Purpose: As the federal government has retreated from taking a dominant role in encouraging implementation of common K-12 standards, states and districts have moved to fill this education policy vacuum. This study aims to understand how state and district leaders are navigating this new policy environment. Research Methods/Approach: Drawing upon…

Purpose: As the federal government has retreated from taking a dominant role in encouraging implementation of common K-12 standards, states and districts have moved to fill this education policy vacuum. This study aims to understand how state and district leaders are navigating this new policy environment. Research Methods/Approach: Drawing upon…

We investigate the role of teachers' unions in state policymaking in the context of "No Child Left Behind." Our analyses of panel data show that political party control and region moderate the influence of teachers' unions in the adoption of accountability policies by states. Our analyses of marginal effects show that teachers' unions…

Suppose you were an alien trying to understand how people in the United States feel about the Common Core School Standards for Mathematics (CCSSM). You could look at the Internet, mass media, YouTube and all of the other venues available. Walking away from them, you would be very confused about whether the U.S. loves or hates the CCSSM, whether…

The Every Student Succeeds Act (ESSA) gives state boards of education a tremendous opportunity to revamp education policy. The federal government will have dramatically reduced influence over issues related to standards and accountability systems. States will have increased freedom to revise state standards and assessment systems, change the…

First launched in April 2009, the Common Core State Standards Initiative was conceived to identify and develop college- and career-readiness standards that address what students are expected to know and be able to do when they have graduated from high school. The initiative introduced the final version of the standards in June 2010, and by…

After more than a decade (and four years behind schedule) Congress finally seems ready to reauthorize the Elementary and Secondary Education Act. For years, critics have complained that the law's focus on test scores offers far too narrow a picture for judging school quality. There is also concern that the "adequate yearly progress," or…

This study investigated the effects of a teacher professional development program funded by a No Child Left Behind (NCLB) grant on program participants' (teachers') stages of concern toward instructional technology integration into curriculum. The study also explored potential differences in the concern levels among the participants from different…

US administrators must meet the demands of accountability while maintaining a balance and the joy of learning in their schools. Accountability comes with the US laws No Child Left Behind (2002) and Title II Reauthorization (2002). Increased accountability has had a major impact in several other countries as well. This paper is largely conceptual…

The Concerns-Based Adoption Model (Hall & Hord, 2006) is one tool educational leaders can use to understand the process of change and teachers' stage-related concerns when implementing innovations. This paper presents select findings from a comparative case study of two urban elementary schools in which changes in teachers' reports of their…

Every state in the United States, under the NCLB act, has set state standards and is testing all students in grades 3-8. Students are given printed questions to which they write answers with a pencil on an answer sheet. These written tests are usually given to determine the academic achievements of students. This paper traces the early history of…