Background: Scholars widely acknowledge that politics help explain why policies are adopted and how they play out in states, districts, and schools. To date, political analyses of education reform tend to isolate a particular policy and examine the politics of its adoption or implementation, but pay less attention to the effects of the politics of…

Background/Context: In an era of high stakes accountability, public school districts struggle to improve teaching and learning for all students. As a result, effective professional development approaches for teachers are a high priority. Recently, teachers' learning communities (LCs) have been recommended because successful LCs foster teacher…