December

Study Finds Steep Decline in Students Repeating Grades
Grade retention—the controversial practice of requiring a student to repeat a grade in school due to a lack of academic progress—steadily declined from 2005 through 2010, according to new research published in Educational Researcher. Read more

November

Increasingly Popular Short-Term Community College Certificate Programs Offer Limited Labor-Market Returns, Study Finds
Short-term certificate programs at community colleges offer limited labor-market returns, on average, in most fields of study, according to new research published in Educational Evaluation and Policy Analysis. Read more

October

New AERA Open Access Journal Now Accepting Article Submissions
AERA Open, a new scholarly journal from AERA, is now accepting article submissions. It is among the first open access journals to be launched by a major scholarly social science society. Read more

James D. Anderson, Noted American Education History and Desegregation Expert, to Give 2014 Brown Lecture in Educational Research—October 23
The title of this year’s public lecture, which features speaker Dr. James D. Anderson, is “A Long Shadow: The American Pursuit of Political Justice and Education Equality.” Read more

September

AERA Names Juliane Baron Director of Government Relations
The American Educational Research Association (AERA) has named Juliane Baron as its new Director of Government Relations. She begins her position on October 1. Read more

August

New Revision of Standards for Educational and Psychological Testing Just Released
The new revision of the Standards for Educational and Psychological Testing has just been released jointly by the American Educational Research Association (AERA), the American Psychological Association (APA), and the National Council on Measurement in Education (NCME). Read more

Study Details Shortage of Replication in Education Research
Although replicating important findings is essential for helping education research improve its usefulness to policymakers and practitioners, less than one percent of the articles published in the top education research journals are replication studies, according to new research published today in Educational Researcher. Read more

Study: Attending a More Selective College Doesn’t Mean a Better Chance
of Graduating 
Attending a more selective college, as measured by average SAT score, does not make much of a difference for a student’s chance of graduating with a bachelor’s degreeonce individual and other institutional factors are taken into account, according to research published today in the American Educational Research Journal. Read more

July

Study Finds Unintended Consequences of Raising State Math and Science Graduation Requirements
Raising state-mandated math and science course graduation requirements may increase high school dropout rates without a meaningful effect on college enrollment or degree attainment, according to new research published in Educational Researcher. Read more

June

Study: Teachers More Likely to Use Ineffective Instruction When Teaching Students with Mathematics Difficulties
First-grade teachers in the United States may need to change their instructional practices if they are to raise the mathematics achievement of students with mathematics difficulties, according to new research published in Educational Evaluation and Policy Analysis. Read more

Study: Little Evidence That No Child Left Behind Has Hurt Teacher Job Satisfaction
The conventional wisdom that No Child Left Behind has eroded teacher job satisfaction and commitment is off the mark, according to new research published in Educational Evaluation and Policy Analysis, a peer-reviewed journal of AERA. Read more

AERA Announces New Editors for Journal of Educational and Behavioral Statistics
AERA has named Daniel McCaffrey and Li Cai as the new editors for the Journal of Educational and Behavioral Statistics (JEBS). McCaffrey and Cai will begin reviewing manuscripts on July 1, 2014, and will become editors of record for a three-year term beginning in January 2015. Read more

May

Study: Addressing “Mischievous Responders” Would Increase Validity of Adolescent Research
“Mischievous responders” play the game of intentionally providing inaccurate answers on anonymous surveys, a widespread problem that can mislead research findings. However, new data analysis procedures may help minimize the impact of these “jokester youths,” according to research published in Educational Researcher, a peer-reviewed journal of AERA. Read more

Study: State Value-Added Performance Measures Do Not Reflect the Content or Quality of Teachers’ Instruction
New research published in Educational Evaluation and Policy Analysis (EEPA), a peer-reviewed journal of the American Educational Research Association, finds weak to nonexistent relationships between state-administered value-added model (VAM) measures of teacher performance and the content or quality of teachers’ instruction. Read more

April

AERA Selects James D. Anderson to Deliver 2014 Brown Lecture James P. Anderson, a professor at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign and a noted expert on American education history and desegregation, has been selected by the American Educational Research Association (AERA), to present the 2014 Brown Lecture in Education Research. Read more

March

AERA Announces 2014 Award Winners in Education Research
The American Educational Research Association (AERA) today announced the winners of its 2014 awards for excellence in education research. AERA will honor the recipients for their outstanding scholarship and service at an awards ceremony on April 5 at the AERA Annual Meeting in Philadelphia. Read more

Study: Community College Transfers as Likely to Earn a BA as Four-Year Students, Despite Credit Transfer Roadblocks
Students who begin their postsecondary education at a community college and successfully transfer to a four-year college have BA graduation rates equal to similar students who begin at four-year colleges, according to new research published today. Read more

Jeannie Oakes Voted AERA President-Elect; Other Key Members Elected to
AERA Council 
Jeannie Oakes, director of the Ford Foundation’s programs in Educational Equity and Scholarship, has been voted president-elect of the American Educational Research Association (AERA).
Read more

February

Study: Classroom Focus on Social and Emotional Skills Can Lead to
Academic Gains 
Classroom programs designed to improve elementary school students’ social and emotional skills can also increase reading and math achievement, even if academic improvement is not a direct goal of the skills building, according to a study to be published this month in American Educational Research Journal (AERJ). Read more

AERA 2014 Fellows Announced
AERA has announced the selection of 22 scholars as 2014 AERA Fellows. Read more

AERA Appoints Inaugural Editors for AERA Open
AERA today announced the appointment of Mark Warschauer, Greg J. Duncan, and Jacquelynne Eccles as the inaugural editors of AERA Open, effective July 1. Read more

January

January/February ER Publishes New Studies on the Arts and Critical Thinking, NCLB Waivers, and School-wide Consequences of Student Risk Factors
The January/February issue of Educational Researcher includes three feature articles, as well as a special section that examines the standards for high-quality education research. Read more
Study: University Rankings Influence Number and Competitiveness of Applicants
How universities fare on reputational quality-of-life and academic rankings – such as those published by the Princeton Review or U.S. News & World Report – can have a measurable effect on the number of applications they – and their competitors – receive and on the academic competitiveness of the resulting freshman class, according to a new study. Read more

Researchers Find Substantial Drop in Use of Affirmative Action in College Admissions
University of Washington researchers Grant H. Blume and Mark C. Long have produced the first empirical estimates using national-level data to show the extent to which levels of affirmative action in college admissions decisions changed during the period of 1992 to 2004. Read more

December

December ER Releases Key New Studies: Higher Education Diversity, Common Core Advocacy, Improving Professional Development, Continuing Relevance of Textbooks
The December issue of ER includes four feature articles. Read more