Annie Pennucci, Hannah Lidman - January 2007

The 2005 Legislature directed the Institute to “conduct an analysis of the availability, services, and effectiveness of programs in community and technical colleges that serve the educational needs of recent immigrant students who are not proficient in English and who are or have been enrolled in high school but have not met graduation requirements.” This review provides information about immigrant student population trends, special challenges, and academic outcomes, as well as a description of available programs in Washington and other states.

Wade Cole, Robert Barnoski - January 2007

This report examines 10th-grade WASL results in spring 2006 for students who are classified as in poverty and not in poverty, by race/ethnicity.

Robert Barnoski, Wade Cole - January 2007

This report describes the relative strength of associations between various student characteristics and "met-standard" rates on the 10th-grade WASL results in spring 2006.

Annie Pennucci - January 2007

The 2006 Washington State Legislature directed the Washington State Institute for Public Policy (Institute) to “hire a meeting facilitator to conduct a series of meetings with a broad group of stakeholders to examine the strengths and weaknesses of educational services available to deaf and hard of hearing children throughout the state.” The legislation further directed the Institute to “develop recommendations that would establish an integrated system of instructional and support programs that would provide deaf and hard of hearing children with the knowledge and skills necessary for them to be successful in their adult lives and the ‘hearing’ world of work.”

This preliminary report summarizes views from stakeholder meetings, focus groups, and interviews conducted between September and December 2006. Stakeholder consultations will continue through March 2007. A final report with recommendations is due June 2007.

Elizabeth Drake - December 2006

The Washington State Institute for Public Policy (Institute) was directed by the Legislature to evaluate the impacts of DOSA. DOSA was originally enacted in 1995 as a sentencing alternative. When ordered by a court, a felony offender’s sentence time is reduced in exchange for completing chemical dependency treatment. Prior to 2005 legislation, DOSA was restricted to a “prison-based” treatment alternative. The 2005 changes created a “community-based” DOSA for offenders with non-prison sentences. Because only 30 offenders have received this community alternative to date, further implementation is necessary before an evaluation of the community-based DOSA can be completed. This report updates our 2005 study of the original “prison-based” DOSA, extending the follow-up from 24 to 36-months. In our earlier report, we found that recidivism rates were lower for drug offenders receiving DOSA, but not for property offenders. With a 36-month follow-up, our findings did not change. That is, prison-based DOSA significantly lowers recidivism rates for drug offenders, but has no statistically significant effect on recidivism rates of property offenders.

Wade Cole, Robert Barnoski - December 2006

This interim report summarizes the work completed to date.

Robert Barnoski, Wade Cole - December 2006

The 2006 Legislature also directed the Institute to evaluate the effectiveness of Promoting Academic Success (PAS) remedial programs in helping students meet standard on the WASL. The study goals are to determine the overall effectiveness of PAS; the relative effectiveness of different remedial strategies; and the relative effectiveness disaggregated by student characteristics.

This report examines the overall effectiveness of summer 2006 PAS programs to help students meet standard on the WASL in August 2006. Effectiveness is defined as the difference in met-standard rates on the August WASL for students who did and did not participate in summer 2006 PAS.

Elizabeth Drake - November 2006

In 2006, the Office of Financial Management contracted with the Washington State Institute for Public Policy to conduct an audit of the Washington State criminal history records systems for adult felonies. Databases included in the audit are from the Administrative Office of the Courts, the Department of Corrections, the Sentencing Guidelines Commission, and the Washington State Patrol. This report is the first of a series and describes the research design and databases to be included in the study. The final report of the series will be completed by April 2007.

Wade Cole, Robert Barnoski - November 2006

A basic indicator of student performance on the Washington Assessment of Student Learning (WASL) is the percentage of students who meet standard. This percentage can vary depending on which students are included in the calculation. As one in a series of reports on the WASL, this analysis describes the different ways to calculate the “met standard” rate.

Wade Cole, Robert Barnoski - November 2006

As one in a series of reports on the WASL, this report describes the use of alternate assessments for tenth grade students in special education in spring 2006.