Today, more than ever, teachers must work effectively and efficiently to meet seemingly contradictory demands placed on them by society. On the one hand, school personnel are tasked with attaining and publicly reporting high levels of student achievement in response to No Child Left Behind. On the other, school personnel must ensure that students…

This article reports on a national study examining the characteristics of effective school principals which reveals that high student achievement is directly linked to "collective leadership"--the shared influence of educators, parents, stakeholders, and community members. The five-year study, commissioned by the Wallace Foundation and…

The data are clear: Unless the nation can find a better way to accelerate improvement in the quality of education and implement it in the next 10 years, this nation will lose its competitive edge against other nations and another generation of children will be lost. Eighty percent of Illinois high school graduates are not capable of doing the…

The Kingdom Come School in Linefork is now a public school, but it began its life in 1924 as part of the settlement school movement that was all the rage at the beginning of the twentieth century. The school was founded by Hiram Frakes, a methodist minister who wanted to create a community that valued education, and promoted opportunities for its…