Researchers have considered how school choice policies affect student achievement, but less inquiry explores how the organization of schools may change in the presence of choice. This descriptive and exploratory paper analyzes a state representative sample of school mission statements at two time points: before the enactment of choice policies in…

In current teacher evaluation systems, the two main purposes of evaluation--accountability/goal accomplishment (summative) and professional growth/improvement (formative)--are often at odds with one another. However, they are not only compatible, but linking them within a unified teacher evaluation system may, in fact, be desirable. The challenge…

Concerns about the academic performance of students from marginalized groups underscore calls for students to be taught by teachers of similar racial, ethnic, or gender identities (e.g., Miller, 2018). In sub-Saharan Africa, projects enlist women teachers as role models for girls in an effort to redress persistent gender disparities in education.…

Based on a research project comprising data from an interview study and a survey with teachers and school principals in four German federal states ("Bundesländer"), this paper questions the claim that the side effects of accountability in education are bound to high-stakes contexts, and also provides evidence of side effects occurring in…

How has education for refugees been shaped by broader dynamics of educational privatization? This paper argues that the invoking of the 'refugee crisis' narrative has been a crucial force in facilitating the privatization of this sector. The urgency of crisis helps to naturalize private actors' participation in refugees' education as equal…

As social and economic problems change, so do the goals of education reformers. This content analysis of presidential debates transcripts, state of the union addresses, and education budgets from 2000 to 2015 reveals the ways in which presidents and presidential candidates have framed education goals thus far in the twenty-first century. Using…

We read and analyzed 165,000 words and uncover a series of counter-stories buried within a textual corpus, authored by Teach For America (TFA) founder Wendy Kopp (Kopp, 1989, 2001; Kopp & Farr, 2011), that offers insight into the forms of racism endemic to Teach For America. All three counter-stories align with a critical race theory (CRT)…

The ways in which the language of reformers intersects with and informs reform implementation is important to our understanding of how education policy impacts practice. To explore this issue, we employed critical discourse analysis (CDA) to analyze the language used by a 21st century skills-focused reform organization to promote its program…

The Common Core State Standards Initiative seeks to prepare all students to graduate high school without remedial needs, to improve transparency across states' accountability systems, and to foster efficiencies in the development and distribution of educational resources. The reform was adopted in more than 40 states and has been described as…

The state mandated public hearings concerning school closing proposals in New York City provide a window into a diverse set of policy actors and their deliberations. Opposition to school closures is often cast as entrenched interests, emotional attachment, support for the status quo or at worst negligence. However, content analysis reveals that…

Over the last 20 years, technology and education policy discourse in Alberta, Canada has been philosophically polarized and dominated by value-neutral ways of thinking about technology (Brooks, 2011). While technology policy implementation has significant ramifications for schools and systems, for much of this time, system leaders, specifically…

This study examines Washington State's attempt to move toward an integrated, P-20 system of education that enhances student transitions from high school to college. In analyzing Washington as a single case study, a profile of the state is developed on key access related characteristics. Data for this study were gathered utilizing fundamental case…