A collective case study methodology is used to explore how high school turnaround principals leveraged the professional development of teachers to raise student achievement. The study also sought to capture the characteristics of the professional development programs principals implemented. Interview data were collected from five turnaround…

States that receive federal waivers to the No Child Left Behind Act were required to implement reforms in designated "Focus Schools" that contribute to achievement gaps. We examine the performance effects of such "differentiated accountability" reforms in Louisiana. These Focus School reforms emphasized school-needs assessments…

States that receive federal waivers to the No Child Left Behind Act were required to implement reforms in designated "Focus Schools" that contribute to achievement gaps. We examine the performance effects of such "differentiated accountability" reforms in Louisiana. These Focus School reforms emphasized school-needs assessments…

The community school model is rooted in John Dewey's (1902) conceptualization of the public school as a hub for the community. This work has evolved over a hundred years and recently experienced prominence in the public eye as a fundamental component of New York City's school turnaround policy. This dissertation describes findings and…

The federal School Improvement Grant (SIG) program allocated US$7 billion over nearly a decade in an effort to produce rapid and lasting improvements in schools identified as low performing. In this article, we use a regression discontinuity design to estimate the effect of Ohio's SIG turnaround efforts on student achievement and school…

According to Duncan and Murnane (2011. "Introduction: The American Dream, Then and Now." In "Whither Opportunity?: Rising Inequality, Schools, and Children's Life Chances," edited by Greg J. Duncan, and Richard J. Murnane, 3-25. New York: Russell Sage Foundation), questions about teachers' commitment to schools that primarily…

Turning around low-performing schools is hard. Strategies financed by federal dollars have shown disappointing results, and states have avoided fundamental reforms even as they hired specialists and retrained school staff. State leaders can adopt or adapt three approaches already in use if they want to go beyond cosmetic remedies for troubled…

Teacher turnover has a significant effect on the overall success of schools. The use of comprehensive turnaround strategies such as the conservatorship process created a problem for a small Southeastern high school by affecting teacher retention rate. A qualitative approach was used to investigate how aspects of turnaround strategies influenced…

Improving student performance in America's chronically underperforming schools has been a challenge for many decades. Despite various school reforms, little to no progress has been shown. Schools have continued to fail, and achievement gaps have widened. The current state of schools has called for a drastic intervention. School turnaround has…

Attracting and retaining teachers can be an important ingredient in improving low-performing schools. In this study, we estimate the expressed preferences for teachers who have worked in low-performing schools in Tennessee. Using adaptive conjoint analysis survey design, we examine three types of school attributes that may influence teachers'…

The purpose of this study was to assess the effectiveness of Uncommon Schools in a turnaround setting. Uncommon was awarded a 2016 grant from the U.S. Department of Education's Investing in Innovation Fund (i3) to support TurnNJ, a project intended to support Uncommon's whole-school turnaround efforts in Camden and Newark, New Jersey. The study…

Numerous high-profile efforts have sought to "turn around" low-performing schools. Evidence on the effectiveness of school turnarounds, however, is mixed, and research offers little guidance on which models are more likely to succeed. We present a mixed-methods case study of turnaround efforts led by the Blueprint Schools Network in…

The latest edition of the Thomas B. Fordham Foundation's sponsorship annual report highlights our work during the 2021-22 school year, overseeing twelve schools that served 5,500 students in four Ohio cities. We value this opportunity to keep stakeholders and the public informed about our efforts, and provide information on each of the schools…

In Australia, school leadership is influenced by neoliberal discourses of accountability and performativity. Many schools seek to balance systemic pressures that narrow outcome expectations with a desire to deliver schooling in the broad interests of the students and communities that they serve. In this case, the principal was appointed to a…

With the passage of the Every Student Succeeds Act, states have increased latitude over school improvement and accountability policies. At the same time, school takeover via state-run turnaround districts has emerged as a prominent education reform. Although policies takeover influence how teachers are prepared, supported, and evaluated, little is…