Today's calls for school restructuring demand a greater response than piecemeal tinkering. The impetus for total organizational change started over 30 years ago in Japan as industrial leaders adapted W. Edwards Deming's beliefs and strategies concerning psychology, systems, perceptual theoretical frameworks, and causes of variation. Quality…

Reggio Emilia's pioneering effort in preschool education has been widely replicated throughout Italy, where almost 90% of nation's children aged 3-6 enroll in national, municipal, private preschools. These preschools are unlike any in the United States. There are no building principals or school boards. America must invest more time, money, and…

Argues that the technological revolution has changed occupational skills and employers' needs, forcing community colleges to do more with the same or less money. Calls for the reengineering of education to move from the current dependency on entitlements and legislative protection to a market-driven, cost-justified system. (MAB)

Explores possibilities for critical, resistance-based approaches to school leadership. Compares Marx's, Habermas's, Baudrillard's, and Foucault's views of human regulation, along with other individual/group theories. Assesses theories' utility for critical leadership in education. Individuals can resist oppressive school practices by pursuing…

Supports Linda Darling-Hammond's contention that many adolescent difficulties are not intrinsic, but stem from mismatches between teens' developmental needs and experiences provided by most secondary schools. A depersonalized, punitive, rote-learning ambience cannot meet adolescents' needs for affiliation, autonomy, and cognitive challenges.…

Neglect of divergent cultural values and belief systems; perennial debates about moral, ethical, and legal questions; power struggles; and technically oriented initiatives have thwarted school-reform efforts. Initiating frequent policy changes to accommodate fads overlooks the slowness of change and the learning process in complex social…

University of Washington educator discusses school reform, and offers reasons why school change will not be as fundamental as many think. Asserts that education occurs within the schools' primary function of day care. Discusses how teachers' roles have changed in the last 20 years and what those roles should be. Discusses universities' role in…

Using linear modeling, the Prospects dataset was employed to examine effects of instructional and school organizational characteristics on first- and third-graders' math and reading achievement. Results supported environmental and interactive instructional approaches, but not a coupling (coordination) approach. Collegiality, support for…

Four levels of authority within the educational decision-making structure in seven European countries and states for primary and lower secondary education are analyzed, and results are presented from a study of decision making. This study indicates a slightly higher degree of school autonomy in England/Wales, the Netherlands, and Sweden. (SLD)

A study by a charter school advocacy group found the most common reason for charter school closure was mismanagement, followed by financial difficulties, inability to find a suitable facility, and failure to meet the academic goals of their charter. Vignettes of charter schools in Alaska and Oregon illustrate these problems and offer advice for…

Analyzes current and future directions of educational change in Quebec, highlighting major policy themes: governance and organization, teaching and learning, and human and financial resources. The necessary conditions for achieving intended reform goals may be lacking. Schools lack the capacity to engage in self-development without external…

Few great ideas to guide school practice are totally new. Conscientious educators have hit some good chords over the years; the challenge is recapturing that music and building a (pedagogical) symphony around it. Philosophical ideas about teachers' views of children, curriculum, teachers, and organizational structures are discussed. (MLH)

Uses both qualitative and quantitative procedures to study select "Gymnasien" in Thuringia and Bavaria. Explores the influence the Gymnasium has had on individual schools' developments. Examines how "long-term mental formations" determine the transformation process. Examines differences between the school structures of…

As individuals contemplate a new worldview of leadership education, they must step back to reflect on what now shapes and constrains leaders in schools. Their understandings of traditional leadership are rooted in organizational theory that is focused on rationality, effectiveness, and efficiency of bureaucratic institutions, defining the…

In the Netherlands, the constitutional freedom of education offers the opportunity for the growing number of Muslims to establish state-funded Islamic schools. At the moment there are 46 Islamic primary schools; a number of schools are in the process of being established and there is still a need for an additional 120 such schools. Right from the…