Between 2015 and 2019, Holyoke Public Schools in Massachusetts cut its dropout rate nearly in half and increased its graduation rate by 10 percentage points, with notable gains among historically marginalized student groups. The district cites Opportunity Academy (OA), an alternative education program within the district's high school, as a key…

New "autonomy initiatives" aim to increase schools' decision-making authority as a strategy to leverage school improvement. These policies build on lessons of previous reforms such as site-based management in ways that bode well for their success. However, how are these policies actually faring in implementation? The authors addressed that…

This qualitative study identified the best practices utilized by community colleges to achieve systemic and cultural agreement in support of the integration of institutional effectiveness measures (key performance indicators) to inform decision making. In addition, the study identifies the relevant motives, organizational structure, and processes…

Total quality management based governance models tend to focus on incremental improvements within the boundaries of a single organization. This may limit the benefits of information technology because they are not complex enough to address business or performance problems that extend beyond the boundaries of a single organization. The research…

This study is a formative evaluation of the OneStop Career Center Integrated Service Delivery (ISD) Model within the California Workforce System. The study was sponsored by the California Workforce Investment Board. The study completed four in-depth case studies of California OneStops to describe how they implemented the ISD model which brings…

Suggests that successful evaluation projects for training programs focus on management decisions. Provides a checklist of concerns that deal with the effectiveness, efficiency, and relevance of the program. Discusses the selection of the data level and decision-making criteria. (CSS)

The philosophy and assumptions of the Multi-Attribute Utility-Bayesian Decision Theoretic model (MAUT-Bayesian model) are presented. The evaluator uses the MAUT-Bayesian model along with the knowledge of the decision-maker's, and perhaps the evaluator's own values to decide what data should be collected. Appropriate data are presented to the…

This paper presents findings of a study that examined the efforts of one Dade County, Florida, high school to use site-based management/shared decision making (SBM/SDM) over a 7-year period. The study examined participants' beliefs about the distribution of authority, the nature of work, and conceptions of learning and compared those beliefs with…

This digest, based on a larger report of the same title, summarizes principles for improving quality in higher education institutions. Emphasis is on the effect of the principles when they are used holistically to create a culture of academic excellence. The quality principles are based on the conceptual framework of total quality management (TQM)…

The insights of various theoretical perspectives on school improvement can be integrated in a common framework called "the institutional perspective" when the sensitivity of each theoretical perspective to the nature of decision making for school improvement is taken into account. The institutional perspective thus generated considers the…

This is a study of the Piedmont Schools Project, an experimental educational program that was conducted in School District of Greenville County, South Carolina. The study is presented in three parts. Part I describes the school district and the design of the project. Part II examines the nature and effects of the change strategy with specific…

In its first year of operation (1973-1974), the Merrimack Educational Management Development Center emphasized the identification of management needs at the local school system level. The Center's assumptions about educational management served as a basis for the program. Special attention was given to the transfer of industry-based management…

This report provides a comprehensive review of quality principles in higher education and proposes that, when used holistically and systematically, the quality principles, also known as total quality management and continuous quality improvement, can create a culture for academic excellence. After an introduction, the first section explains the…

The Cluster Schools Program attempted to restructure the governance structure in participating Newark (New Jersey) schools through shared decision making and site-based management. It also sought to foster strong links with other public and private institutions by establishing a collaborative that includes university participants among others.…

How institutional research can improve the quality of institutional performance of colleges and universities in the face of funding constraints is discussed. An example of the use of instructional research to assist in documenting institutional quality in Australia is noted. Institutional research uses data collection, analysis, and interpretation…