During the 1997-98 school year, the Sentry Hill School District made the decision to "redesign" Clayton Elementary School after persistently low student achievement placed the district in the lowest category of the district's accountability system. This case study outlines the changes made at the school. Redesigning the school meant removing all…

This report is part of a series of special topic reports developed by the Chicago Annenberg Research Project to document key issues and problems affecting the Chicago Annenberg Challenge and the improvement of Chicago public schools in general. The report introduces the concept of instructional program coherence and explains why schools whose…

This paper provides data on the Comprehensive School Reform Demonstration (CSRD) program in the mid-continent region. Started in 1998 and part of the Mid-Continent Research for Education and Learning and Model Developers Plan, the CSRD program aims to increase student achievement by assisting schools across the country to implement successful,…

This report details what happened in Philadelphia's middle schools during the Children Achieving reform effort, a comprehensive, one-size-fits-all reform project. Based on research of the program over a 5-year period, the paper explains why reforms fell short of their intended outcomes. The critical levers for change were content standards, the…

This guide is designed to help educators make good decisions about comprehensive school reform (CSR). Since CSR takes different forms in different schools, the booklet should help schools craft a unique plan that builds on unique strengths. It emphasizes the importance of choosing carefully one or more research-based CSR models to serve as the…

Education reform based on technical and rational processes often short-circuits reform because it is uncontentious, abstract, and provides educators with no legitimate ways to question the marketplace values and policies that drive much contemporary school reform. The perspective referred to as "betterment" is an alternative reform that…

This report is based on a study that examined the effect of changing principals during a restructuring process. Data were collected at two rural elementary schools in a midsouthern state that had participated in the Accelerated Schools Project. The project's effectiveness was threatened by frequent principal succession at both schools. The schools…

This paper describes how the Accelerated Schools Model has served as a catalyst for transforming the Charter School of Education at California State University, Los Angeles. The Accelerated Schools Project has been one of the largest and most comprehensive school restructuring movements of the last decade. The focus of Accelerated Schools is…

This book is part of a series of case studies that demonstrate better ways to educate Ohio's students. The case study is part of the Transforming Learning Communities (TLC) Project, designed to support significant school-reform efforts among Ohio's elementary, middle, and high schools. This report describes the implementation of an innovative…

Few answers are to be found in the research literature about what happens to traditional academic subjects in school restructuring. This paper provides an analysis of the U.S. social studies curriculum and a description of how it has fared in the public high schools of New York City (NYC). A research project conducted during 1994, 1995, and 1996…

To gain information on how schools in the Southwestern region are implementing a new program, the staff of the Comprehensive School Reform Demonstration (CSRD) project undertook the development of a survey instrument. Based on the research on school change, the survey provides information to schools, districts, and state departments about the…

Educators design school restructuring efforts based on their beliefs about the changing global society; pressures of the business world, community, and parents; and perceived societal needs. A recent survey shows that school children's greatest concerns are divorce, money and finances, and family discord and violence. Children's voices, not…

Discusses what individual schools and teachers can do to examine their practices systematically while linking improvements to school improvement efforts at district and state levels. Action research is a refinement of the process every teacher goes through while trying to improve. Improving the education process teacher by teacher seems society's…

Summarizes a Louisiana study that asked teachers and new principals in 24 restructuring schools to assess their level of involvement in shared decision making, the kinds of information used to reach decisions, and their perceptions of various information sources' usefulness. Results showed high involvement but little valuing of information beyond…

Education researcher Gerald Bracey claims that the No Child Left Behind Act (NCLB) will result in privatization and educational vouchers because schools are expected to show regular gains in the proportion of students judged "proficient." (MLF)