Even as the Obama administration tries to make good on promises of unprecedented transparency and accountability in economic-stimulus funding, the first reports from states and school districts show the difficulty of figuring out--in detail--how the money for education has been spent. In the broadest sense, the quarterly stimulus reports made…

Academic development has emerged as an important new site of practice in higher education internationally over the past 40 years, and has been influential in shaping the terms of debate about teaching and learning in higher education. Academic development has shifted its focus from the individual teacher to strategic interventions at institutional…

Ethical challenges associated with the relationships among members of an evaluative team/organization receive less attention. Examples of the kinds of ethical dilemmas that could occur within an evaluation team include an individual taking undeserved credit, transferring blame, making false promises, withholding information, breaching…

Since the Supreme Court approved a 2006 amendment to the Federal Rules of Civil Procedure requiring public entities such as school districts to produce electronically stored public records during the "discovery process" in lawsuits, maintaining such records, especially e-mail messages, has been an ongoing obligation for district leaders. While…

Today in America, there are millions of children who do not get a kind of culturally sensitive teaching. As has happened many times before, America is undergoing a demographic shift. Yet the teaching force has not changed nearly as fast. As a result, a great number of students aren't getting the kind of classroom experience the author got at Cedar…

In most admissions offices, the focus of training sessions for student telecounselors and tour guides is on transmitting information about the institution. Although this transmission of institutional knowledge is important, these training sessions are opportunities for student admissions employees to consider how their work relates to their…

As the technology infrastructure of schools expands, a common concern has been the underutilization of computers and other technologies in the classroom. Teachers are often blamed for failing to integrate technology into their teaching, giving such reasons as lack of time, training, equipment, and support. However, it has been suggested that these…

Many educators are interested in using technology to enhance their teaching, but feel they are behind the curve or are overwhelmed by the number of choices and do not know where to begin. This article presents tips for getting personal technology professional development in shape.

States are in fiscal funk. This means that "ambitious education initiatives" are being scuttled. The current downturn could force teachers to see how much can be accomplished by attending to some long overlooked, incontrovertibly effective actions and initiatives. In this article, the author recommends several simple fundamental changes in…

New teachers need to know that the connections with a wide web of colleagues and friends support professional growth and well-being. In this article, the authors focus on effective ways to support new English teachers and student teachers by developing a mentoring program. It is more realistic to encourage new teachers to develop a "network of…

Policy influences practice. Policy has the capacity to strengthen practice by demanding accountability for both process and results through clear expectations as well as deliberate sanctions for failure to meet those expectations. Policies can also provide resources to meet expectations. In this article, the authors discuss how several national…

In this article, the author talks about professional development schools (PDSs), a form of collaboration between schools and universities that have tremendous potential to improve both, and discusses four joint tasks of PDSs, namely (1) improvement of student learning; (2) preparation of educators; (3) professional development of educators; and…

This qualitative comparative case study identified factors that distinguish between high and low-performance on reading achievement in elementary rural Appalachian schools. This study determined the most effective instructional reading strategies, as well as other influential factors, implemented by school districts in the rural Appalachia area…

Much has been written about school-university partnerships including their general intent to positively impact student learning through the continuous professional development of classroom teachers. This article, which offers an in-depth description of the growth of a school-college partnership, follows the development of a partnership between a…

Case studies about issues arising from education policy were written between 2003 and 2011 by doctoral candidates in Curriculum and Instruction who were career K-12 educators. Literary analysis was employed in grouping 57 case studies, which described primarily situations that occurred in school districts in one large metropolitan area, by topic…