Potential clients for centralized school district organizations with formal responsibilities for research and evaluation include societies, federal and state governments, boards of education, superintendents, other administrators, principals, and teachers. Not all clients are equal. An historical review of the evaluation literature supports the…

The ethnographer should be part historian, part psychologist, part sociologist, part anthropologist, and must apply rigorous and consistent rules and procedure to the various steps in his/her research in order to arrive at reliable conclusions. An ethnographic observational study of administrative behavior of eight school superintendents provides…

The growing importance of negotiation in education requires superintendents to be informed of five key issues inherent in the educational process: The applicability of the industrial negotiation model, the principle of accountability, the superintendent as a participant or chief negotiator, the scope of negotiation, and the delegation of authority…

In 2002, the RAND Corporation launched a project to understand how educators are responding to the new accountability requirements in California, Georgia, and Pennsylvania--three states that represent a range of approaches, regions, and student populations. The researchers aimed to identify the factors that enhance the implementation of SBA…

This book is an easy-to-use guide for school boards in how to use data intelligently when evaluating student achievement, educational improvement, and school accountability. Its purpose is to encourage school boards to use data as a basis for their decision-making instead of speculation, perception, or limited observation. Board members can learn…