Showing papers by "Arkansas Department of Education published in 2010"
TL;DR: In this article, the authors examined potential explanations for the gender gap including the role of marriage and division of financial decision-making among couples, and found that decision making within couples was sensitive to the relative education level of spouses for both women and men.
Abstract: Research has shown that financial illiteracy is widespread among women, and that many women are unfamiliar with even the most basic economic concepts needed to make saving and investment decisions. This gender gap in financial literacy may contribute to the differential levels of retirement preparedness between women and men. However, little is known about the determinants of the gender gap in financial literacy. Using data from the RAND American Life Panel, the authors examined potential explanations for the gender gap including the role of marriage and division of financial decision-making among couples. They found that differences in the demographic characteristics of women and men did not explain much of the financial literacy gap, whereas education, income and current and past marital status reduced the observed gap by around 25%. Oaxaca decomposition revealed the great majority of the gender gap in financial literacy is not explained by differences in covariates – characteristics of men and women – but due to coefficients, or how literacy is produced. They did not find strong support for specialization in financial decision-making within couples by gender. Instead, they found that decision-making within couples was sensitive to the relative education level of spouses for both women and men.
8 citations
TL;DR: Teodoro et al. as discussed by the authors argue that the real conundrum of impossible jobs is why agency leaders fail to copy successful innovations in law enforcement and education, and they discuss how the relative illegitimacy of clients and inflexibility of personnel systems combine with the professional norms, job mobility and progressive ambition of agency leaders to limit the diffusion of innovations.
Abstract: In their now classic Impossible Jobs in Public Management , Hargrove and Glidewell (1990) argue that public agencies with limited legitimacy, high conflict, low professional authority, and weak "agency myths" have essentially impossible jobs. Leaders of such agencies can do little more than "cope," which is also a theme of James Q. Wilson (1989), among others. Yet in the years since publication of Impossible Jobs , one such position, that of police commissioner has proven possible. Over a sustained 17-year period, the New York City Police Department has achieved dramatic reductions in crime with relatively few political repercussions, as described by Kelling and Sousa (2001). A second impossible job discussed by Wilson and also by Frederick Hess (1999), city school superintendent, has also proven possible, with Houston and Edmonton having considerable academic success educating disadvantaged children. In addition, Atlanta and Pittsburgh enjoyed significant success in elementary schooling, though the gains were short-lived for reasons we will describe. More recently, under Michelle Rhee, Washington D.C. schools have made the most dramatic gains among city school systems. These successes in urban crime control and public schooling have not been widely copied. Accordingly, we argue that the real conundrum of impossible jobs is why agency leaders fail to copy successful innovations. Building on the work of Teodoro (2009), we will discuss how the relative illegitimacy of clients and inflexibility of personnel systems combine with the professional norms, job mobility and progressive ambition of agency leaders to limit the diffusion of innovations in law enforcement and schooling. We will conclude with ideas about how to overcome these barriers.
5 citations
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TL;DR: The authors argue that the APSA will lack empirical power and political legitimacy, and thus will have little impact, using lenses borrowed from strategic planning and from public personnel management literature, and argue that our field should build stronger links with the applied world.
Abstract: Surveys suggest that in the 1970s most political scientists wished they had chosen a different profession, a true tragedy, as Ricci (1984) writes. We discuss the causes of alienation, but also offer data suggesting that the situation had improved markedly by 1999. We speculate that this has much to do with a better job market and more realistic expectations about that job market. Nonetheless, all is not well. Both conservative senators and prominent political scientists continue to question the importance of Political Science (e.g., Cohen 1999). The APSA has attempted to increase its relevance by returning to its Progressive roots, attempting to shape public policy in a statist direction. We argue that such attempts will lack empirical power and political legitimacy, and thus will have little impact. Instead, using lenses borrowed from strategic planning and from the public personnel management literature, we argue that our field should build stronger links with the applied world. Second, APSA needs to study and systematize public personnel issues of the field, much as we have already (quite properly) done regarding race and gender issues. Third, we should encourage political debate within the field. This would require valuing political diversity and intellectual flexibility. Finally, to a considerable degree the Political Science niche is that of a prep school for lawyers. This is not the right market for us. Rather, given American voters' remarkable ignorance of the political system, we should take over new markets: undergraduate civic education and the training of secondary social studies teachers. In this way we can, over time, assure both a more rational electorate and our own relevance.
4 citations
TL;DR: The Politically Correct University: Problems, Scope, and Reforms as mentioned in this paper explores the culture of political correctness in higher education, focusing on the problem of liberal political orthodoxy in teaching and scholarship and seek to understand how diversity has become the dominant ideology in colleges and universities.
Abstract: This is the introductory chapter for the edited book, The Politically Correct University: Problems, Scope, and Reforms, which explores the culture of political correctness in higher education. We focus on the problem of liberal political orthodoxy in teaching and scholarship and seek to understand how diversity – of race, ethnicity, gender, and sexual orientation, but not of sociopolitical ideas – has become the dominant ideology in colleges and universities. The chapter provides an overview and commentary on the book’s four sections. The first section, Diagnosing the Problem, begins by providing the most current and comprehensive statistical analysis of the relative rarity of conservative and libertarian professors. It then explores the psychological and sociological mechanisms by which such imbalance comes about, and considers how and why academia stresses demographic diversity while largely eschewing political diversity. The second section, ‘Diversity’ in Higher Education, suggests that anticonservative bias in the academy is likely explained by a psychological phenomenon known as groupthink, explores the psychological goals and assumptions underlying diversity programs and political correctness (while arguing that sociopolitical diversity may be the most important form of diversity for achieving those goals), and explains the history of how demographic diversity came to trump ideological diversity on campus. In the third section, Different Disciplines, Same Problem, leading scholars explore how political correctness affects scholarship and teaching across liberal arts and social science disciplines, including English and linguistics, history, and political science. In the final section, Needed Reforms, practitioners describe the history of political correctness in universities and propose reforms.
3 citations
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TL;DR: The District of Columbia Opportunity Scholarship Program (OSP) as discussed by the authors is a school voucher initiative targeted to disadvantaged students in the US Capital, where students with family incomes near or below the federal poverty line can receive a voucher.
Abstract: The District of Columbia Opportunity Scholarship Program (OSP) is a school voucher initiative targeted to disadvantaged students in the US Capital. Vouchers worth up to $7,500 annually are awarded by lottery to students with family incomes near or below the federal poverty line. Students can then use their voucher at any of 60 participating private schools in DC. Is this program just? From the perspective of Rawlsian liberalism, an education program is just if it expands opportunity equally for all or at least improves the prospects for the “least advantaged” affected group. Since the OSP is a targeted program and not universally available to all students, it must satisfy Rawls's second condition, called “the difference principle”, in order to be viewed as just. Evidence from a rigorous evaluation of the program suggests that the DC voucher program advances the cause of social justice, but with an important caveat.
1 citations
TL;DR: Support personnel are employed primarily in the rural parts of the state where there is a shortage of SLPs and this model of service delivery has been used effectively in Arkansas schools to enhance services provided by the SLPs.
Abstract: Rules and regulations governing the use of support personnel in Arkansas were approved in 1996. These regulations allow school districts to employ support personnel, assistants or aides, to assist master's level speech-language pathologists (SLPs) with clerical and clinical tasks. School district personnel must develop proposals, receive approval, and participate in training before the support personnel can be used in the delivery of speech-language services. The supervising SLPs manage the caseload, provide direct services, and supervise the support personnel. This model of service delivery has been used effectively in Arkansas schools to enhance services provided by the SLPs. Support personnel are employed primarily in the rural parts of the state where there is a shortage of SLPs.