Many features of our secondary schools are static, self-destructive, and depersonalizing. Rather than organizing the middle school along secondary school lines, using the elementary school model, with some obvious modifications, provides a more humanistic approach. (Author/SJL)

Undergraduates rated their affective reactions to hypothetical test failures under conditions of high or low effort and in the presence or absence of self-servicing excuses. Then, in the role of teachers, they administered punishment to hypothetical students under the same failure conditions. Results were interpreted using self-worth theory.…

The author argues that failing grades and grade repetition harm students and should be removed from the middle school. He presents a grading system of A-B-C-Incomplete which would eliminate grade repetition, encourage individualized instruction, and promote student self-esteem. (SJL)

Compared aptitude, vocational, and personality measures of high school dropouts with those of a normative population. Also studied the relative contribution of selected variables to achievement. Suggests that achievement motivation, social class, and the institutional impact of the school must be examined to identify reasons for academic failure.…

Using as a case study an attempted change in student evaluation and reporting procedures in a junior high school, this paper proposes an analytic framework that identifies specific organizational features which impede the innovation process. (SJL)

Following a mathematics test, 134 sixth-graders from different social class/national origin groups, were asked to attribute causality for their success or failure. All groups tended to attribute success more to internal than external causes and more to stable than unstable causes. Attributions of failure varied between the groups. (Author/SJL)

Discusses failure of the civil war prison at Andersonville in terms of administrative problems. Failure is blamed on lack of clear channels of authority and communications. Correction of these organizational problems laid the groundwork for a system that would meet its goals. A flowchart is presented. (JAC)

Fifth-grade boys of relatively good, average, and poor reading ability were assessed on tasks in which success and failure were manipulated. Consistent with predictions, poor readers displayed characteristics indicative of learned helplessness and low self-concepts of ability, including low expectations and less persistence. (Instructional…

To examine the possibility that teacher variables affect school integration results, this article reviews the literature on minority children and teacher attitudes and behavior. This literature indicates that biased assessments (unfavorable attitudes, qualitatively inferior instructional behavior, and lower expectations) are made of minority or…

An achievement situation describing two children successfully and unsuccessfully performing task in competitive, cooperative, and individualistic reward structures was presented to 400 children across five grade levels. Results showed that different evaluative beliefs about the concepts of ability and reward allocation were associated with each…

Professor Donald C. Orlich of Washington State University charges that, with few exceptions, the hundreds of research and development projects funded by the federal government since 1953 have brought no significant improvement in instruction. He is especially critical of the Experimental Schools Program. (Author/SJL)

As achievement in basic reading declines, the content validity of tests in special subjects may be reduced because examinees cannot read the test items. This study found that reading ability and item format affected test scores in the area of health science for a sample of high school students. (Author/JKS)

A workable rationale for educational innovation should center around nationally and regionally coordinated research, development, and dissemination; a local network of experimental schools linked to regional and national centers; a larger network of dissemination schools for "road testing" innovations; and comprehensive training programs for staff…

Rather than waiting for youngsters interest to flag in school, 12 Illinois school districts screen children for learning deficiencies before they're in Kindergarten. (Editor)

Reviews popular literature-based propositions pertaining to student retention and non-retention. Surveys the scope of the problem of retention and suggests that retaining a child so as to repeat an unsuccessful experience is inappropriate, whereas retaining a child and using resources to correct well-documented, individual problems is appropriate.…