Education

Abdul-Hamid, Husein, Sarah Mintz, Namrata Saraogi, and World Bank Group. 2017. From Compliance to Learning: A System for Harnessing the Power of Data in the State of Maryland. World Bank E-Library. Washington, D.C.: World Bank Group. 152 pp. This book builds on a 2015 World Bank report that assessed Education Management Information Systems (EMISs) in the state of Maryland. That report uncovered a successful system, and this one expands on lessons learned and ways to apply them in practice. The goal of this study is to distill Maryland’s good practices in education data systems and share them in a way that is useful to education stakeholders interested in harnessing the power of data to strengthen learning outcomes. This study also examines the history of education data collection and use in the United States with a focus on Maryland, including a review of federal and state legislation that has helped to shape Maryland’s education data policies and systems.

Huffman, Terry.  An Appalachian School in Coal Country: Facing the Challenges of a Changing Region.  Lexington Books (August 20, 2019).  158 pgs.  Huffman examines the struggles and triumphs of an elementary school in one of the poorest counties in the United States.  Despite the economic crisis in the county, Creekside Elementary School is achieving unprecedented academic success.  This study explores the objectives, goals, and challenges of the educators of Creekside Elementary and the ways in which they are able to serve the needs of their students and community.  Creekside is a microcosm of the changes occurring in the Appalachian region itself, and this book examines how one elementary school is able to succeed despite all odds and how others like it might achieve similar results.

Macartney, Hugh, John D Singleton, and National Bureau of Economic Research. 2017. School Boards and Student Segregation. Nber Working Paper Series, No. 23619. Cambridge, Mass.: National Bureau of Economic Research. 36 pp. This paper provides the first causal evidence about how elected local school boards affect student segregation across schools. The key identification challenge is that the composition of a school board is potentially correlated with unobserved determinants of school segregation, such as the pattern of household sorting and the degree to which boards are geographically constrained in defining zones of attendance.

Rudibaugh, Lindsey, Mica.  Helping the Way We Are Needed: Ethnography of an Appalachian Work College.  Ph.D. diss.  208 pages.  Prescott College, 2015.  This doctoral research is an ethnographic study that describes the lived culture of Alice Lloyd College, a work college located in the Appalachian Mountains of Kentucky, and its efficacy in engaging Appalachian students in sustainability education in a college setting.  Campus culture was found to be consistent with that of the broader Appalachian region, with three blue collar values - work ethic, service and self-reliance - emerging as core cultural indicators within the campus community.  Student participants reported low levels of cultural dissonance in transitioning from their family lives to life in college, with most claiming that their immediate families were supportive of their decision to attend college. This is uncommon in the higher education landscape as many Appalachian students on more traditional campuses are first-generation college attendees who struggle to graduate and experience a clash between their home culture and the culture they experience at school.