Using data from seven cohorts of language immersion lottery applicants in a large, urban school district, we estimate the causal effects of immersion programs on students’ test scores in reading, mathematics, and science and on English learners’ (EL) reclassification. We estimate positive intent-to-treat (ITT) effects on reading performance in fifth and eighth grades, ranging from 13% to 22% of a standard deviation, reflecting 7 to 9 months of learning. We find little benefit in terms of mathematics and science performance but also no detriment. By sixth and seventh grade, lottery winners’ probabilities of remaining classified as EL are 3 to 4 percentage points lower than those of their counterparts. This effect is stronger for ELs whose native language matches the partner language.

Research has demonstrated that students in dual-language immersion programs perform as well as, or better than, their peers in core academic content areas by late elementary school. However, the extent to which immersion education fosters bilingualism has received less attention in the literature.

The study of the mechanics of tumbling toast provides an informative and entertaining project for undergraduates. The relatively recent introduction of software packages to facilitate the analysis of video recordings, and the numerical solution of complex differential equations, makes such a study an attractive candidate for inclusion in an experimental physics course at the undergraduate level. In the study reported here it is found that the experimentally determined free fall angular velocity of a board, tumbling off the edge of a table, can only be predicted at all accurately if slipping is taken into account. The size and shape of the board used in the calculations and in the experiments were roughly the same as that of a piece of toast. In addition, it is found that the board, tumbling from a standard table of height 76 cm, will land butter-side down ͑neglecting any bounce͒ for two ranges of overhang (␦ 0 ). ␦ 0 is defined as the initial distance from the table edge to a vertical line drawn through the center of mass when the board is horizontal. For our board ͑length 10.2 cm͒ the approximate ranges of overhang are 0-0.8 and 2.7-5.1 cm. The importance of the 0-0.8 cm ͑only 2% of all possible overhangs for which tumbling is possible͒ favoring a butter-side down landing should not be underestimated when pondering the widely held belief that toast, tumbling from a table, usually falls butter-side down.

One of us (ST) constructed a Blue Man Group® instrument1 from 2-in PVC piping2 (internal radius r = 2.54 cm) as an undergraduate project. The instrument itself is shown in Fig. 1.

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