Assessment can have a profound transformational impact on a college or university, but for this to occur, such core values as improvement of student learning through collection of performance-related data must be integrated into the institutional culture. At Truman State University (Missouri), an initially modest commitment to improving student…

Describes the faculty development efforts at eight medical schools participating in a large-scale medical curriculum development project, exploring faculty-development topics and the methods and ways the institutions motivated faculty to participate. Outcome measures used to gauge program effectiveness are also discussed. Concludes that approaches…

Eduardo Padron, president of Miami-Dade Community College (Florida), has created unprecedented diversity throughout the institution, created new transfer agreements, and made technological advancements. After three years, his take-charge administrative style has created tension with faculty, which recently voted to unionize. Some observers cite…

Central governance of undergraduate medical school curriculum is compared with traditional departmental approaches, based on experiences at the University of Pittsburgh (Pennsylvania). It is argued that centralized governance has more advantages but greater cost. A major challenge of this approach is in resolution of faculty conflict between…

Documents the presence of displaced workers in adult English-as-a-Second-Language (ESL) classes and their work experiences in a changing economy. Class discussions, surveys, and the collection of oral histories in four regions in Southern Ontario elicit common themes that ESL teachers and administrators should focus on in helping learners deal…

New technologies lead higher education institutions to question their academic structures and processes, but effective implementation of the technologies and positive changes in traditions will occur only if basic research about teaching and learning is incorporated into discussions and planning. Issues related to instruction, faculty development,…

This article describes how Cahokia middle and high school students conduct inquiry-based science through a pitfall trap experiment. In a collaborative effort, students designed and conducted pitfall trap investigations that combined their interest in the natural world with their love of technology. The students set up their own experiments to…

For more than a decade, the Government of Hong Kong has instituted a policy of school decentralization aimed at devolving authority to all stakeholders, including the representatives of School Sponsoring Bodies, principals, teachers, parents, and community members. This study examines the relative contribution of two dimensions of school…

Smyth introduces this special issue with the claim that the question of "how to pursue forms of leadership that listen to and attend to the voices of...young people" is the "most urgent issue of our times". Dana Mitra's article describes what seem to be serious and elaborate attempts to involve students in school…

Implementation of IT "solutions" in the context of changes to business processes and efficiency is a common trigger for using formalised project management techniques. The trigger may include topical activities such as job evaluation schemes or quality assurance accreditation. This has led to a blurring of the boundary between projects and…

The curriculum of the Life Orientation (LO) learning area forms an excellent basis for equipping learners to respond positively to social demands, assume responsibilities, and optimise their life chances. I report on a qualitative study that focused on the extent to which schools and LO teachers succeeded in achieving the outcomes of the…

Job burnout is a condition observed in recent years among a wide variety of helping professions. In this study, burnout was described as emotional exhaustion, job dissatisfaction, and the desire to leave the job and/or profession. To examine burnout in the profession of school psychology, a random sample of members (N=139) of the Illinois School…

A survey was conducted at College of the Canyons (COC) to assess the current status of the campus climate. The survey instrument focused on students' experiences, attitudes about diversity issues, and suggestions for improving the climate for diversity. The survey was mailed to all disabled and under-represented racial/ethnic group students plus a…

The recent movement to integrate social services into schools to serve at-risk students is hampered by the proliferation of highly specialized human services. Each had different organizational approaches, one bureaucratic and the other communal. A study examined the Center on Organization and Restructuring of Schools' (CORS) data on 24…

This book grew from a collection of papers presented in the 1987-88 academic year at the University of Cincinnati. Some of the papers explore issues prevalent in the 1988 presidential election year. The issues are critical to an understanding of the relationships between social issues and political activity in U.S. society. Chapters examine two…