Jennifer Sloan McCombs

Making Summer Count

How Summer Programs Can Boost Children's Learning

Despite long-term and ongoing efforts to close the achievement gap between disadvantaged and advantaged students, low-income students continue to perf...

Getting to Work on Summer Learning

Recommended Practices for Success

RAND is conducting a longitudinal study that examines the implementation and effectiveness of voluntary summer learning programs. This second report i...

Ready for Fall? Near-Term Effects of Voluntary Summer Learning Programs on Low-Income Students' Learning Opportunities and Outcomes

As part of a randomized controlled trial study assessing the effect of district-run voluntary summer programs, this second report in a series looks at...

Reforming Teacher Education

Something Old, Something New

Teachers for a New Era (TNE) is one of the latest efforts aimed at teacher education reform. Eleven institutions participate in TNE, which emphasizes ...

Learning from Summer

Effects of Voluntary Summer Learning Programs on Low-income Urban Youth

RAND researchers assess voluntary, district-led summer learning programs for low-income, urban elementary students. This third report in a series exam...

A Casebook of Alternative Governance Structures and Organizational Forms

This study examines alternative ways that government can carry out its activities. It should prove useful to government agencies and decisionmakers wh...

Every Summer Counts

A Longitudinal Analysis of Outcomes from the National Summer Learning Project

This seventh report in a series presents longitudinal findings on the effectiveness of voluntary summer learning programs in five school districts. Th...

Hours of Opportunity: Lessons from five cities on building systems to improve after-school, summer school, and other out-of-school-time programs

The Wallace Foundation sponsored an initiative to help five cities increase collaboration, access, quality, information sharing, and sustainability in...

Reforming Teacher Education

Teacher education has been subject to both scathing criticism and innumerable efforts designed to reform it or to save it from being dismantled. One o...

Putting Data to Work for Young People

A Ten-Step Guide for Expanded Learning Intermediaries

This ten-step plan should help expanded learning nonprofits address challenges related to data collection and management and therefore make after-scho...

Investing in Successful Summer Programs

A Review of Evidence Under the Every Student Succeeds Act

Research evidence suggests that summer breaks contribute to income-based achievement and opportunity gaps for children and youth. However, summertime ...

Ending Social Promotion Without Leaving Children Behind

The Case of New York City

The New York City Department of Education asked RAND to conduct an independent longitudinal evaluation of its 5th-grade promotion policy. The findings...

Summer for All

Building Coordinated Networks to Promote Access to Quality Summer Learning and Enrichment Opportunities Across a Community

In this report, the eighth in RAND's Summer Learning Series, the authors chronicle early efforts in four communities to create coordinated approaches ...

GETTING TO WORK ON SUMMER LEARNING

Recommended Pratices for Success

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Hours of Opportunity: The power of data to improve after-school programs citywide

The Wallace Foundation sponsored an initiative to help five cities increase collaboration, access, quality, information sharing, and sustainability in...

Standards-Based Accountability Under No Child Left Behind

Since 2001-2002, standards-based accountability (SBA) provisions of the No Child Left Behind Act of 2001 (NCLB) have shaped the work of public school ...

The Air Force Deployment Transition Center

Assessment of Program Structure, Process, and Outcomes

"It is often accepted as common knowledge that military personnel benefit from decompression time between a war zone and the home station. To capitali...