Show Me the Evidence!: Proven and Promising Programs for America?s Schools

Are you searching for a proven program that will raise your school′s or district′s standards for student achievement? Here′s exactly the guidance you need to improve your students′ levels of learning without having to reinvent the wheel. Slavin and Fashola apply a fair and consistent standard of effectiveness and replicability to the programs they examine in this book.

They evaluate the different programs and present their findings to help you decide

• Which programs show proven effectiveness in raising student achievement
• Whether a particular program will work better for your students than what you′re currently doing
• Whether the results of a particular program or policy can be successfully adapted to your school
• How best to implement the program you′ve chosen

The authors offer the comprehensive, objective evidence that will help you select the right program for your school or district. You′ll find out which programs accomplish what goals. You′ll be able to zero in on the schoolwide programs that can be used in Title I projects or in schools that get funding from whole-school legislation. The authors help you find the answers to your most important questions about any schoolwide program you′re considering. In addition, Slavin and Fashola hope this book will spur you and all other educators to demand that the programs you′re using "Show me the evidence!" of genuine student achievement and school improvement.

Robert E. Slavin is director of the Center for Research and Reform in Education at Johns Hopkins University, director of the Institute for Effective Education at the University of York, and the cofounder and chairman of the Success for All Foundation. He has authored or coauthored more than 200 articles and 20 books, including Educational Psychology: Theory into Practice (Allyn & Bacon, 1986, 1988, 1991, 1994, 1997, 2000, 2003), Cooperative Learning: Theory, Research, and Practice (Allyn & Bacon, 1990, 1995), Show Me the Evidence: Proven and Promising Programs for America’s Schools (Corwin, 1998), Effective Programs for Latino Students (Erlbaum, 2000), and One Million Children: Success for All (Corwin, 2001). He received the American Educational Research Association’s Raymond B. Cattell Early Career Award for Programmatic Research in 1986, the Palmer O. Johnson award for the best article in an AERA journal in 1988, the Charles A. Dana award in 1994, the James Bryant Conant Award from the Education Commission of the States in 1998, the Outstanding Leadership in Education Award from the Horace Mann League in 1999, and the Distinguished Services Award from the Council of Chief State School Officers in 2000. He received his BA in psychology from Reed College in 1972 and his PhD in social relations in 1975 from Johns Hopkins University.

Olatokunbo (Toks) S. Fashola is a senior research fellow with Optimal Solutions Group and an adjunct research scientist and faculty associate at Johns Hopkins University. She has served as principal investigator, evaluator, and advisor for several programs and program evaluations across the country.

Prior to joining the Optimal Solutions Group, Fashola was the research director of the Comprehensive School Reform Center at the American Institutes for Research (AIR), where she was primarily responsible for the evaluation and production of AIR Reports. This work involved reviewing and evaluating the effectiveness of K-12 programs. Fashola was also involved in the National Longitudinal Study of the No Child Left Behind Act (NLS-NCLB) and served as a senior content advisor for the What Works Clearinghouse in the area of high school dropouts.

Her more recent work addresses the education of African American males, afterschool programs, schoolwide reform, and program evaluation and rigorous research in general and special education.

Toks Fashola is the editor of Educating African American Males: Voices From the Field (Corwin Press, 2005) and wrote some of the book’s chapters. She wrote Building Effective Afterschool Programs (Corwin Press, 2001) and Show Me the Evidence!: Proven and Promising Programs for America′s Schools. Fashola has also served as an author of book chapters in Effective Programs for Latino Students.

Fashola has served on panels to reputable organizations such as the U.S. Department of Education′s IES and the National Academy of Science′s Committee on Research in Education as well as the National Science Foundation. Her work has been featured on National Public Radio (NPR) and on Public Broadcasting Services (PBS).

She has served as an expert witness in the area of desegregation and currently serves on the National Education Steering Committee of the Campbell Collaboration, an international methods organization dedicated to conducting systematic reviews of academic and social science research. Fashola also serves as a national advisor to the Boys and Girls Club of America.

Toks Fashola’s areas of interest include reading, early childhood education, data-driven decision-making, afterschool programs, high school dropouts, emergent and adolescent literacy, and research methods.