This planning and development guide suggests that careful, comprehensive, long range planning combined with gradual program implementation and effective administrative leadership can create responsive middle school programs. Sample sequential objective charts and activity lists are included. (DCS)

Describes the successful, low-cost program for infusion of computer competencies into the curriculum of the School of Education at the University of Alaska, Anchorage, where all students are required to become computer competent prior to graduation. Computer competency goals for students in school's certification programs are outlined. (MBR)

Describes the goals and methods of the School Development Program, a model for improving academic achievement in the elementary grades, which has been implemented in a Michigan school district as part of a court-ordered desegregation plan. Emphasizes the importance of parent participation. (RDN)

A competency-based systems approach to job training is presented that ensures that trainees are taught the knowledge and skills essential for successful job performance. The procedural model for this instructional system is comprised of five phases: analyze, design, develop, implement, and control. Each phase is described in detail. (CT)

Discusses the use of coaching to establish a communal learning effort among teachers and reinforce skills introduced through inservice. Issues examined include the length of coaching, who should coach, training coaches, coaching's effects, the relationships of evaluation and supervision to coaching, the principal's role, and implementation. (MCG)

Discusses how the Lowell School District (MA) formed a partnership with a university and microcomputer manufacturer to select equipment, created a committee of administrators, teachers, and parents to oversee and implement the plan, and how the implementation efforts will be evaluated. (JN)

Describes a project that (1) developed a teacher training curriculum intervention program to create classroom environments conducive to children's literacy development, (2) ascertained the degree to which teachers were able to implement such a program, (3) discerned the observable factors which characterized implementing classrooms, and (4)…

Reviews studies concerning the management of instructional design and the proposed role for computer-based aids for the process. Problems of implementation are highlighted using a recent example of an evaluation of a computer-based course. A cost-benefit analysis of conversion to computer-based instruction and hardware is included. (Author/MBR)

Describes the Department of Technology of the Houston Independent School District's program of computer literacy to prepare teachers, administrators, and parents for the integration of microcomputers into the school district's curriculum. Training tenets, questions to consider regarding program, student, teacher, hardware, and software needs, and…

The development of free tuition policy at the City University of New York is traced, focusing on four phases of the policy cycle: initiation, implementation, evaluation, and termination. This study was intended to add to general models of the policy termination process now in circulation. (MLW)

Discusses the power that local school districts and schools exert over the eventual success or failure of state government initiatives. Analyzes three major hurdles that reform efforts must surmount at the district and school levels: affecting classroom instruction; eliciting a commitment of local resources; and becoming integrated into other…

An evaluation research capability was used to document the design and implementation of two programs in a large urban school district. This paper describes the research context, the origins of the role of resident evaluator, the broad functions of this role, and factors contributing to the usefulness of this approach. (BW)

The National Association of Manufacturers urges states, major metropolitan cities, or regional labor market areas to have a full-time, paid industry-education coordinator on the school staff. The coordinator should be responsible for conducting needs assessments among both teachers and members of the business-industry community and implementing…

Describes the design and implementation of the microcomputer network that will soon link every vocational center and comprehensive high school in West Virginia. The author discusses the advantages of networking, what equipment is used, instructional emphases, how various programs use the network, teacher training, and learner outcomes. (CT)

Describes the evolution of a phonics-basal elementary reading program in a rural New Mexico school district and the resulting improvement in reading. Notes the conditions in which changes initiated by the district and the Follow Through sponsor occurred. Explains monitoring and evaluation advances. (SB)