Use of a longitudinal school compleall districts and campuses, not just This report provides an overview of tion rate as an indicator of school those in the Exemplary and Recogschool success indicators, along with district performance has been disnized categories, there was an interest an analysis of Texas data using a cussed since the advent of the Acafrom the field and public to explore an sc...

OBJECTIVE To examine the influence of state laws and district policies on district-wide elementary school and middle school practices related to physical education (PE) time and the percentage of moderate-to-vigorous physical activity (MVPA) time during PE. DESIGN Multivariate, cross-sectional analysis of state laws, district wellness and PE policies, and district PE practices for school year...

BACKGROUND A large measles outbreak occurred in Quebec, Canada, in 2011. Although nearly two-thirds of the cases occurred in only two health districts, a mass vaccination campaign targeting all Quebec elementary and high school students without valid two-dose history was undertaken to prevent future outbreaks. We compared rates of non-vaccination and age at first measles vaccine dose among stud...

Public school finance mechanisms differ from state to state, and they are often extremely complex. Most commonly, the federal government contributes about 7% of the total school budget, and the remainder is split fairly evenly between local contributions (primarily raised through local property taxes) and state contributions (primarily raised through state income taxes and sales taxes). The ave...

Research consistently shows that teacher quality is a powerful determinant of student achievement gains, yet, urban school districts often struggle to staff their schools with qualified teachers. This problem seems to begin with teacher recruitment. In order to improve teacher recruitment, a popular intervention for urban school districts is raising teacher salaries to improve the school distri...

BACKGROUND The Whole School, Whole Community, Whole Child (WSCC) model calls for greater collaboration across the community, school, and health sectors to meet the needs and support the full potential of each child. This article reports on how 3 states and 2 local school districts have implemented aspects of the WSCC model through collaboration, leadership and policy creation, alignment, and im...

In response to the scientific evidence documenting both profound developmental changes in sleep and circadian biology during adolescence and the myriad of negative health, performance, and safety outcomes risks associated with chronic sleep loss, at least 70 public school districts in the United States, representing approximately 1,000 schools, have successfully implemented a delay in high scho...

BACKGROUND The School Health Policies and Programs Study (SHPPS) is a national study periodically conducted to assess school health policies and programs at the state, district, school, and classroom levels. For SHPPS 2006, district-level questionnaires were designed for telephone administration, but mixed-mode data collection that also used paper-and-pencil mail questionnaires was required to ...

In this paper, we report the results of a pilot study of the cost of teacher turnover in five school districts. We examine the rate of turnover, the relationship between turnover and teacher and school characteristics, and the costs associated with recruiting, hiring, and training replacement teachers. We find evidence that turnover costs, although difficult to quantify, are significant at both...