Focuses on subtle changes that evolved over three-year study of parent involvement cadre working to implement Harry Levin's Accelerated School Model targeted at high-risk students. Although the school in this study appears to have successfully involved parents in their children's education, parent cadre's underlying purpose is not being adequately…

Recent incorporation of a performance assessment in Arizona's test mandate provides an opportunity to examine the assumptions and beliefs underlying measurement-driven reform. Efforts to meld cognitive-constructivist beliefs about pupil learning and assessment contradict behaviorist beliefs about changing teachers and reforming schools. Mandates…

Teachers in a mainstream elementary school setting initiated a program called "Circle of Friends," to provide support for a student with deafness and behavior problems and for other students having difficulty making friends. Learning activities involved interpreting the term "friend," helping students get to know each other, celebrating their…

Summer camps can implement a biomonitoring program that determines water quality through study of aquatic insects. Such a program requires a minimum of equipment and allows campers to explore the natural world and absorb information that will affect their views of science and the environment. (LP)

Discusses the historical development of "hard" and "soft" systems thinking traditions and examines how these traditions have been understood and applied in the field of instructional development. Proposes the need for a synthesis of the two traditions in planning, implementing, and evaluating instructional programs. (AEF)

An SBM team chairman of a middle school-college collaboration explains ongoing problems, including teachers' discomfort with student and parent participation, teacher-administrator power struggles, the push for immediate results, and communication issues. Despite setbacks, the group has some tangible outcomes: improved safety procedures, a…

Explores the 1988 Education Reform Act's effects on providing physical education and sports in British schools, and specifically, implementation of the National Curriculum for Physical Education. The ERA and local school management have not only changed interschool and school-government agency relationships, but have fostered potentially damaging…

Title II of Goals 2000 created the National Educational Standards and Improvement Council (NESIC), a federally funded agency to devise national content and performance standards in key academic subjects and certify state-submitted standards. Since Republicans have taken over Congress, this council is finished. Any private successor must mount…

Analyzes Singapore's information technology master plan in relation to its earlier national computer policy plans. Topics include global activities, economic development, implementation and use of information technology and services, and partnerships with industry and the public sector. (Author/LRW)

Describes a proposed core-level bibliographic standard that combines the cost effectiveness of minimal-level cataloging with full-level cataloging's utility for library cooperation. The process of developing core-level standards, a definition of a core record, comparisons of core records with minimal- and full-level records, and implementation…

The Encourage Program at Children's Hospital of Saint Paul (Minnesota) helps teens with chronic or life-threatening illness adjust to the changes in their lives through individual contact with peers who have similar conditions. The program addresses the unique needs of chronically ill adolescents as they go through various stages of development.…

How to expand to a larger scale a working community-service program using federal money is considered. Planning time is an essential, as are a focus on program culture and technical support. Adapting programs, rather than prescribing solutions, should help in the cautious move toward a national program. (SLD)

A major problem with the proposed approaches to national service is that they may draw attention away from the real causes of and the feasible solutions to critical problems. Community action should involve young people in sustained, long-term empowering activities, not in one-time experiences or in work that does not challenge current power…

Character-education programs can be implemented without creating a political firestorm if planners carefully consider key process and content elements, including community involvement; core values; comprehensive, effective curricula; formal evaluation; prosocial behavior codes; communications; family outreach; and leadership from a knowledge base.…

Describes a three-year teacher education program created by the College of Education at Iowa State University designed to make technology an integral part of the teaching and learning environment. Discusses the program's steps and components, including the use of computer-related technology courses, field experiences, and educational computing…