Organizations including universities are operating in an increasingly volatile environment and they are in a state of constant change. To survive and thrive in this ever-changing environment, building the capacity to adapt is essential. The basic purpose of this research was to identify and propose basic dimensions that help to envisage the…

There have been countless efforts to improve academic achievement in public schools across the United States, especially in urban school districts. Few efforts, however, use rigorous analytic modeling tools to anticipate and prevent the potential side effects of change. This chapter proposes the application of system dynamics on educational reform…

In turnaround schools, traditional approaches to school improvement (and some say, even the recent seven billion dollar federal investment in school improvement) aren't enough -- but why? Schools that successfully achieve turnaround "do school" differently to break cycles of underperformance and maximize learning for all students, and…

Over the past few decades, systemic thinking has gained in popularity in developmental and learning sciences. The trend has, however, shown up in gifted education research only occasionally. The aim of this article is to introduce systemic thinking to the field of giftedness and explore possibilities for its application. In the first part, a…

This paper seeks to clarify and spells out the responsibilities of policy makers to create the conditions for an effective accountability system that produces substantial improvements in student learning, strengthens the teaching profession, and provides transparency of results to the public. The authors point out that U.S. policy makers will need…

Over the last decade, a growing consensus has developed that for our nation's students to succeed in twenty-first-century economic and civic life, high school graduation is no longer sufficient. Labor-market analyses have shown that high-wage positions increasingly require postsecondary education and training, and students must now graduate…