This paper analyses the relationship between Norwegian school reform implementation and the use of special education. After the introduction of the national reform programme called the "Kunnskapsloftet" ("Knowledge promotion") in 2006, the use of special education has increased dramatically in Norway. As part of the national…

American educational policy was rapidly transformed between 1980 and 2001. Accountability was introduced into a sphere that had long been loosely coupled, both major political parties reevaluated longstanding positions, and significant institutional control over the schooling shifted to the federal government for the first time in the nation's…

Thousands of educators, parent activists, and others are expected to convene in the heat and humidity of Washington next month for a march protesting the current thrust of education policy in the United States, especially the strong emphasis on test-based accountability. Organizers of the Washington say U.S. policymakers are moving in the wrong…

Five years after Hurricane Katrina, the New Orleans public schools bear little resemblance to the disintegrating system that was further undone by the catastrophic flood. Two-thirds of city schools in 2004 were rated "Academically Unacceptable" under Louisiana's accountability standards; in 2010, about 4 in 10 rate that designation, and…

Restructuring large schools into smaller, more personalized learning communities focused on developing students academically, socially, and emotionally has the potential to produce better outcomes for students. Although small school reform in large urban high schools has been the focus of the research literature on school reform in the last…

This report offers recommendations for building community support for federal school turnaround approaches, particularly in communities that oppose these approaches. Parents, the report concludes, want improvement but cherish their local schools and distrust the turnaround options mandated from above by higher levels of government. Thus,…

The National High School Center's "Eight Elements of High School Improvement: A Mapping Framework" provides a cohesive high school improvement framework comprised of eight elements and related indicators of effectiveness. These indicators of effectiveness allow states, districts, and schools to identify strengths and weaknesses of their current…

In August 2009, the U.S. Department of Education announced opportunities for states and local educational agencies to vie for $3.5 billion in Title I School Improvement Grants targeted at turning around or closing down chronically low-achieving schools. To qualify for a portion of these funds, school districts were required to implement one of…

For more than a decade, Florida's legislators and governors--first Jeb Bush and then Charles Crist--have pushed one of the nation's most ambitious education reform agendas: grading the performance of schools before No Child Left Behind was even an idea. Florida may be more known to outsiders for everything from its Indian River citrus crop to the…

This is the first in a series of articles which will examine the results of a qualitative, longitudinal study of school improvement initiatives from the perspective of school stakeholders. The article captures the responses of students from a low socio-economic status school in NSW, Australia to a school initiative that restructured the learning…

Advocates for virtual education say that it has the power to transform an archaic K-12 system of schooling. Instead of blackboards, schoolhouses, and a six-hour school day, interactive technology will personalize learning to meet each student's needs, ensure all students have access to quality teaching, extend learning opportunities to all hours…

Between 1970 and 1990 enrolment in Newfoundland and Labrador schools dropped by 22 percent. The first wave of major educational reform (1990 to 2000) saw massive reductions in public school expenditures and the reduction of more than 1650 teachers. Facing continued enrolment loss and a large current account deficit, in 2004, government again…

This study examined three high schools in a large urban school district in Texas that achieved an academically acceptable rating after being sanctioned to reconstitute by state agencies. Texas state accountability standards are a result of the No Child Left Behind Act of 2011 (NCLB). Texas state law requires schools to design a reconstitution plan…

The No Child Left Behind Act of 2001 (NCLB) has had a monumental impact over the past decade on how educational reform is viewed in the United States. As a result of how the law is structured, schools for students who are deaf or hard of hearing have been the focus of attention for educational reform under NCLB. While there have been some shifts…

The authors conducted a third-party study of the student achievement effects of Struggling Schools, a user-generated approach to Comprehensive School Reform (CSR). The design was a quasiexperimental, pre-post matched sample (N = 180) with school as unit of analysis, drawing on 3 years of achievement data from standardized external assessments.…