The widening mismatch between the skills of the work force and the skill demands of the work place underlie the need for school restructuring. Fourth in a series, this document builds on and extends the issues discussed in the National Governors' Association's (NGA) previous publications and reports on case studies of early restructuring efforts…

The widening mismatch between the skills of the work force and the skill demands of the workplace underlie the need for school restructuring. Within the categories of school-level, school-district, and state-level issues, a discussion about and suggestions for restructuring U.S. education in order to improve its productivity and student…

Because they reach almost every young person in the nation, schools are best positioned to prepare the next generation of Americans for active citizenship. The public increasingly recognizes that students' civic learning is important to maintaining our representative democracy, and parents are calling for schools to help prepare young people for…

Does Comprehensive School Reform (CSR) work? Research results have been mixed. Some studies have measured a modest improvement in student achievement; others have found no effect. A team of RAND researchers has approached the question of CSR's effectiveness by first focusing on an even more basic question: Has CSR been implemented? A shortcoming…

In fall 2001, Pennsylvania initiated a "friendly takeover" of the School District of Philadelphia and embarked upon what at the time was characterized as the "largest-scale privatization of public schools ever undertaken." Under the guidance of a School Reform Commission comprising members appointed by the governor and the…

This book will help changemakers move toward better functioning school systems and districts using reliable, participative, and practical methods. The author describes an orderly sequence of activities from getting started to monitoring continuing evolution of that most desirable future. These activities are intertwined with simple explanations of…

In the past 30 years, research has suggested the need for much smaller high schools. In response, some administrators have attempted to subdivide big high schools into smaller entities. This digest reviews recent research on the movement to break up large schools and discusses five types of error common to such attempts--errors of autonomy, size,…

This paper examines the complexity and ambiguity of policies that purport to promote deregulation and decentralization of education. The paper describes the development of decentralization/deregulation policies in the Netherlands and applies the specific dilemmas faced in the country to the unexpected difficulty in preparing and passing a…

The need for students to experience affiliation and membership is a strong theme in recent thinking on school reform. But affiliation without concern for students' intellectual work and growth defeats the purpose of schooling. This study investigated the sources and mechanisms that sustain intellectually focused affiliation among students, defined…

Alchemy is the magical or mysterious power or process involving chemistry, magic, and philosophy in transforming one thing into another. The term is often used to describe the medieval study that sought to transform cheaper metals into gold or silver. "Educational alchemy" is the process by which schools are converted into more effective learning…

This book is about education system reform in Central and Eastern Europe, with emphasis on decentralization and management. In the past, local authorities served as implementation arms of the central ministry, while finance and decision-making were controlled by the central government, leaving local communities with little influence. New education…

To capture some of the benefits of small-scale schooling, educators are looking for ways to downsize, including dividing large schools into subunits or "schools within a school." This approach establishes within the school a smaller educational unit with a separate educational program and its own staff, students, and budget. This digest…

This paper presents a narrative of a case study conducted in an Ohio middle school as part of a 5-year nationally funded reform program, Transforming Education through Art Challenge (TETAC), which features the arts as central in integrated/interdisciplinary curriculum planning. In the school the paper reports on, there are approximately 64…

During the 1997-98 school year, the Sentry Hill School District made the decision to "redesign" Clayton Elementary School after persistently low student achievement placed the district in the lowest category of the district's accountability system. This case study outlines the changes made at the school. Redesigning the school meant removing all…

This report is part of a series of special topic reports developed by the Chicago Annenberg Research Project to document key issues and problems affecting the Chicago Annenberg Challenge and the improvement of Chicago public schools in general. The report introduces the concept of instructional program coherence and explains why schools whose…