A free school for teachers gives participants an alternative to traditional programs: innovations are practiced, not preached; modules meet participant-identified needs; and objectives, learning activities, and evaluation criteria are delivered a week in advance. (Completion of five modules earns an increment credit applying to a teacher's salary…

Alternative organizations such as food co-ops and free schools are committed to working in an egalitarian, participatory-democratic fashion. Like bureaucratic organizations, however, they encounter various problems of power. The author analyzes these problems, based mainly on his experience as director of a free school. Among the dilemmas…

The purposes of this study are to determine (1) if public alternative school teachers' perceptions of their instructional practices differ significantly from those of teachers in conventional schools in the same district and (2) if public alternative school students' perceptions of teaching practices in their school differ significantly from those…

Outlined are the components of Project ADVANCE, a behavior modification program for severely emotionally disturbed children (14 to 20 years old); reported are results of a questionnaire sent to parents of children enrolled in Project ADVANCE; and summarized are data on the academic achievement of Project ADVANCE participants. Among the program…

A discussion of factors associated with evaluation of proposed alternative educational systems is presented in brief form. Emphasis is given to enumeration of critical characteristics serving as the basis of comparison, examination of alternative systems in terms of each characteristic, and determination based on the comparison as to whether the…

Analyzes findings of a 1972 survey of 1,767 University of California students to determine the magnitude and structure of desire for non-traditional study programs. Discusses implications of the findings which revealed a negative view of established forms and modes and a desire for greater time and space flexibility in access. (JT)

In order to try to explain the success of street academies, descriptions of such schools from both the popular and professional literature are used to develop an analysis of typical program characteristics; suggest less obvious possible reasons for success which are usually not cited and speculate on one global program characteristic that may be…

Describes an alternative career education program for high school seniors where independent study contracts send students into the community to explore careers and seek information as volunteer workers. (DW)

Culmination of a 3 week social studies unit on U.S. pioneers and westward expansion involved a weekend trip by wagon train for 5th graders in South Windsor, Connecticut. (JC)

Philadelphia's School for All Ages increases contact among members of various age groups and of different generations. A college modulemobile makes learning easy to pick up in Grand Rapids, Michigan. (Author/MLF)

In an effort to insure that medical technologists prepared for their careers through nontraditional educational offerings are at least as competent as those graduated from traditional programs, the American Society for Medical Technology has defined the term "nontraditional education" for its own use, categorized the educational…

This report on the role of the arts in progressive and experimental education suggests that, despite certain notable exceptions, alternative schools have traded the old formalism for a new disorder that is unfriendly to some (though not all) elements of successful arts instruction: critical self-consciousness, periodic solitude, and stringent…

The open school concept used as an alternative to more traditional forms of schooling in selected elementary and secondary schools in Austin, Texas, includes seven major dimensions: individualized instruction, continuous progress of students, team teaching, multiage and multigrade grouping, differentiated staffing, open space classrooms and…

A project to develop a school within a school at the Model Secondary School for the Deaf is described. It is explained that 20 students were scheduled for the minischool for 14 to 17 hours per week of flexible grouping according to needs and styles of learning. Interdisciplinary teaming formed the backbone of the program. Five chapters concentrate…