What Works Offers ‘Quick Reviews’ of New Studies

In an effort to make its services more timely and relevant, the federally supported What Works Clearinghouse has launched a series of “quick reviews” to assess the methodological soundness of studies that have made national news.

“There are all kinds of studies coming out daily that are cutting-edge,” said Mark Dynarski, who directs the clearinghouse, which is based at Mathematica Policy Research Inc. in Princeton, N.J. “The idea is whether the clearinghouse can help the public in determining whether studies are well crafted, if they use sound methods and make good inferences.”

Created in 2002 by the U.S. Department of Education’s Institute of Education Sciences, the online clearinghouse vets the research base for programs, practices, or policies that educators might try out in their own jurisdictions. But the first reviews were slow in coming, and few studies met the clearinghouse’s strict evidence standards, leading some critics to dub the project...