To improve educational research, this article suggests using an industrial model to analyze the educational system. Questions arising from such a model--involving inputs, outputs, prices, technology, consumer characteristics, and intra-industry structure--are related to existing educational research and to needed future research. (Author/RW)

How some of the past literature creates the impression of an inevitable method-paradigm linkage and of a forced choice between qualitative and quantitative paradigms is shown. Difficulties of making method choices are considered. It is suggested that purposefully developed strengths of different methods should not be ignored. (Author/GK)

Critiques of conventional models for evaluating the utility of organizational human resource policies. Questions the implicit assumption that utilities are invariant across changing labor market conditions, and concludes that omission of these considerations overstates the likely utility of the programs being evaluated. (TE)

This paper provides a conceptual framework for addressing the issue of effectiveness and efficiency in education. It considers alternative criteria for identifying efficiency and discusses constraints on improving efficiency. The first section distinguishes efficiency from effectiveness, and also distinguishes "internal" from "external" efficiency…

Presents a model relating the adequacy of an organization's problem-solving to its resources and to the appropriateness of its structures. Describes a test of the model, on 25 public elementary and secondary schools in southeastern Michigan, which found that different organizational structures use money differently and produce different outputs.…

Examines the impact of program design on the development of research-based practice models. The concept of program design is reduced to elements that can be examined for their reliability, validity, relevance, and internal consistency. (Author/RWB)

Several conceptions of schooling are outcome-bound: input-output models, school effectiveness models, classroom learning models, and systems theory models. Problems with each of these conceptions are identified, followed by a brief discussion of an outcome-free approach in which schools are viewed as cultural ecologies. (BW)

Evaluation within human service organizations is defined in terms of accepted evaluation criteria, with reasonable expectations shown and structured into a model of systematic evaluation practice. The evaluation criteria of program effort, performance, adequacy, efficiency and process mechanisms are discussed, along with measurement information…

The effectiveness of an organizations's adaptive behavior depends on the extent to which public relations concerns are considered in goal setting and program planning. The following five open systems propositions, based on a "functional" paradigm, address the complex relationship between public relations and organizational intelligence and do not…

This book presents the results of 15 years of input-output (I-O) research on schooling effectiveness. The I-O approach identifies and measures the inschool and out-of-school factors that contribute to schooling outcomes, especially reading skills and verbal and mathematics achievement. Five categories of inputs are reviewed in this textbook: (1)…