Introduction: Many physicians seek information from colleagues over other sources, highlighting the important role of interaction in continuing professional development (CPD). To guide the development of CPD opportunities, this study explored the nature of cancer-related questions faced by general surgeons, and how interaction with colleagues…

In this article, the author presents a discussion regarding the sharing of decision making regarding curriculum in preschool. The preschool where she teaches is housed in a diverse, faith-based elementary school in the heart of Grand Rapids, Michigan, a midsize, midwestern city. It offers full-day, half-day, and two-and-a-half-hour preschool…

In a policy climate driven by tests and external mandates, theories of school reform that place teachers, their knowledge, and their relationships at the heart of school improvement have garnered attention as promising alternatives. Yet little exists in print about how such theories actually work or what these approaches look like in practice.…

In this article, we revive work redesign theory, specifically Hackman and Oldham's Job Characteristics Model (JCM), to examine distributed leadership initiatives. Based on our early observations of six schools engaged in distributed leadership reform and a broad review of literature, including empirical tests of work redesign theory, we retrofit…

Democracy engenders freedom for all, human rights, participation based on equality, shared values, the rule of law, due process, good governance and transparency. In the workplace, it would include freedom of expression, association, participation, access to available information and the right of workers to understand what goes on where they work.…

The Delaware Education Research and Development Center (DERDC) conducted a two-part study to determine the impacts of this program on participating schools in the state. In the first part, DERDC interviewed a sample of administrators and teachers from 6 of the 15 participating schools. Their responses helped design a survey that was administered…

When Stephanie Smith became the principal of Seaford (Delaware) Middle School four years ago, she was told to accept the fact that the school would never be able to change its status as a school that needed to improve. She did not accept that. To improve performance levels, she set the expectations high. Her defiance paid off: the school is now…

With the implementation of site-based decision-making occurring in schools, an understanding of the views of secondary school principals and of secondary school teachers would provide valuable information. In the study, six principals and six teachers, from either high performing or low performing schools, were purposefully selected for their…

Established in 1940, Lady Gowrie Child Centres in Australia provide integrated early childhood programs and develop and share project work, information, resources and training at local and national levels. While changes in social policy compromised their provision of integrated programs, the centre in Adelaide has made real strides towards moving…

Previous research into deinstitutionalization has largely ignored the perspective of people with intellectual disabilities, especially those with severe intellectual disabilities. This research aimed first to understand how women with severe intellectual disabilities experienced transition from a locked ward of an old long-stay hospital into other…

This article reports the results of a longitudinal study of 35 Swedish comprehensive schools involving interviews with teachers, school leaders, students, and parents carried out in 1980, 1982, 1985, and 2001. During the 35-year period covered by the study, the schools experienced significant reforms. The most important of these reforms involved a…

Observations were conducted in three county councils to find out whether the government's ambition to develop Learning Disability Partnership Boards (as expressed in the White Paper "Valuing people") are being realized. All the partnerships practiced various inclusive activities in order to involve people with learning disabilities in…

Following the initiation of educational reforms, this article reports on the different models of leadership that have emerged as being important for developing teacher professionalism in government primary schools in Karachi, Pakistan. The evidence from the case studies, reported in this article, illustrates that even within formalized government…

We examine the contemporary relationship between headship and leadership in England. This speaks to the current globalizing agenda promoting generic leadership within a modernizing agenda of restructuring and reculturing in public education. Thinking based on several research studies is used to stimulate perspectives on a range of complex tensions…

In his Places to Go column for a special issue on the Net Generation, Stephen Downes takes an unexpected trip--to Google. According to Downes, Google epitomizes the essence of the Net Generation. Infinitely searchable and adaptable, Google represents the spirit of a generation raised in the world of the Internet, a generation that adapts…