In the literature, discussions of staff development (as a top-down decision-making model) have shifted to teacher-centered professional growth. Components include teachers as learners, reflective decisionmakers, collaborators, and accountability experts. Creating a culture of learning and involving teachers in strategic decision making are…

Identifies ways in which practices and attitudes work against the prevention of emotional and behavioral disorders in students. These include an overriding concern for labels and stigma, objections to a medical model and failure-driven services, a preference for false negatives over false positives, proposals for a "paradigm shift," and statements…

Schools in the Eugene, Oregon, area are participating in the Peaceable Educational Practices (PEP) project, which identifies research-based best practices for reducing school violence. Three general strategies include school data collection, schoolwide policies and programs, and tailoring strategies to the school. PEP schools have seen a dramatic…

Critics feel education scholarship lacks rigor and a practical focus on achievement, wasting substantial resources. Research on effectiveness of educational reforms is often weak, inconclusive, or simply inadequate, and good scholarship may have little influence on classroom practice. Popular policies often persist despite strong research evidence…

Describes the way in which Wilfrid Laurier University (Ontario), an institution that had worked hard to improve its programs and reputation, addressed a disappointing ranking in a national news magazine. In cooperation with other educators, administrators, and institutional researchers, the university undertook a successful project to have the…

Discusses the needs of incarcerated mothers for child welfare services. Explores why working with women in jail and their children is within the scope of the child welfare system's mandate. Describes pressures on criminal justice and child welfare systems that prevent either from working effectively with these families; suggests a collaborative…

Presents an evaluation of a multimedia training program, supported by a videoconference link, for senior secondary school staff in the use of a computer-based management information system and the subsequent impact on the school organization. Discusses change strategies, implementation, and implications for the design and delivery of professional…

Surveyed urban classroom teachers to investigate their temporal orientation, attitudes toward school change and reform, and time investment behaviors. Data from self-report surveys indicated that there were major differences in teachers' temporal orientations and willingness to participate in school reform activities across age and across gender…

Summarizes proceedings of a 1-day seminar co-sponsored by NAMTA and Taliesin West, home of the Frank Lloyd Wright School of Architecture. Discusses authentic progress in educational practices such as those of Maria Montessori and Wright, whose innovative legacies became traditions within their fields. Concludes that innovation comes when founding…

Faced with pupil flight to more prestigious public and private schools, French secondary schools create "good classes," reinforce security and discipline, and try to strengthen links to feeder schools. Parents remain skeptical about relevant criteria for judging school quality; measures are needed to equalize their choosing ability.…

An administrative team member/restructuring facilitator analyzes the failure of a block scheduling reform in a small, suburban district. The prevailing dynamics that obstructed success were fear of change, propagandizing of data, and a culture of complacency. These problems could have been avoided by training staff to work in longer periods,…

Universities can benefit from the experiences of corporations that have "reinvented" themselves in the past decade. Corporations did this by identifying their basic missions, disposing of or deemphasizing activities not essential to those missions, paring down institutional bureaucracies, and forming alliances with other corporations to share…

Discusses new strategies for conceptualizing teacher effectiveness at the elementary/secondary levels, to be used as a basis for improving the usefulness of research on teacher effectiveness. The aim is to shift away from one-dimensional assessment of individual teachers toward a multidimensional approach that can inform improvement of both…

Higher education financing in Europe is undergoing a period of confusion and change. Five issues are noted: student participation in financing their studies is lower than optimum; upward trends in tuition/fees will continue; student financial aid systems in most countries must be rethought; tuition/fees and student aid systems must be coordinated…

Although higher education institutions have undergone substantial change in recent years, the transformation they now face will be revolutionary, not evolutionary, and will occur much faster. Campus administrators and leaders must form strategic alliances to map and guide the course of change. The more the leadership team is engaged in the…