A requirement for quality assurance is becoming more prevalent in higher education today as institutions are being asked to demonstrate that they are providing robust, meaningful learning experiences for students. Many institutions are adopting curriculum review frameworks as part of their overall quality assurance strategy. Three leaders at…

Enterprise Resource Planning (ERP) systems present a management problem for various industries including institutions of higher education (IHEs) because they are costly to acquire, challenging to implement, and often fail to meet anticipated expectations. ERP systems are highly complex due to the nature of the operations they support. This…

This article examines the development and implementation of a strategic cultural change program from a case study perspective. Initially, the article describes how the program was developed, including an explanation as to how a communication component was integrated into the program from inception. This integration helped reduce the anxiety that…

In the current educational context, school models that leverage technology to personalize instruction have proliferated, as has student enrollment in, and funding of, such school models. However, even the best laid plans are subject to challenges in design and practice, particularly in the dynamic context of a school. In this collective case…

The continuous poor performance of South Africa's learners is detrimental to its developing economy. The need for education change prompted two universities to initiate a system-wide change strategy in a poorly performing school district. The leverage for change was leadership development, involving school principals and district officials. The…

The Local Control Funding Formula (LCFF) represents a fundamental transformation of the way California allocates state funds to school districts and the ways the state expects districts to make decisions about (and report on) the use of these funds. This is the first in a series of short briefs that aims to capture some key themes emerging from…

Nearly all states have standards for student learning and they have assessment programs to measure students' proficiency on those standards. But schools within each state nonetheless are left to develop their own standards-based student report cards as the primary means of communicating information about students' performance. To address the…

In 2009, the federal government committed over $3 billion nationwide to help states and districts turn around their worst-performing schools. The U.S. Department of Education intended for the School Improvement Grants (SIGs) to spur dramatic change.This report looks at the results of a field study of the first-year implementation of those grants…

This paper investigates the implementation and use of an internal organisational blog by several departments in the HR division in a large public sector financial organisation in the UK. This qualitative study adopts a case study approach and examines the experiences of staff using the blog to explore whether it can facilitate organisational…

Guided by theories of institutions, organizations, and sense-making, this manuscript examines how public, charter, and Catholic school staff in a large urban area organize for instruction and respond to educational change. To build theory about institutional processes of "organizing" from participants' perspectives, data included a…

Examines the implementation of quality programs in four organizations; the communication used to introduce the programs and to encourage employees to participate; and employees' perceptions of the programs, implementation activities, and change agents. Presents four key themes that emerged: creating and communicating vision; sensemaking and…

Since 1988, considerable state and school/district energies have been devoted to implementing Re:Learning in Pennsylvania. This paper describes the experiences of Cycle I project directors who implemented Re:Learning in late 1988 or early 1989. Re:Learning is a national effort to redesign the total school system, based on Theodore Sizer's (1984)…

The principal coordinates curriculum change in the public schools. Critical features of effective curriculum implementation are open communication, a strong staff development program, and daily encouragement and support of faculty members. Planning and organization, financial support, and human support are among the principal's significant…

It is argued that the failure of change in teacher education results from lack of understanding of the dynamics of change and the organizational features of teacher education, generally subject to external pressure. The role of institutional dimensions of problem solving, decision making, communications, goals, climate, and implementation are…

Discusses the role of organizational communication in the process of curricular reform at eight medical schools participating in a large-scale medical curriculum development project, particularly during four stages of change: recognizing the need for change; planning; implementation; institutionalization. Communication strategies for promoting a…