During the 1960s, Israel's primary schools were very dissimilar in their student-body compositions, and only half practiced ability grouping. Analysis of data on late 1960s male students reveals large contextual effects on educational outcomes in schools that did not group students and small contextual effects in schools which did. (KH)

Student privacy rights and the increase in student violence present conflict of interests in schools. The effects of Family Educational Rights and Privacy Act of 1974 (FERPA) on this conflict are reviewed as well as liability of schools and court decisions relating to issue. The challenge to educators is to protect student privacy while providing…

Argues that urban schools, as primary instruments of cultural assimilation and social equalization, have failed urban youth. Suggests the "committed school" model as a partial solution. Warns that strong white middle-class biases reflected in curricula and teacher attitudes must be eliminated before progress can be made. (DMM)

Criticizes school policies that hamper teachers' use of new methods such as journal writing and reader response to literature because these methods have caused criticism of teachers and school administrators. Concludes that students have a right to ideas, good teaching, sharing, mistakes, and trust. (SRT)

Surveyed 1,596 adolescents to determine what sort of secondary schools they would like. The majority were happy with the status quo but expected schools to be less authoritarian concerning rules. Students wanted more say in what they learned and better student-teacher relationships. No strong desire for deschooling was indicated. (JAC)

Every student at one high school in Illinois is considered to be a winner. A program is described that motivates teachers to motivate students to achieve. The program features support and communication from administration and department heads through an ongoing schoolwide publicity campaign emphasizing motivational themes. (TE)

This paper examines the potential influences of school reform policies on the high school dropout rate, and it summaries a diverse set of reports on American education that recommend increasing academic standards in schools as a means for improving secondary school performance. (Author/LMO)

Discusses the necessity for schools to be responsive to the developmental needs of young adolescents in order to develop an effective learning environment. Analyzes the application of the Middle Grades Assessment Program to this effort, as exemplified in the case of the Francisco Middle School in San Francisco, California. (PGD)

Say Yes to Education is a scholarship guarantee program that pledges to young children and their families a fully paid, post-secondary education along with academic and social supports that follow children throughout their elementary and high school careers. Since its inception in 1987, the Say Yes to Education program has "adopted"…

Although society has changed exponentially over the past 100 years, secondary schools have remained largely static, according to Gerald Hayward, who moderated EdSource's 28th Annual Forum, "Shaking up the Status Quo: The Movement to Transform High School," held in March 2005. Calling high schools difficult, complicated, and expensive,…

This paper describes conditions and circumstances in students' family, peer, and school worlds which students perceive as creating pressures and stress powerful enough to divert their attention and interest from school. Rather than assuming that minority status, linguistic differences, part-time employment, peers and/or poverty necessarily create…

This book introduces the concept of a youth charter -- a communication strategy that can help young people understand the reactions of others to their behavior. Such charters identify a community's standards and expectations for young people's behavior and created occasions for imparting these standards and expectations to the young. The process…

The first phase of a persistence study used research as a tool to develop advice for practitioners on how to help adults persist in their studies. The study team defined persistence as adults who stay in programs for as long as they can, engage in self-directed study when they must drop out of their programs, and return to programs as soon as the…

Between 1940 and 1970, an estimated three million people left their home places in Appalachia to migrate to industrial centers in search of jobs. Many became long-time dwellers in the urban underclass. Others who found secure employment struggled with questions of identity and cultural negation and continued to consider their rural origins as…

This document compiles a series of articles from the Center for Rural Affairs monthly newsletter, January-August 1999. The series responds to public statements of some legislators, urban school board members, and others about the need to eliminate small rural schools because of their "inefficiency." Seven short articles discuss various aspects and…