Schools self-identify as caring communities and teach young children to be caring for each other. But schools also teach other contradictory and competing messages, such as individualism and self-reliance, rationalist concepts of justice and meritocracy, and other neoliberal approaches to life and community. Furthermore, while endorsements of care…

In this study, the aim is to reflect the perspectives of education stakeholders regarding the leader's duties in creating an effective school within the context of organizational culture. In this regard, existing studies in the literature on the interaction between corporate or school culture and leadership have been compiled. As a result, it was…

School leaders in the twenty-first century face complexities that frequently make leadership challenging. Many underperforming schools struggle because, among other things, school leaders and their followers lack the necessary skills to guide their institutions to success. Research demonstrates that school leaders today need skills such as…

Given the proportion of young children experiencing disadvantages in achieving optimal health due to inequities related to race, place, and income, there is increasing attention to developing effective early childhood (EC) systems. As EC leaders embrace methods such as collective impact in driving systems change, there is a growing recognition…

Advocates of Invitational Education theory and practice believe consistent application of an ICORT mindset upon an institution's people, places, policies, programs, and processes (5Ps) can optimize and sustain success for all stakeholders. Given a professional learning community (PLC) is impacted by and also influences all of an institution's 5Ps,…

Many personal and policy decisions turn on perceptions of school effectiveness, defined here as the causal effect of attendance at a particular school or set of schools on student test scores and other outcomes. Widely-disseminated school ratings frameworks compare average student achievement across schools, but uncontrolled differences in means…

University of Central Oklahoma's (UCO) Student Transformative Learning Record (STLR) leverages the Learning Management System (LMS), rubrics, an online dashboard, transcript services, and badging to assess students' employability and durable soft-skills. Featured by the Chronicle for Higher Ed, this Comprehensive Learner Record model has helped…

The article aims to outline the proposals for linking school effectiveness research and school improvement that are currently relevant in international discussion and to ask how they deal with the 'technology deficit' at the level of model improvement. We will first show the difference between school improvement and school effectiveness. Then, we…

The fourth article we are highlighting from the extensive "FORUM" archive introduces Michael Fielding's critique of practice and policy for school effectiveness, first published in 2000. In it, Fielding describes the disillusionment with New Labour education policies before setting out a well-made argument for the person-centred school…

Based on a belief that providing all students with the best opportunities for academic success requires a constant focus on improvement, the North Dakota Department of Public Instruction (NDDPI), in partnership with the Region 11 Comprehensive Center, released the latest version of its School Renewal Guide for North Dakota Public Schools. Using…

Although the Texas economy is racing ahead at full speed, state K-12 education has stalled. One major obstacle has been the claim by opponents of school choice in Texas that giving families more education options via education choice policies would harm or even destroy rural district schools. These concerns, even if understandable, are not based…

In 1848, Horace Mann remarked, "Education, then, beyond all other devices of human origin, is the great equalizer of the conditions of men, the balance wheel of the social machinery" (para. 10). Yet, school reform, especially in large urban districts like New York and Los Angeles, seeking to equalize the human conditions of people is a…

Driving across tracts of new-home development in El Paso, Texas, one can't miss the signs of charter-school momentum. Charter-school enrollment has been growing in Texas for years, but in many localities and even at the state level, charter schools had until recently encountered harsher treatment from policymakers than what advocates have…

The sixth edition of The New Meaning of Educational Change is unlike any of its predecessors. Michael Fullan first provides a deeply critical account of the last 60 years of educational change across the world with a focus on the United States. He then presents a radically different future based on learnings from the past and innovative examples…

Distributed leadership is one of the most influential and well-discussed ideas to emerge in the field of educational leadership. Prompted by the foundational and seminal work of Spillane et al. (2001) the idea of shared or 'stretched' leadership that incorporates both formal and informal leaders, has been of interest to researchers, policy-makers…