Historians have recently opened up a reconsideration of the 1950s. Long characterized as a time of stolid conformity and Cold War conservatism, the era is increasingly seen in more variegated terms. Studies exploring a range of institutions, causes, and activities have illuminated ways the intellectual and social soil of postwar America gave root…

Policy statements of the last two decades have directed schools to enter into partnerships with parents to enhance the social, emotional, and academic growth of their children. However, in practice and scholarship, parental involvement has been constructed as attendance to school-based activities and needs. This article draws on data from an…

Critical scholarship frequently depicts literacy education as an "initiation into passivity." Disconnected from the lives of students and reduced to strategies for scoring points on tests, literacy becomes an exercise in the reproduction of a moral economy of discipline, compliance, and productivity. Yet people also recognize that the modern world…

This study explored the effects of high-stakes testing and accountability on the fundamental practices associated with middle school philosophy. Participants were middle school educators, including administrators and teachers, from Pennsylvania middle schools. An online survey was used to collect data for this study. The survey addressed the…

Although No Child Left Behind (NCLB) might have left an impression that only standardized tests and adequate yearly progress (AYP) mattered on the general public, the frustration over the narrow curricular focus also has created an opportunity in the education-policy realm, sparking conversations on what it takes to educate the whole child. This…

In January, W. H. Brady Scholar Charles Murray stepped back from current education debates about reauthorization of the 2002 No Child Left Behind Act and education funding in the president's budget to ask more fundamental questions about the goals that should shape American education in the future. This "On the Issues" is adapted from…

This issue includes the following articles: "New Rule Increases Flexibility for Students with Disabilities," which discusses a new provision of the No Child Left Behind Act of 2001 (NCLB) that will give local school districts greater flexibility in meeting the Act's requirement for educating students with disabilities; "The Three R's for Success.…

Discusses the implementation of the U.N. Convention on the Rights of the Child, including progress made since 1989, and aims of early childhood education under the convention's mission and ideals. Proposes that the convention should be enacted in domestic law and become a reality in day-to-day teaching, thus ensuring that the philosophy of the…

Findings, conclusions, and recommendations concerning the role of the Federal Government in providing day care services are presented in this Summary Report, Part I of the Final Report. The six chapters of the report are as follows: 1. Statement of the Problem--identifies the social context in which day care and child development programs must be…

This book traces the history of adult and continuing education in the United States from 1750 through 1990. The following topics are among those examined in the book's 12 chapters: literature, philosophy, and self-education in the 18th century; uses of knowledge in the antebellum period (law and learning, piety and learning, commerce and culture);…