During the past year, Wisconsin state legislators debated a series of bills aimed at closing low-performing public schools and replacing them with privately run charter schools. These proposals were particularly targeted at Milwaukee, the state's largest and poorest school district. Ultimately, the only legislation enacted was a bill that modestly…

This paper examines the impact of vouchers in general and voucher design in particular on public school performance. It argues that all voucher programs are not created equal. There are often fundamental differences in voucher designs that affect public school incentives differently and induce different responses from them. It analyzes two voucher…

Despite their progress, most schools in Kansas' Quality Performance Accreditation (QPA) System fall short of the philosophy and practice envisioned by QPA. What has been accomplished and what remains to be done in QPA is detailed in this two-volume report. It was found that teachers working together were at the center of improvement. Schools where…

Schools have traditionally been accountable for management of educational programs, while students were held responsible for academic achievement and personal success. Recent reform and restructuring efforts have increased the responsibility of schools for student outcomes. Wisconsin has shifted responsibility for student outcomes to the…

Written to help educators maximize student learning, this publication outlines a process for designing and implementing an improvement and restructuring plan based on knowledge acquisition, needs assessment, indepth planning, and development of commitment to change. Research has identified 14 conditions for successful schools: high attendance,…

School restructuring continues to be a common approach to improving education. Despite restructuring's continued and growing support, there is little research to support its effectiveness. The theoretical contrast exposed in school restructuring is between bureaucratic and organic organizational forms. A study assessed the effect of restructuring…

This paper reports on the Leadership for Organisational Learning and Student Outcomes (LOLSO) Project, a new program that addresses the need to extend understanding of school restructuring initiatives in Australia. The project aims to change school practices by enhancing student learning. The LOLSO Project addresses six specific research…

In 1984 the State of New York mandated participation in the Comprehensive School Improvement Program (CSIP) for elementary schools that ranked in the bottom 9 percent on statewide student competency exams. To discern the overall effectiveness of the program and identify why it appeared to succeed in some schools and fail in others, the changes in…

This work provides school change leaders with tools, techniques, tips, examples, illustrations, and stories about promoting school change. Tools provided include histograms, surveys, run charts, weighted voting, force-field analysis, decision matrices, and many others. Chapter 1, "Introduction," applies a matrix for asking questions…

Summarizes a three-year Consortium for Policy Research in Education project to identify conditions in U.S., Canadian, and Australian schools that promote high performance through school-based management. Findings showed that SBM requires redesign of the whole school organization. Success depended on how schools decentralized four key resources:…

The Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation funds a 5-year program supporting the start-up of new small high schools of no more than 400 students and the conversion of larger high schools into smaller, more personalized schools or learning communities. This report focuses on the program's first year and compares new small schools, large high schools…

This study finds that the New York City version of school-based decision making, School-Based Management/Shared Decision Making (SBM/SDM), fails to bring school-based management or shared decision making to the schools. This report begins by describing the seriously dysfunctional structure of the New York City public schools and explains the…

Argues for the development of school-wide reform plans derived from research on individual differences in learning and effective school practices. Data are presented from three urban schools where a systematic school restructuring effort enabled the establishment of strong family-school-community connections and effective and efficient delivery of…

Describes the planning, facilitation, continuation, and evaluation of Designing Successful Learning, an effective staff development program created to facilitate district restructuring and improve student outcomes. The program focuses teachers' attention on cooperative learning, interdisciplinary instruction, performance assessment, student…

This paper presents, describes, and explains the results of Project SIGN (a school improvement groups network) collaboratively conducted by the University of North Carolina at Greensboro and the Camp Lejeune Dependents' Schools during the 1989-90 school year. The collegial, professional in-service program, designed to improve school effectiveness…