fabbi, David Forgues

Library Faculty Presentations

Context: UNLV, University Undergraduate Learning Outcomes, Inquiry & Critical Thinking, Information Literacy, iSkills Assessment

Bridging The Information Literacy Gap: First-Year Students Reflect For Success, Jennifer L. Fabbi, Dan Gianoutsos, David Forgues

Library Faculty Presentations

UNLV Context

• Fall 2011: 22,138 undergraduate students; 72% were fulltime; 5135 freshmen with a 76.4% first-yr retention rate (2010 to 2011); 40.6% six-year graduation rate

• Budget-induced movement to large-enrollment classes – Program eliminations and consolidations underway

• General Education Reform developments – Articulation of University Undergraduate Learning Outcomes, especially Inquiry and Critical Thinking – New general education requirements extending vertically throughout the curriculum

• Focus on enhancing the first-year experience for incoming students

Exploring Student Perceptions To Explain The Relationship Between Physical Activity And Academic Achievement In Adolescents: A Mixed Methods Study, Megan J. Hylok

College of Education and Human Sciences: Dissertations, Theses, and Student Research

A nationwide survey conducted by the Center for Disease Control in 2007 reported 65% of high school students did not meet the recommendation that youth participate in at least 60 minutes of physical activity most days of the week (CDC, 2008). While research has focused its attention primarily on bodily health, growing evidence supports the benefits of physical activity on brain health (Ratey & Hagerman, 2008). Physical activity is important and many adolescents are not meeting the recommendation, therefore, it is important to explore the adolescent perceptions to understand which factors influence physical activity participation. The significance of this study …

Superintendents Speak Out: A Survey Of Superintendents’ Opinions Regarding Recent School Reforms In Arkansas, Virginia H. Blankenship, Joshua H. Barnett

Arkansas Education Reports

In an effort to improve educational opportunities for all students, Arkansas policymakers have made education reforms in many areas since 2003, such as increasing school funding by nearly 30 percent, consolidating both districts with enrollments below 350 students and inefficient schools, and strengthening accountability measures designed to raise academic achievement. However, there is little empirical evidence about how any of these reforms have impacted districts, schools, and students across the state, so policymakers have no way of knowing whether such reforms have the potential to improve student achievement and help close the achievement gap between disadvantaged students and their more …