REL Fast Response Studies
Fast Response Studies are short-term projects conducted on current education issues of importance at the local, state, and regional levels. Topics reflect issues identified through lab outreach and through requests for assistance from policymakers and educators.
Completed Studies
Pre-K Participation Rates in Tennessee’s Public Program
This study examines the first four years of Tennessee’s Voluntary Prekindergarten program, directed to four-year-olds eligible for free or reduced-price lunch. It reviews participation levels and trends for the program as a whole, for collaborative partner classrooms, and for student and district subgroups and discusses the geographic distribution of program sites.
Principal Investigator: Anna Grehan, PhD; Linda Cavalluzzo, PhD
September 2011
Superintendent Turnover in Kentucky: A Descriptive Analysis
This REL Appalachia report, Superintendent Turnover in Kentucky, is the state’s first detailed description of superintendent turnover. It intends to help policymakers and other leaders better understand turnover so that they can develop new programs to prepare, recruit, and retain superintendents. The report describes superintendent turnover statewide, by rural status, and by Appalachian and non-Appalachian region over 1998/99–2007-08 and also looks at how turnover varies by 2007/08 school district characteristics.
Principal Investigator: Jerry Johnson, PhD
August 2011
Connecting Tennessee Career and Technical Education to Tennessee High-Wage and High-Demand Occupations
Tennessee is in the process of implementing new Career and Technical Education (CTE) career clusters, model sequences of courses, and Programs of Study (POS) to fulfill requirements of the Carl D. Perkins Career and Technical Education Improvement Act of 2006. This study will provide information on concentrations in high school CTE program areas to support planning and decision making by the Tennessee Department of Education (TDOE) in its efforts to redesign its CTE program. This independent report will show the state’s political and business leaders the extent to which its high school CTE program areas embrace the state’s major areas of economic growth and development in preparing students for opportunities in high-wage and/or high-demand careers. Descriptive statistics will be used to provide a comparison of the extent to which student completion of concentrations in the various high school CTE program areas are aligned with occupations that are high-wage or high-demand in the local area across different regions in Tennessee.
Principal Investigator: Christine Mokher, PhD
August, 2011
Estimating College Enrollment Rates for Virginia Public High School Graduates
Using data from the National Student Clearinghouse and the Virginia Department of Education, this report examines college enrollment rates overall and by student academic and demographic characteristics for the Virginia public high school class of 2008.
Principal Investigator: Laura Holian, PhD; Christine Mokher, PhD
February, 2011
Changes in the Cost of Energy in One State's School Districts
As the price of energy rose dramatically in recent years, school districts suddenly faced unexpected increases in energy bills not accounted for in school budgets. This report by REL Appalachia, Changes in the Cost of Energy in One State's School Districts, examines energy expenditures in Tennessee school districts for 2002/03–2007/08 to see how much energy’s share of district spending rose and whether the increase disproportionately affected districts with certain characteristics. Energy expenditures rose from 2.6 to 3.0 percent of total expenditures over the period. Not all districts with the same characteristics (region, size, locale) were similarly affected. Many had considerably different scores on an index of the fiscal stress resulting from higher energy costs, suggesting that district characteristics are not a reliable indicator of the need for state support. States could use the stress index instead to concentrate support on districts under the greatest stress from rising energy prices.
Principal Investigator: Donald Cymrot, PhD
March 2010
The Relationship Between Changes in the Percentage of Students Passing and in the Percentage Testing Advanced on State Assessment Tests for Kentucky and Virginia
Under the accountability provisions of the No Child Left Behind Act of 2001, states are required to assess students in reading and math and to identify them as below proficient or as proficient or advanced (both considered passing). Because schools are held accountable only for ensuring that students test proficient or better, there have been concerns that a focus on increasing the percentage of students testing proficient might unintentionally lead to fewer students testing at the advanced level. This REL Appalachia report, The Relationship Between Changes in the Percentage of Students Passing and in the Percentage Testing Advanced on State Assessment Tests for Kentucky and Virginia, finds that schools in Kentucky and Virginia with the greatest increases in the percentage testing proficient or better also have the greatest increases in the percentage testing advanced.
Principal Investigator: Louis Jacobson, PhD
March 2010
West Virginia's Progress Toward Universal Prekindergarten
The report examines rates of participation in West Virginia’s universal, voluntary pre-k program from 2002/03 to 2006/07. It describes the share of seats provided by collaborative partners and public school systems and analyzes participation rates by demographic and socioeconomic subgroup and county characteristics.
Principal Investigator: Linda Cavalluzzo, PhD
April 2009
Preparing to Serve English Language Learner Students: School Districts with Emerging English Language Learner Communities
This report aims to help school districts deal with the challenges of newly enrolling or rapidly increasing English language learner students by offering background information and sharing the experiences of districts that have addressed similar challenges in providing services and infrastructure to support the success of English language learner
Principal Investigator: Annette Zehler, PhD
June 2008
Assessing the Likelihood Virginia Public Schools will Meet the Central Goal of No Child Left Behind: Having Every Student Proficient
This report investigates progress in Virginia public schools in satisfying the requirement of the No Child Left Behind Act of 2001 that every student be proficient in reading and math by 2014. It develops a variable change model that uses observed baseline proficiency and proficiency trends at individual schools to forecast gains for six subgroups in elementary, middle, and high schools.
Principal Investigator: Louis Jacobson, PhD
September 2007
Registering Students from Language Backgrounds Other Than English
This report seeks to alert administrators, school staff, and database managers to variations in the naming systems of other cultures; to help these groups accommodate other cultures and identify students consistently in school databases; and to provide knowledge of other cultures' naming conventions and forms of address to assist in interacting with students and their family members.
Principal Investigator: Carolyn Adger, PhD
August 2007
Studies in Progress
Providing Supplemental Educational Services to Rural School Students: A Descriptive Study of Enrollment and Participation Rates in Four States
State officials are required to develop, implement, and publicly report on standards and techniques for monitoring the quality and effectiveness of supplemental educational services (SES). This requirement clearly assigns to SEAs the responsibility to ensure that SES tutoring services are available to children in rural areas, where access to SES providers is limited and where afterschool programs are not readily accessible due to transportation schedules. This study will provide descriptive information to help SEA and LEA officials identify underserved rural areas. Outcomes will include descriptive information to inform policy decisions regarding SES participation by rural students and provider recruitment in rural districts. Specifically, the evidence obtained will determine (a) if differentials in enrollment and participation rates exist between rural, urban, and other school locales, (b) the consistency of patterns across states, and (c) differentials in the type(s) of services providers offer (computer-based, conventional, mixed mode) by district location (i.e., rural or non-rural).
Principal Investigators: Marty Alberg, PhD; Christine Mokher, PhD
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