"Harvard Education Letter" is published bimonthly by the Harvard Graduate School of Education. This issue of "Harvard Education Letter" contains the following articles: (1) The Road to School Improvement: It's Hard, It's Bumpy, and It Takes as Long as It Takes (Richard F. Elmore and Elizabeth A. City); (2) Better Teaching with Web Tools: How…

In this testimony Celia Hagert, senior policy analyst for the Center for Public Policy Priorities, testifies in support of CSHB 454, which relates to the provision of free lunch and breakfast to all enrolled students in certain school districts and campuses. Houston Independent School District (HISD) started serving free breakfast to all students…

This paper highlights some of the enduring dichotomies that prevail in Australia regarding the most effective way to teach literacy. These contrastive positions are often used by policymakers and the media to construct the view that teachers are failing to teach literacy well. In uncovering some of the polemical positions taken on literacy…

Approximately half of children and adolescents who are socially unpopular are not aggressive. Some voluntarily isolate themselves from the peer group, whereas others are intentionally excluded and often victimized. Although school social workers regularly provide services to this population, there is little reported research on effective…

A Clemson University introductory landscape design class collaborated with South Carolina Botanical Gardens (SCBG) staff and coordinators of Sprouting Wings to design an exploratory Children's Garden within the SCBG. Service learning provides students with invaluable real-world experiences solving problems and interacting with clients while…

Much attention is currently being paid to rising rates of obesity, especially among youth. In this context, garden-based education can have a role in improving public health. A qualitative study conducted at the Brooklyn Botanic Garden (BBG) Children's Garden provides supporting evidence for the claim that growing vegetables can improve the…

As students who have difficulty in acquiring the basic processes in reading are significantly disadvantaged in later schooling, there is a need for effective interventions for young at-risk students. Reading Recovery is the most widely known and extensively promoted intervention for young struggling readers. However, serious reservations have been…

Teachers possess several strategies to fine-tune their purposive interactions to children's needs. Our study investigates which strategies teachers use in their goal oriented interactions with pupils, whether differentiation is perceptible in the way they interact with children whom they define as "children at risk" as compared to the…

Background/Context: Policy documents such as Title I of the No Child Left Behind Act [NCLB] (2001) direct schools and school systems to funnel resources to students based on their socioeconomic and linguistic status, as well as according to performance on standardized measures of achievement. Such conversations in the US about serving "at…

Successful music education programs pay special attention to the national standard components and are generally able to service at-risk students with music classes that, when consistently attended, serve as venues for building self-esteem and social skills as well as improving behavior. However, not all at-risk students receive music instruction.…

Under the No Child Left Behind Act, states have been required to set minimum proficiency standards that virtually all students must meet by 2014. Sanctions of increasing severity are to be applied to schools that fail to meet interim targets, known as Adequate Yearly Progress (AYP). The authors examine the effect of this legislation using…

In the fall of 2005 the principal and teachers at Knickerbacker Middle School (KMS) were worried. KMS was a "School in Good Standing" but had not hit federal or state benchmarks because of low subgroup scores on the English Language Arts (ELA) test--especially scores received by economically disadvantaged students, about half of this…

This case study covers a wide variety of challenges facing administrators as they make an effort to improve the learning environments of impoverished communities. It may be used in an introductory course for aspiring school leaders and practitioners in the eld of school leadership. This case also presents myriad complex organizational issues that…

This paper presents questions and answers regarding college access and success. These questions include: (1) What is the "achievement gap" and how serious is it?; (2) Is college the best option for all students? If not, why prepare all youth for college?; (3) Can we afford to send everyone to college?; (4) What prevents students from going to…

In spite of mission statements which articulate respect and value for all students, at individual, institutional, and systemic levels, educators make choices on an ongoing basis which reinforce existing hegemonic structures. These include larger societal forces; curriculum and the structures of schools; and attitudes, dispositions, and…