This article responds to Poutiatine's (2009) "What is Transformational?: Nine Principles Toward an Understanding Transformational Process for Transformational Leadership" by relating home schooling environments as lab schools for developing transformational leaders. Although many families select home schooling for improved academic progress or…

The United Nations International Children's Emergency Fund (UNICEF) and the United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization (UNESCO) Institute for Statistics (UIS) launched the joint Global Initiative on Out-of-School Children in 2010 to accelerate efforts towards the goal of universal primary education by 2015. The goal of the…

The English Language Arts Common Core State Standards (ELA CCSS) come at a time when many reading teachers, literacy coaches, and classroom teachers seek more extensive literacy practices than the policy mandates of No Child Left Behind and Reading First. These initiatives placed requirements for instruction in core aspects of reading at the…

Effective leaders must find ways to motivate their employees to provide maximum success for the organization. In today's world of high accountability, this ability is paramount to the success and survival of schools, and is an especially important skill for early career principals to master. Knowledge of the factors that might have contributed to…

"What if?" might be the most powerful question in education. NAESP and Crayola challenge schools with that question every year in their Champion Creatively Alive Children grant competition. Schools are encouraged to ask questions such as: What if arts-infused learning thrived every day in schools? What if schools relied more on project-based…

Becoming a champion of arts education means establishing a culture that embraces a team approach toward integrating the arts. This article offers some practical guidance for developing a creative leadership team--and cultivating creativity in the whole school.

Without a doubt the authors' proposal of viewing gifted education in systemic terms is a promising one. In fact, it is most refreshing to read something eclectic like this with an aim to synthesize a field of research and practice which for too long has lacked consensus in both practice and theory. The author agrees with them that a mechanistic…

Effective leadership is on everyone's mind this presidential election year as the country's citizens look for a strong candidate to guide them through the next four years. Effective leadership is just as critical in the nation's school districts where people prepare their young people to be the global citizens of tomorrow. In most school…

For many school districts in the United States, making the transition to the Common Core State Standards (CCSS) is proving to be a challenge at a time when they are already facing many obstacles, not the least of which is dwindling financial resources. A change of this magnitude cannot be made haphazardly; to be successful in its goal of helping…

As he prepares to leave for National American University (NAU), Dr. John E. Roueche, the longtime director of the Community College Leadership Program (CCLP) at the University of Texas (UT) at Austin, is criticizing the direction of the program that he helped develop. Roueche is concerned that at a time when community college enrollment is…

This volume focuses on learning communities at the beginning and at the culmination of work in the major of psychology and reflects a commitment to good practice both within and outside the classroom. Its comprehensive approach attests to the power of learning communities within the discipline and is a fine example of their evolution. In this…

This commentary is part of an ongoing dialogue that began in the October 2011 special issue of "Performance Improvement"--Exploring a Universal Performance Model for HPT: Notes From the Field. The performance improvement/HPT (human performance technology) model represents a unifying process that helps accomplish successful change, create…

The role of community in child and adolescent development is emerging as a significant area of theoretical inquiry, research, and application. This article describes the development and utilization of a comprehensive community change effort designed to increase the attention of all community members toward strengthening core developmental…

Homelessness is a serious and growing issue. Evaluations of systemic-level changes are needed to determine progress in reducing or ending homelessness. The report card methodology is one means of systems-level assessment. Rather than solely establishing an enumeration, homelessness report cards can capture pertinent information about structural…

The publication of Anya Kamenetz's "DIY U: Edupunks, Edupreneurs, and the Coming Transformation of Higher Education" (Chelsea Green Publishing, 2010) caused quite a splash in the higher ed community. If, as she advocates, highly motivated students can access quality online coursework for free--if they can create their own learning paths based on…