Over the last several hundred years, local and national educational systems have evolved from relatively simple systems to incredibly complex, interdependent, policy-laden structures, to which many question their value, effectiveness, and direction they are headed. System Dynamics is a field of analysis used to guide policy and system design in…

With seemingly fewer highly functional families, society is demanding schools that accomplish the impossible--higher standards and higher success rates. The current educational system cannot accomplish the impossible. The solution for the desired higher standards and higher success rates is not more programs or more technology. It is systems…

The American Association of School Administrators (AASA) invited the 2007 state winners to gather in Denver, Colorado, for three days of intensive dialogue about the challenges facing today's superintendents. As a result of the panels and small group discussions that followed, superintendents identified and detailed in this paper five avenues for…

Both the trend toward the scientific information explosion and the trend toward equal opportunity of education are altering what we teach and how we teach. While the movement in research and development in education has been toward using systems applications to deal with these changes, there are some problems with this approach. The domain of…

Questionnaires sent to five categories of respondents asked a series of questions with regard to 26 future-possible-statements about social studies. Partial results are reported and discussed here. (JB)

This paper considers the problem of planning in higher education from several different points of view. First, educational planning as it relates to problems at the national level is discussed. This includes the question of a national educational policy, projections of the demand for higher education, the financing of higher education, politics…

This guide is the third of three documents that make up a Professional Development Package for Educational Systems Design. It is intended for use by members of a core design team and assumes that the school district and community have committed themselves to a systems design process, and that a design leadership group representing the school…

The systems approach is a technique that can be applied to assist in problem solving and planning, but in itself does not solve problems. (Author)

To meet public scrutiny and increased demands for quality public education, schools must plan. Developing legitimate plans depends on the ability to recognize the patterns that guide current practice and uncover those that will create change. Educators need to understand the planning concepts that have helped business meet new challenges. To bring…

This guide is the first of three documents that make up a Professional Development Package for Educational Systems Design. Together, the documents constitute an integrated package designed to help educators and others accomplish specific purposes relative to a communitywide systems design effort. The orientation guide is ideally used in a 1-day…

A systems design framework for the transformation of education is presented in this paper. A systems approach views education as a system of interdependent problems and the design process as one of four parts of organizational inquiry. A framework for educational design is presented, which is composed of three dimensions--focus for change, scope…

The system approach to planning and managing educational change features the use of an adaptive framework and a strategy for planned system change. The approach focuses management attention upon (1) relevant future states of expectations or goals, (2) present and future state variables and contexts, (3) human organization factors, and (4)…

Because schools must operate in a changing environment, educators must manage change whether they wish to or not. Administrators must plan accordingly, and the best plans arise from a solid theoretical base. This book provides that base, by drawing on systems theory to develop effective approaches to strategic and operational planning in…

Reports of educational policy and planning problems in Greece, Portugal, and Turkey are presented in this volume. It is the second part of a study by the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development to determine how educational systems function (see SO 011 254). In this volume each country's research team presents their work to date,…

This guide is the second of three documents that make up a Professional Development Package for Educational Systems Design. The intended audience for this guide is a leadership group empowered to provide leadership, policy direction, and support for a design effort. This group may consist of the educational leadership in a community in cooperation…