This book examines school-based management and provides strategies to implement management changes. The 14 chapters examine the components of good schools, including clarity of purpose, leadership, professionalism, lack of bureaucratic control, competition, and choice. The text describes the components of school-based management and the need for…

School reform has taken many shapes over the years. Among the most pervasive of school-reform theories is school-based management (SBM), which is examined in detail in this book. The introductory chapter locates the current round of SBM in the longer cycle of educational reform, describes the extent of SBM activity over the past decade in the…

This book provides the educational practitioner and community participants with the practical knowledge needed to follow a participatory governance process within an existing bureaucracy. Chapter 1 presents the principles of participatory governance and identifies various mind-sets that have developed over many decades of traditional education.…

With the advent of large interest in school-based management came the task of inventing a different type of budgeting system--one that delegated the many tasks of developing a budget, expending the allocated funds, and controlling those expenditures in a way that did not exceed the allocation to the site level. This book explores the various means…

Research seeking to evaluate the effectiveness of SBM has been complicated by the complex policies and practices that have been implemented with great variation. Given this difficulty, this book presents findings of a study that sought to understand the ways in which school-based management (SBM) actually operates in a school recognized for its…

Many school districts and schools find that they have an incomplete understanding of site-based management (SBM). This guidebook provides a systemwide approach to site-based management, using SBM as a strategy for school improvement and increased student success rather than for managing the status quo. It identifies nine essential perspectives and…

Elmore (1990) has presented two contrasting models of school restructuring, each with different views about who is empowered--teachers or parents. This book examines what happens when schools and school districts attempt to implement either of these models. Following the introduction, "Examining School Restructuring Efforts," by G.…

The nature and direction of educational reform and the principal's role in it are examined in this book. Information was gathered from a questionnaire that was mailed to an unspecified number of leading principals and administrators in each of the 50 states. A selected number of the initial respondents participated in a follow-up questionnaire.…

This book provides useful guidelines for implementing collaborative decision making in the public educational system. The prologue presents the historical background of educational reform in the United States and offers a rationale for radical school reform at the individual school level. The nine chapters that follow are divided into three parts.…

School leaders, especially principals, will play a major role in determining how effectively public schools are able to respond to the challenges of the next century. This handbook summarizes, analyzes, and synthesizes literature on educational leadership. It also integrates theory and practice, containing ideas from practitioners. The volume…

Site-based management is a concept whose time has come. This book was designed to introduce the concept of teaming, elaborate the decision-making process, and describe the skills and processes needed for a variety of decision-making situations. Chapter 1 introduces the concept of teaming and discusses the decision-making process in depth. Chapters…

Effective schools exhibit unique structures and continuous change. Moral imperatives inspire people to sustain the commitment critical to building effective schools. Over 450 interviews with practitioners, parents, board members, politicians, academics, union leaders, consultants, and others are joined with background literature and research to…

This book was written for teachers and principals committed to instituting shared governance and more democratic forms of leadership and to help understand today's principalship and what it means to administer a shared-governance school. The data were derived from a study of successful principals in schools affiliated with the League of…

School-based management (SBM) has gained popularity as a method for local school participants to improve their schools. As yet, however, there is little empirical evidence supporting a link between SBM and improved school performance. This book examines the SBM strategies that hold the most promise for increasing organizational effectiveness…

The Chicago (Illinois) School Reform Act of 1988 set in motion a chain of reform efforts that have been the subject of considerable study. The plan emphasizes returning control of the schools to parents and the community through school-based management and local school councils. This book reports on studies of the implementation of the reform…