This book describes the nation's most comprehensive and longest-running statewide school-reform initiative: the 1990 Kentucky Education Reform Act (KERA). Focusing on the broad picture, the book is a compilation of 17 articles by education experts who were asked to examine the intended and unintended consequences of Kentucky's reform law. The book…

This case study examined the process of change employed by a rural Kentucky elementary school identified as having successfully implemented the state's primary program. The main purpose of the study was to analyze how the school implemented the primary program based on characteristics of effective change. The case study was based on a total of 23…

The Kentucky Education Reform Act of 1990 (KERA) totally rebuilt Kentucky's curriculum, governance, finance structures, and processes for elementary and secondary education. The Kentucky system developed 75 valued outcomes related to the 6 broad learning goals named in KERA. A valued outcome is the ability to demonstrate consistent quality…

As part of an 8-year study of education reform in rural Kentucky, this report examines the primary program that has evolved in six rural elementary schools as a result of the Kentucky Education Reform Act (KERA), which requires that grades K-3 be replaced by a nongraded program. This change aimed to eliminate failure in the first 2 years of…

This paper describes how a vice principal at a rural Kentucky elementary school successfully implemented curriculum changes to meet the learning needs of young children. The change process also addressed the concerns of kindergarten teachers frustrated with the demands of teaching basal reader activities that eliminated explorative play and other…