The accountability required by school-reform measures such as No Child Left Behind has placed increased emphasis on data analysis for appraising schools, administrators, teachers, and students. The focus of accountability-driven initiatives is developing policies and procedures that collectively influence the district, the school, and most…

In this article, the author features the America's Choice School Design, a school improvement program that has enlisted 547 schools in 16 states in its brand of comprehensive reform, and describes the program's move to loosen its nonprofit moorings and change to a for-profit company. The purpose of the move to for-profit status is to raise capital…

This book is a roadmap for developing collaborative strategies that integrate the knowledge, ideas, expertise, resources, networks, and systems of the nonprofit, private, public, and religious sectors in the transformation of elementary and secondary schools. While most books on school reform focus on micro issues such as curricula,…

Since the passage of the "No Child Left Behind Act of 2001" (NCLB), the evidence that it is working has continued to grow. Because of this law, teachers and parents are getting the information and help they need to help every child reach his or her best in school--and as a result, student achievement is rising across America. While…

Discourse about high poverty schooling generally revolves around three points of view. In the first, equity of school resources is considered to be the key ingredient in school improvement. In the second, no matter the school resources, there are successful high poverty schools, so therefore policy should focus on their example and not use poverty…

Evander Childs High School and Morris High School are two of the largest and most challenged secondary schools in the Bronx. Despite decades of political handwringing, many attempts at school reform, an array of corporate and community partner programs, and efforts to recruit highly qualified faculties for the long term, many of the students in…

The State of Florida Department of Education provides pre-and-post-graduation data for public high school graduates throughout Florida. These data were used for the present report to produce data sets for all M-DCPS regular high schools and charter high schools graduating students in 2008 and 2009. Summary data for the district are also provided.…

As the United States stands on the brink of a new era in American history with new leaders, fresh ideas, and a strong feeling of optimism for the future, everyone has an important opportunity to get the nation's education policy right. Association for Supervision and Curriculum Development (ASCD) recommends that as policymakers reshape the…

When studying different types of returns to education, educational reforms are commonly used in the economics literature as a source of exogenous variation in education. The Swedish compulsory school reform is one example; the reform extended compulsory education throughout the country, in different municipalities at different points in time. Such…

Private foundations are attempting to move away from educational reform approaches based on model development. The limits of the "Johnny Appleseed" (sowing seed and moving on) mode of grantmaking are coming clear. Persistence--a willingness to commit resources to an issue or institution for 5 to 10 years--will need to be an operating…

Charter schools may provide part of the answer to increased demand for restructuring and school accountability/autonomy. This handbook describes in detail the organization and operation of charter schools. Chapters define charter schools, describe their appeal and the approval process, present a model charter-school structure, discuss innovative…

If fundamental change in education is to be lasting and effective, it must be a systemic transformation that pervades all aspects of the organization. The New American Schools Development Corporation (NASDC) mission requires rapid, comprehensive change. The Community Learning Centers program described in this document features systemic change with…

A persistent dilemma of school leadership is whether principals should concentrate efforts on building cohesion and good working relationships among staff or on specific curriculum aimed toward specific learning outcomes for students. Interviews with three principals who worked through both strengthening collegiality and improving curriculum show…

High schools today face problems of culturally diverse student populations, diversity of student learning styles, and a growing public perception that high schools do not adequately prepare their graduates for either work or college. This paper offers an extensive review of literature on block scheduling as well as a handbook for gaining support…

This report presents general criteria for authentic pedagogy, instructional activities rooted in a primary concern for high standards of intellectual quality, as well as more specific standards that can be used to judge the quality of assessment tasks, classroom lessons, and student performance. Examples are given of tasks, lessons, and student…