Discusses organizational development and its importance to the competitive community college. Suggests new tactics to renew colleges by changing competencies, redesigning structures and systems, and developing new alliances. Closes with a basic design that emphasizes narrowing the gap between a college's current core values and future…

Describes the program at Carter G. Woodson elementary school, Baltimore (MD), an urban school serving many at-risk students which has adopted the curriculum and techniques of the Calvert School, a predominantly white, selective private school. There have been readily observable and measurable gains in academic achievement at the public school.…

Discusses the content and impact of the Kentucky Education Reform Act (KERA) of 1990, which redesigned the state's education system, including new finance, governance, and accountability mechanisms. Although funding differences between school districts declined, the basic proportions of allocations changed very little. The KERA strategy appears…

The first year of shared governance in a Canadian urban elementary school and the responses of the school's 14 teachers to the system of equal rights and responsibilities for teachers and the principal were described. Shared governance worked well, although not without conflict, but the group eventually used shared governance to resolve conflicts.…

Describes a state-sponsored pilot project to facilitate the quality of organizational change within Florida schools and districts. Guided by quality standards fashioned after national Baldridge criteria, the project is a partnership venture between the University of South Florida and 13 West-Central Regional Leadership Network districts, which…

School legislation is often designed to alter the fundamental structure of the public education system. Article describes elements of charter-school legislation and provides examples of strong and weak laws. Discusses California's experience to date with charter schools, issues to consider when assessing the implications of charter-reform…

Advocates standards-based teacher assessment linked with school reform as a system for building the capacity of elementary teachers. Suggests that linking teaching standards with student standards focuses and coordinates state reforms to address knowledge, skills, and abilities needed by teachers to enhance student learning. Examines a program in…

The Kentucky Family Resource Centers developed under the Kentucky Educational Reform Act are described as examples of the school-linked service movement. The lessons learned in the development of the centers and policy issues that need to be addressed by both education and social services to assure continued development of this movement are…

One of five articles in the section on the "Promise and Purpose of Professional Development Schools," this article discusses the inherent institutional forces that work to counteract attempts at influential change. The paper reports on the establishment of a PDS program in a school/university partnership at Indiana State University,…

Facility planning can be a catalyst for restructuring education by coordinating technology throughout the entire curriculum anticipated for the school. Describes a major high school renovation in Snoqualmie Valley, Washington, where a teacher-developed science curriculum became the basis for restructuring science and technology during the facility…

Describes events leading to the establishment of four urban professional development schools (PDS) by the University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee and the Milwaukee Public Schools. School sites, university/school district interaction, preservice student activities, and schoolwide change projects are described. Results of a survey of site teachers on PDS…

Examines the visions for the redesign of schools and the ways in which computers and communications technology have provided the means for these visions. Highlights include changes in instructional practices, including collaborative learning and interdisciplinary themes; change agents in the redesign of schools; and school organization and…

This article describes the Pathfinder Project, an Arizona project which serves adjudicated youth in an alternative placement based on a "Success School" model of the school as a learning organization with high emphasis on community service, individual goals, work-study, coaching for success, and group counseling. (DB)

Cooperative Integrated Reading and Composition was implemented with elementary school regular, remedial, and special education students as an approach for organizing reading and language arts instruction. Compared to a control school, the experimental school found significant effects on reading vocabulary, total reading, and language scores but…

Magnet schools were created as a result of the failure of mandatory desegregation plans, but the magnet schools concept has spawned the ideas of controlled parent choice of schools and the chartering of public education. Implementation of the Goals 2000 Act could jeopardize trends magnet schools have set in motion. (SLD)