Implementation and Performance in New American Schools


Book Description

As a private nonprofit corporation, New American Schools (NAS) began in 1991 to fund the development of designs aimed at transforming entire schools at the elementary and secondary levels. This report describes trends in implementation, school performance, and related factors for a sample of NAS schools. It is based on a three-year longitudinal study of these schools.




Facing the Challenges of Whole-School Reform


Book Description

About a decade ago, New American Schools (NAS) set out to address theperceived lagging performance of American students and the lacklusterresults of school reform efforts. As a private nonprofit organization,NAS's mission was-and is-to help schools and districts raise studentachievement levels by using whole-school designs and design team assistanceduring implementation. Since its inception, NAS has engaged in adevelopment phase (1992-1993), a demonstration phase (1993-1995), and ascale-up phase (1995-present). Over the last ten years, RAND has been monitoring the progress of the NASinitiative. This book is a retrospective on NAS and draws together thefindings from RAND research. The book underscores the significantcontributions made by NAS to comprehensive school reform but also highlightsthe challenges of trying to reform schools through whole-school designs.Divided into sections on each research phase, the book concludes with anafterword by NAS updating its own strategy for the future. This book willinterest those who want to better understand comprehensive school reform andits effects on teaching and learning within high-stakes accountabilityenvironments.




System-wide Efforts to Improve Student Achievement


Book Description

Strong system-wide support is increasingly being identified as laying an important role in policy efforts aimed at increasing student achievement (Hightower, Knapp, March, and McLaughlin: 2002). Yet current research often views district and other system-wide support as largely governance changes without substantive linkage to school improvement outcomes (Cuban and Usdan: 2003). In this volume we seek to deepen our understanding of the role of school districts and system-wide initiatives through a series of case studies that focus on how school districts and system-wide actors facilitate policy innovation and reform initiatives that are designed to improve student achievement. Through both quantitative and qualitative studies from diverse settings across the country, chapters in this volume examine the role of instructional technology, alternative accountability practices, management and partnership reforms, and school improvement efforts through new incentive and support practices. While challenges remain, these case studies demonstrate how districts support and facilitate school change aimed at improving student achievement.




A Nation at Risk


Book Description

This special issue examines the underlying assumptions of the "A Nation At Risk" report, the context within which the Commission's work was situated, and the effects of the report in improving teaching and learning, as well as the performance of the public educational system. The purpose is to address three broad questions: Was America's education system really putting the nation at risk in the early 1980s? What is the legacy of "A Nation At Risk"? Given our current knowledge on education and human development, the report's overall concern is restated: What risks and opportunities lay before the nation today, and how will they affect the notion of a "learning society" and our public education system? Taken as a whole, the seven articles address the three broad issues identified regarding the past, current, and future of educational reform in the United States.




Expanding the Reach of Education Reforms: Perspectives from Leaders in the Scale-Up of Educational Interventions


Book Description

How does one spread a successful educational reform? The essays here recount the authors?' experiences with the scale-up process. Among their lessons are the importance of building the capacity to implement and sustain the reforms, adjusting for local culture and policy, ensuring quality control, providing the necessary infrastructure, and fostering a sense of ownership. The process is iterative and complex and requires cooperation among many actors who must ensure that the results align with goals.




Selected Rand Abstracts


Book Description

Includes publications previously listed in the supplements to the Index of selected publications of the Rand Corporation (Oct. 1962-Feb. 1963).




Second Handbook of Research on Mathematics Teaching and Learning


Book Description

The audience remains much the same as for the 1992 Handbook, namely, mathematics education researchers and other scholars conducting work in mathematics education. This group includes college and university faculty, graduate students, investigators in research and development centers, and staff members at federal, state, and local agencies that conduct and use research within the discipline of mathematics. The intent of the authors of this volume is to provide useful perspectives as well as pertinent information for conducting investigations that are informed by previous work. The Handbook should also be a useful textbook for graduate research seminars. In addition to the audience mentioned above, the present Handbook contains chapters that should be relevant to four other groups: teacher educators, curriculum developers, state and national policy makers, and test developers and others involved with assessment. Taken as a whole, the chapters reflects the mathematics education research community's willingness to accept the challenge of helping the public understand what mathematics education research is all about and what the relevance of their research fi ndings might be for those outside their immediate community.




Examining Comprehensive School Reform


Book Description

Urban school reformers for decades have tried to improve educational outcomes for underserved and disadvantaged students, with the assistance of constantly evolving federal and state policies. In recent years, education policies have shifted from targeting individual students to developing universal standards for teaching and learning, and comprehensive school reform (CSR) has emerged as an effective key model. The federal CSR program seeks to support the implementation of comprehensive school reform, especially in high-poverty schools, and to improve efforts to help all children meet challenging academic standards. Schools that receive federal CSR funds must adopt approaches that comply with the No Child Left Behind Act (NCLB). This book provides a series of studies and reflections on CSR by leading experts in the field.




IJER Vol 14-N1


Book Description

The mission of the International Journal of Educational Reform (IJER) is to keep readers up-to-date with worldwide developments in education reform by providing scholarly information and practical analysis from recognized international authorities. As the only peer-reviewed scholarly publication that combines authors’ voices without regard for the political affiliations perspectives, or research methodologies, IJER provides readers with a balanced view of all sides of the political and educational mainstream. To this end, IJER includes, but is not limited to, inquiry based and opinion pieces on developments in such areas as policy, administration, curriculum, instruction, law, and research. IJER should thus be of interest to professional educators with decision-making roles and policymakers at all levels turn since it provides a broad-based conversation between and among policymakers, practitioners, and academicians about reform goals, objectives, and methods for success throughout the world. Readers can call on IJER to learn from an international group of reform implementers by discovering what they can do that has actually worked. IJER can also help readers to understand the pitfalls of current reforms in order to avoid making similar mistakes. Finally, it is the mission of IJER to help readers to learn about key issues in school reform from movers and shakers who help to study and shape the power base directing educational reform in the U.S. and the world.




Leadership Lessons from Comprehensive School Reforms


Book Description

The process of understanding a text from the narrator s point of view is crucial for the tasks of interpreting and translating the Bible. If the translator s understanding of a narrative from the narrator s point of view is erroneous, then the whole process of translating the message into another language may also fall into error. This poses Bible translators a difficult challenge: How can we understand the narrator s point of view of the biblical stories which are culturally, geographically, and historically remote from our own? Understanding a text from the narrator s point of view must precede the translation process. In this work Hankore presents an argument for the intended utterance of Genesis 28:10 35:15 before proposing in brief how to translate it. By following this process, Hankore shows that a correct understanding of the concept of the ancient Israelite vow in the framework of a social institution is fundamental to reading and translating Genesis 28:10 35:15, and goes on to show how this same votive framework assist an explanation of the relevance of Genesis 34 to the Jacob story.