Education And Psychology

Peabody faculty member David Dickinson will be a featured guest speaker at an international conference on child development in Porto Alegre, Brazil, Nov. 24-25. Read More

Performance pay for teachers continues to gain momentum nationally despite the absence of a clear understanding of its impact on students, teachers and schools. A new book from the National Center on Performance Incentives at Vanderbilt University brings together the latest research on the topic to offer guidance for researchers, policymakers and practitioners seeking deeper understanding of the complexities surrounding this issue. Read More

The impact of recognition and rewards on student attendance and performance in afterschool programs is the aim of a new study being launched by the National Center on Performance Incentives at Vanderbilt University and uBoost, a company that manages student reward programs. Read More

Performance pay programs designed by teachers, for teachers have been found to offer small incentives to a large number of teachers, new research indicates. Read More

Even though it's against federal law to grow, sell or possess marijuana, 13 states have recently legalized medical use of the drug. Now California is contemplating taking the next step – legalizing marijuana outright – in the hope that taxing marijuana sales could help ease the state's latest budget crisis. Vanderbilt University Law School professor Robert Mikos, an expert on federalism issues, examined the conflict between state and federal drug laws in a new paper. Read More

In this tough economy, the allure of buying lottery tickets seems like a pretty enticing way to erase financial problems. But new research from Vanderbilt Law School found that people who won between $50,000 and $150,000 did not solve their debt problems and only postponed bankruptcy. Read More

Will Judge Sonia Sotomayor become the next U.S. Supreme Court justice? Vanderbilt faculty Tracey George, Terry Mahoney and Brian Fitzpatrick provide expert insight and commentary. Read More

When a homegrown politician dies suddenly, local companies show the loss of a valuable connection immediately in their share prices, according to research from the Vanderbilt Owen Graduate School of Management. Read More

Empirical research from Vanderbilt professor of law and political science Tracey George shows how the United States court system, especially the Supreme Court and the Court of Appeals, could dramatically change under the Obama Administration. Read More

Many schools across the nation struggle in their efforts to deal with challenging behaviors. A new book co-authored by Kathleen Lane, associate professor of special education at Vanderbilt University's Peabody College of education and human development, aims to help schools develop a comprehensive strategy to identify and help students with behavior issues before violence erupts. Read More

Peabody College doctoral students Paul Morphy and Peter Beddow were named the first winners of the Bonsal Education Research Entrepreneurship Award (BEREA) April 22. Read More

Vanderbilt University's new Peabody Research Institute and the Tennessee Department of Education today announced a partnership to conduct the first statewide evaluation of the effectiveness of Tennessee's Voluntary Pre-K Program. Read More

A new national survey of high school writing instruction finds it lacking, with 50 percent of teachers reporting they are not prepared to teach students how to write well and rarely assign complex writing tasks. Read More

Urban school districts across the country have shifted back to managing segregated schools following the recent lifting of court-ordered desegregation plans, a new book finds. Read More

Early data from a project evaluating the first-year impact of New York City's performance pay program, the School-Wide Performance Bonus Program (SPBP), finds no discernable impact on student achievement thus far. However, the report's authors caution that it is too soon to draw any overall conclusions about the program's impact. Read More

K-12 and higher education experts from Vanderbilt University's Peabody College of education and human development will present their latest research April 12-18 in San Diego, Calif., at the American Educational Research Association's annual conference. Read More

As parents and policymakers increasingly worry about the quality of public schools, alternatives such as charter schools, magnet schools and vouchers appear more attractive. But experts wonder: What difference do schools of choice make? Read More

Comparing different ways of solving math problems is a great way to help middle schoolers learn new math concepts, researchers from Vanderbilt and Harvard universities have found. Read More

New research from Vanderbilt University has found students benefit more from being taught the concepts behind math problems rather than the exact procedures to solve the problems. The findings offer teachers new insights on how best to shape math instruction to have the greatest impact on student learning. Read More

New research from Vanderbilt University's Peabody College offers guidance for teachers to help them improve writing instruction in the primary grades and develop stronger student writers. Read More