An eight-year study of 49 schools purporting to practice and apply Quality Management (QM) techniques and processes uncovered some revealing differences between what respondents thought "should be" happening in these schools and what they reported was happening. The gaps uncovered could be recognized as differences between rhetoric and…

Updating the 1990 edition, this book emphasizes the importance of designing public relations programs around the needs and problems of the school and its special publics. The book approaches the subject from the perspective that increased interest and importance is being placed on community relations skills and schools, suggesting that two…

This book details a system for evaluating all training programs regardless of their instructional style, method, or format. In the introduction the relationship between high quality training and total customer satisfaction, types of training subject to quality problems, and ways of ensuring the quality of training are discussed. The remainder of…

This paper chronicles ongoing alterations to the organizational structure of the acquisitions department at Pennsylvania State University using the tenets of total quality management (TQM). The movement toward reorganizing for process improvement began in late 1992 when the associate dean of libraries called the acquisitions department together to…

Quality-improvement principles are a sound means to respond to customer needs. However, when various quality and productivity theories and methods are applied, it is very difficult to consistently deliver quality results, especially in quasi-monopolistic, non-competitive, and regulated environments. This book focuses on quality-improvement methods…

This monograph summarizes the current thinking in the national literature on the subject of cost-containment and productivity in higher education and applies findings to higher education in California. It presents a framework for characterizing the major factors driving higher education costs, outlines potentially promising areas in identifying…

A study was conducted to provide vocational educators with resources regarding implementation of Total Quality Management (TQM). Data were gathered through development of a bibliography of resources; a survey of all Oklahoma vocational-technical schools regarding specific industries in their area using TQM components (10 responses); and site…

This paper examines how the concepts of strategic planning, assessment, and Total Quality Management fit together and relate to one another in the field of higher education. Central to the explanation of how these topics are related is the Japanese philosophy of Kaizen, a driving force behind the quality improvement movement in that country. The…

This paper describes some lessons learned from the first 2 years of Total Quality Management (TQM) implementation at the Coast Guard Academy (New London, Connecticut). Key issues for TQM adoption at the Academy included leadership, training, organization, total involvement, and measurement. It was found that top management must define the…

Workshops and related staff development activities designed for vocational education instructors, administrators, career counselors, and support services staff are described in this two-part report. Part I focuses on the Vocational Staff Workshops (VSW) project, indicating that its key objectives were to identify regional in-service training…

This annotated bibliography is part of a three-part report on creating high performing schools through organizational and individual learning. It includes such topics as: teachers supporting teachers; educational improvement via total quality management; overcoming barriers to organizational change; the institutionalization of public schools;…

A teacher describes how the staff at his junior high school, and particularly his ninth-grade team, worked on continuous improvement in three ways: restructuring the working roles and relationships among staff; restructuring the working roles and relationships between staff and students; and merging systemic advancements and education philosophy…

These four papers are from a symposium that was facilitated by Toni Powell on the change process in organizations at the 1995 Academy of Human Resource Development (HRD) conference. "The Effectiveness of Change Agents as Affected by Strategic Interactions" (Marie A. George) explores the nature of strategic interactions exhibited by a chief…

This curriculum guide resulted from a project conducted to: (1) improve the productivity and efficiency of 21 companies by providing workplace literacy instruction to workers lacking basic skills required for their jobs; and (2) to improve the capability of educational providers to meet the basic skill needs of the manufacturing and financial…

This report is based on the record of three Congressional subcommittee hearings that examined: how the principles of total quality management can be used to improve schools; how companies can work with schools to assure that new workers are able to perform in a total quality environment in the workplace; and how modern computer-based educational…