H.R. 366, The Vocational and Technical Education for the Future Act, is intended to help states, community colleges, and other postsecondary education institutions and local educational agencies better utilize funds for vocational and technical education programs, increase accountability, emphasize student achievement, and strengthen opportunities…

Faculty, instructional staff, and assessment professionals are interested in student outcomes assessment processes and tools that can be used to improve learning experiences and academic programs. How can students' skills be assessed effectively? What assessments measure skills in communication? Leadership? Information literacy? Quantitative…

Education funding today is a mess, and a solution is needed that addresses its biggest problems: most disadvantaged students do not receive the funding they need; red tape and overhead waste time and money; and new types of education options, like charter schools, are starved for dollars. Unfortunately, until now, so-called solutions have…

This paper asserts that California's system of education funding is rife with waste. A state commission found that the system was "convoluted--driving up administrative costs, diverting attention from educational concerns, and depriving the public of readily accessible, comparative information." The paper suggests that the California…

Since the 1960s, the world has undergone transformations in trade, industry, and technology. Some assert that the postmodern society needs organizational structures that allow for diversity, instability, unpredictability, and mobility. However, this paper argues that the headlong rush toward such organizational forms may well encourage the…

In 1999, Illinois enacted a tuition tax credit program. Tax credit supporters suggest tax credits help low-income students. However, opponents argue that they disproportionately benefit higher-income families whose children are already attending private schools and may decrease already limited resources available to public schools. New data from…

This document is a chapter in "The Principles and Practice of Educational Management," which aims to provide a systematic and analytical introduction to the study of educational management. The structure of the book reflects the main substantive areas of educational leadership and management, and most of the major themes are covered in the…

This paper presents the results of the first year evaluation of a 2-year project, "Comprehensive Accountability, Professional Development, and Assessment System for the Tri-County Charter School Partnership." This partnership of five charter schools was working to develop a replicable and comprehensive accountability system for each of…

This guide summarizes the accountability requirements of Title I of the No Child Left Behind Act (NCLB), presenting a five-step process to help states decide whether schools are making adequate yearly progress (AYP): states determine what all students should know and be able to do; states calculate the starting point for AYP; states set specific…

This paper examines accountability in public and private schools. It discusses the considerable authority the state has to regulate all schools, whether public or private, and focuses on how state constitutions constrain the states' ability to delegate to private actors the responsibility and funding for public education without accompanying…

This paper discusses the legal implications of "Zelman v. Simmons-Harris," the Supreme Court ruling on education vouchers. The ruling opens the way for vouchers, as concerns the federal judiciary, but the decision did not abrogate many states' restrictive provisions regarding publicly funded voucher and tax-benefit programs. Nor did the decision…

This paper presents national 2000-01 data from charter schools and charter-school authorizers in the United States regarding the various stages of the accountability process: the charter application stage, the monitoring stage, and the sanctions stage. The larger accountability context of public schools and its impact on charter schools are also…

This study had two broad goals: to discuss state politics and accountability policies in Virginia and Georgia before the No Child Left Behind (NCLB) Act and to analyze the civil rights implications of NCLB's accountability requirements for future policy decisions. Part 1 describes previous policies and governance arrangements and how these factors…

Texas has apparently achieved great success in closing the gap between advantaged and disadvantaged students, at least in the lower grades. Texas students in all grades have made substantial gains on the Texas Assessment of Academic Skills (TAAS). The effect of TAAS-type accountability on student performance in the higher grades is important,…

This paper presents a family of studies associated with a large-scale evaluation conducted to assess the impact of research-based models and promising strategies on non-cognitive and cognitive school indicators. In a partnership between community-based organizations and a large urban public school district, project SHIELD provided services to…