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Educational Program Evaluation

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RAND rigorously evaluates all kinds of educational programs by performing cost-benefit analyses, measuring effects on student learning, and providing recommendations to help improve program design and implementation. Our portfolio of educational program evaluations includes studies of early childhood education, summer and after-school programs, educator pay-for-performance, programs intended to reduce educational disparities, and choice- and standards-based reforms.

Report

Summer Learning Programs Benefit Low-Income Urban Students

Sep 7, 2016

Low-income students lose ground in the summer relative to their wealthier peers. High-quality voluntary summer learning programs can help disadvantaged students catch up and succeed in school, but consistent attendance is crucial.
Commentary

Exploring New Approaches to Higher Education: The Expansion of Competency-Based Programs

Sep 29, 2015

Policymakers and educators must determine if the risks of maintaining the status quo outweigh the potential benefits of competency-based programs, especially for those students who are ill-served by the traditional higher education model.

Explore Educational Program Evaluation

Commentary

What Emerging Research Says About the Promise of Personalized Learning

Personalized learning holds promise as an innovation that can lead to improved educational outcomes for students. But implementers should have modest expectations for the magnitude of the benefits, and patience for the full benefits to emerge.

Aug 16, 2017
News Release

News Release

'Principal Pipelines' to Develop School Leaders Can Be Affordable Way to Improve Schools

Improving school leadership by better selecting, training and evaluating principals can be an affordable option for school districts to reduce turnover and improve schools.

Jun 20, 2017
Report

'Principal Pipelines' Can Be an Affordable Way to Improve Schools

Improving school leadership by better selecting, training, and evaluating principals can be an affordable way to reduce turnover and improve schools.

Jun 20, 2017
Commentary

How to Navigate Public-Private Partnerships in Higher Ed

Universities are partnering with private companies that have the resources to help them compete in the online learning market and maximize student enrollment. Do their different missions—providing high-quality education and making a profit—dilute the quality of the courses?

May 26, 2017
Journal Article

The Costs and Benefits of Scaled-Up Pre-Kindergarten Programs

Essay presenting the available evidence from economic evaluations of the costs and benefits of scaled-up pre-kindergarten (pre-k) programs and the implications of the research for investing in those programs.

May 23, 2017
Commentary

Going Forward, Looking Back: Lessons from School Improvement Grants

The Every Student Succeeds Act takes effect this fall, returning significant power to states and local districts to set goals and prescribe strategies to lift achievement. As schools finalize their plans under the new law, they can learn from the shortcomings of School Improvement Grants.

May 10, 2017
Multimedia

Informing Investments in High-Quality Preschool

In this congressional briefing, RAND senior economist, Lynn Karoly, presents findings from her research, which compiles the most reliable evidence concerning the short- and long-run effects of high-quality preschool programs for participating children and the associated costs, benefits, and economic returns.

May 5, 2017
Report

Quality Rating and Improvement Systems for Early Care and Education Programs

Quality rating and improvement systems (QRISs) have now been almost universally adopted as an important tool to boost ECE program quality. For the second generation of QRISs, states will need to be more strategic about the allocation of funds to achieve their goals of expanding access to and improving the quality of ECE programs.

May 1, 2017
Project

Mapping MOOCs4Inclusion

As part of the MOOCs4Inclusion research team, RAND Europe contributed to a literature review to identify recent research on the use of free digital learning by migrants and refugees in the EU and neighbouring countries.

Apr 28, 2017
Journal Article

Journal Article

Free Digital Learning Opportunities for Migrants and Refugees: An Analysis of Current Initiatives and Recommendations for Their Further Use

This final report on MOOCs and free digital learning opportunities for migrants and refugees is a modest and explorative contribution to better understandingthe challenges and opportunities for developing digitally-enabled solutions to tackle educational access and learning possibilities for the recent influx of refugees and migrants in Europe.

Apr 28, 2017
Report

Report

Digital Resources for STEM Educators and Recommendations for Cyberlearning Initiatives: Results from the National Science Foundation Digital Library/Distributed Learning Program Evaluation

This evaluation of the National Science Digital Library/Distributed Learning (NSDL) program assessed the sustainability of NSDL resources, tools, and services over time and across the changing technology landscape.

Apr 27, 2017
Multimedia

Why Prison Education Matters

In this Events @ RAND podcast, our panel of experts discuss the costs and benefits of using education to stop the prison revolving door, and the effectiveness of programs like The Last Mile, which prepares inmates for reentry by providing them with marketable skills.

Apr 6, 2017
Commentary

School Choice: How Parents Can Find Out What They Need to Know

To make an informed choice about schools, parents need to know about the quality of instruction, services, and the overall school climate. Schools need a better system of measuring and collecting data on performance, and a way to make it accessible to families.

Feb 21, 2017
Report

Report

Combining Entrepreneurship and Web Development for High School Students: A Pilot Evaluation of the Startup Tech Program and High School Students' College and Career Aspirations

This pilot evaluation of Startup Tech assesses whether 12th-grade students experienced either improved self-efficacy or changes in their college and career plans during the year in which they were in the program.

Jan 6, 2017
Commentary

Support for Postsecondary Education in Prison

Correctional educational programs can reduce incarceration costs and recidivism. But it's critical that former inmates can connect with reentry services in the community to complete their education.

Dec 15, 2016
Multimedia

Why Correctional Education Matters

RAND research on correctional education explores the effects on recidivism and post-release employment outcomes, as well as its cost-effectiveness.

Dec 12, 2016
Journal Article

Journal Article

Independent Evaluation of California's Race to the Top-Early Learning Challenge Quality Rating and Improvement System: Cumulative Technical Report

This final comprehensive report highlights key findings from the half-term report and presents additional results related to the implementation of the system, quality improvement (QI) supports provided through the system, program quality and children's developmental outcomes, and perceptions of quality and the rating system.

Dec 5, 2016
Journal Article

Journal Article

Independent Evaluation of California's Race to the Top-Early Learning Challenge Quality Rating and Improvement System: Cumulative Technical Report Executive Summary

These findings can be used to make revisions to improve the QRIS as a measure of program quality and to identify promising ways to support QI efforts among early childhood programs.

Dec 5, 2016
Journal Article

Journal Article

Independent Evaluation of California's Race to the Top-Early Learning Challenge Quality Rating and Improvement System

Implementation of the RTT–ELC QRIS was in an early stage at the time the study began, but significant progress has been made over the course of the system's development, from 2012 to 2015.

Dec 5, 2016
Commentary

Before We Measure Teaching Quality, We Should Know What It Is

The lack of an evidence base on teaching quality and its impact in higher education points to a need for more research, made more pressing by the imminent roll-out of the Teaching Excellence Framework, which intends to assess and monitor teaching quality at UK higher education institutions.

Nov 29, 2016

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RAND Topic:
Educational Program Evaluation

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RAND Education