Purpose: Increasingly, school systems are forming improvement networks and using continuous improvement (CI) to realize more ambitious and equitable instruction. Yet networks reside in environments that place formidable demands on school leaders and house multiple, and sometimes contradictory, beliefs about educational goals and practices.…

Network governance's increasing adoption in education has significantly challenged collaborative networks' external accountability. While educational inspection in network governance has been discussed, research focusing on microlevel educational inspection practices is rare. This study uses evidence from collaborative school turnaround to explore…

This study proposes an empirically grounded theory of how school reform implementation relates to effectiveness, useful for developing and studying many approaches to school reform both in the U.S. and abroad, and also for assessing how policymakers and implementers might leverage various aspects of implementation to create effective school…

This study is situated within the idea that in complex adaptive systems such as higher education, organizational leaders need to be ready to make decisions that not only react to change but also are able to inspire it. This ability to respond to external change through the development and exercise of internal capabilities for long-term success is…

This article explores external facilitation for school improvement; more specifically, it examines the practical work of external facilitators. It is based on a Swedish case in which facilitators at the Swedish National Agency for Education support low-performing schools. The article aims to develop knowledge about how external facilitators in…

Massachusetts General Law does not recognize students as stakeholders in school turnaround, despite extant literature supporting the benefits of including students as decision makers in their education experiences. The purpose of this Action Research study was to understand why student voices are critical to successful school turnaround, and to…

Persistently low-performing schools across the United States are tasked with meeting state benchmarks and address the needs of their students. Every developed country has had to address the issues surrounding declining graduation rates, state benchmark results, and schools identified as underperforming. These schools have made attempts to engage…

School accountability has been a focus for state and federal legislators for over 50 years. In 2017, Texas passed House Bill 22 to align their accountability system with the Every Student Succeeds Act of 2015. This piece of legislation gives every Texas public school a letter grade based on state assessment scores, attendance, and other factors.…

Research on school improvement has accumulated an extensive list of factors that facilitate turnarounds at underperforming schools. Given that contextual or resource constraints may limit the possibilities of putting all of these factors in place, an important question is what is necessary and sufficient to turn a school around. We use a…

In the United States, thousands of students attend urban, secondary schools that are in need of improvement due to their inability to meet state standards (National Center for Education Statistics, 2020a). These schools are in need of transformation but cannot be turned around without the right leader in place (Herman et al., 2008). Turnaround…

This qualitative study described the lived experiences of twelve Black female principals who currently work in Title I schools. This study set out to determine how they managed their challenges and barriers while leading. Data included one-on-one interviews with participants. The work lives of the participants were situated in Title I schools,…

School improvement is an iterative process through which districts and schools develop their capacity, implement and refine new policies and practices, and respond to new developments and needs over time. School improvement policy can also be considered an iterative process, with policy implementors learning from previous rounds of a policy.…

When the Every Student Succeeds Act (ESSA) began requiring states to identify schools for support and improvement plans, the North Dakota Department of Public Instruction (NDDPI) recognized a statewide challenge. As a variety of improvement efforts got underway at individual schools and districts, the department lacked an overarching plan and…

Purpose: While previous research has examined the impact of school turnaround models, less is known about the principals who lead these turnaround schools. This study examines the personal demographics, experience, educational background, prior school performance, salaries, and turnover of principals who led two turnaround models in Tennessee's…

Purpose: The involvement of organizational development (OD) consultants in schools has become widespread in recent years. In Israel, their presence increased in the past 2 decades when the Ministry of Education encouraged their entry as support for the self-management reform and improvement of failing schools. Despite accumulated experience and…