"The Integration Anomaly" explores a "puzzling divergence" between changes in metropolitan residential and school segregation. Based on a review of existing literature, it argues that the best way to address rising school segregation is to decouple school assignment from neighborhoods through universal school choice. The report…

This article explores ways in which evidence contributes to individual thought and to the formation of shared knowledge and shared decisions. It also distinguishes among sources of evidence intended to attribute causality and those designed merely to describe. It is based on data from a naturalistic study of 16 school districts. (BW)

The supposed gulf between curriculum development as it is practiced, and curriculum theory, may be an imaginary one, this article suggests. Textbook curriculum axioms are used to analyze Mississippi's Accountability and Instructional Management program, and it is found to be consistent with the theory taught in college classrooms. (DCS)

Five dissemination models that may ensure that research findings are translated into practice are described from the literature. Current research findings in seven areas (such as technology, curriculum, and early intervention) related to education for visually handicapped people are summarized, together with recommended dissemination procedures.…

Recent research in language teaching is cited and four models for assessing the relationship between research and practice are discussed. These models are called the application model, separation or hands-off model, resource model, and common-ground or convergence model. (SW)

This article identifies and discusses key components of a research-based whole school approach to bullying prevention. Discussion focuses on ways to increase awareness and understanding, characteristics of targets (often students with special needs) and bullies, facts on bullying, and six bullying prevention practices, for example, train targets…

The paper deals with the contribution of empirical psychology to the problems of instruction and proposes a conceptual framework to promote helpful interactions between experimenters and teachers of children with learning difficulties. Both groups share a common concern, the definition of tasks by testing instructions in action. (Author/DB)

Develops a model for analyzing the behavior of commissions and discusses the role of social science in the model. Uses the model to examine Boston's Safe Schools Commission, with data on how social science was used by the commission being used to suggest several modifications to the model. (Author/JN)

Two education initiatives in Ohio, the Pairwise Mentoring System and the Baldrige Approach for School Improvement, show promise for raising the achievement of K-12 students. As busy educational leaders who are expected to lead change efforts in their schools, preservice and inservice administrators can benefit by seeing the connections between new…

This study attempted to identify efforts to evaluate programs for gifted and talented students in 122 Texas school districts and to compare these practices with those recommended in the literature and with Texas Education Association guidelines. Areas examined included informal and formal assessment of student and teacher identification practices,…

It is not likely that the schools as presently organized and conducted and with the prevailing model of change employed for their improvement can be redesigned to meet satisfactorily the wide and varied range of expectations for them. The schools are suffering from a confusing array of expectations and a crippling overload of functions. Our…

Defines and discusses the extremes of "poetism" (or overreliance on intuition) and "scientism" (overreliance on research-based models) in teaching and supervision. Argues that teaching is neither an art nor a science, but more like a craft that skilled teachers practice as artisans, combining technique and reflection. (TE)

A research and development approach to performance monitoring in public agencies involves establishing objectives, selecting indicators, establishing criteria for comparison, and using information. Examples from Virginia education agencies indicate that performance monitoring requires commitment, patience, openness to ideas, and risk taking. (SK)

Using a framework that draws upon current organizational theory and assumptions about knowledge utilization and school improvement this report examines the process of change at the school level. The model developed attempts both to categorize the "strategies" employed by the Research and Development Utilization (RDU) program/projects and…

The research model presented here is designed to be used by practitioners who either do not have substantial training in research methodology or do not have the time to design and document involved procedures. (SK)