Conventional thinking holds that districts and schools face a strategic decision between two fundamentally different alternatives: make or buy? The former refers to planning, designing, and enacting school-specific improvement initiatives. The latter refers to contracting with external providers of schoolwide improvement programs. However, there…

Improving the Russian economy depends in part on having well-educated and energetic personnel, and this is being hindered by universities in which there is an aging professoriate and students enrolled in specialties that are not in demand by employers. Higher education is expected not only to conduct programs of specialist training in order to…

Of the cadre of non-educators--business leaders, military men, government officials, lawyers--who have been called on to transform large urban school districts in recent years, Paul Vallas has been at it the longest and, in the minds of many, is the one with the best track record. Since 1995, he has tackled the third- and eighth-largest districts…

Principals manage schools, ensuring that nothing interrupts business as usual. They spend little time on instruction. A good principal is the one who works in a high-achieving school that has no significant management problems. Districts celebrate improved student results by recognizing an outstanding crop of students, rarely pointing to the…

This Facilitator's Guide has been prepared for presenters of the "Language Development for English Language Learners" professional development module. It accompanies the 67-slide PowerPoint presentation with speaker's notes and contains materials to help prepare for a professional development session, including activity instructions, handouts,…

Describes an innovative program of teacher education for inner-city school teachers which views the school as a unique social system and teaches teachers to understand how their roles relate to others in the school/community. (AN)

This paper assesses the impact of cross-role grouping on the social systems of participating schools. Data were gathered informally through conversations and interviews with members of cadres, cadre presentations, liaison and research evaluation personnel in specific cadres, and direct observation in some situations. The study covers three…

An evaluation of two programs--the federally sponsored Teacher Corps and the Ford Training and Placement Program established at the University of Chicago in 1967-68--whose goal is to train teachers capable of acting as change agents in the schools indicates that they have not been successful in reaching this goal, and that school context is…

Virginia state officials selected the University of Virginia to run a training program that will let an experienced school leader earn a credential as a "turnaround specialist." This strategy, borrowed from the corporate world, is meant to form an elite cadre of school leaders that are able to jump-start improvement in low-performing…

This booklet was developed as part of the Pilot Communities Program and focuses on how to develop and use teams in schools. The first section of the book, entitled "The Groundwork for Building a Team," includes the rationale for and definition of a team and discussions of: (a) team goals and objectives and real world constraints; (b) selection of…

A project is proposed involving a 3-year coordinated program of 9-week summer institutes and school-year inservice training programs to prepare 15 graduate teachers and 15 undergraduate Indian teacher aides to perform highly specialized roles in the education of Indian children. Teachers and aides will be placed in teaching teams of at least three…

Describes the "floating faculty" program developed by the Prince George's County (Maryland) Public Schools to provide onsite inservice training for school faculties in the district through the use of specially trained personnel that make up a "faculty-without-a-school." (JG)

In Colorado, a project was developed to teach participants a collaborative planning process for staff development and to assist in the design of a system of personnel development. Areas covered included: (1) selection of cadre members; (2) participation; (3) program design; and (4) consultants' reflections. (JN)

The article summarizes recent trends of vocational education personnel development in Minnesota, Oregon, and Oklahoma--cadre training, preservice teacher education, opportunities for women, and special projects. (EA)

The Ford Training and Placement Program (FTPP) is a collaborative effort of the University of Chicago, the Chicago Public Schools, and the communities which the schools serve. The model assumes that (a) each school is a unique system characterized by institutional role sets and personalities with individual needs and (b) universities cannot…