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This report was generated by "people who work inside the schools and the parents of the students who study in those schools." The researchers found that national studies have failed to address directly issues of major concern for those working in the classrooms. They conducted their own study to articulate the problems of schooling by designing and using research processes that allowed members of the school community to name their experiences inside schools. Their position is that "the heretofore identified problems of schooling (lowered achievement, high dropout rates and problems in the teaching profession) are rather consequences of much deeper and more fundamental problems." The report focuses on issues of human relationships, race, culture and class, values, teaching and learning, safety, physical environment, and despair, hope, and the process of change as the major areas to be addressed in school reform.
Lezotte finds a "kinship" with W. Edward Deming's total quality management (TQM) and the basic operational tenets of the Effective Schools movement. Comparisons between the two are drawn in Part I. In Parts II and III, Lezotte lays out plans for developing and implementing a "blueprint" for the "total quality effective school."
This book documents the success that teachers across the country have had in addressing a wide variety of problems related to student achievement. Principals, teachers, and other school staff members have provided in this text short descriptions of their school demographics, the problem(s) faced, and the new practice(s) implemented, with results and comments. A contact person is listed for each new practice for those wanting to obtain additional information.
Baltimore's school board posed a question to researchers at The Center for Research on Elementary and Middle Schools (CREMS) at Johns Hopkins: "Forget about cost, about regulations, about the way we've always done things.... What would it take to see that every child in an inner-city Baltimore elementary school will succeed?" (p. 15). CREMS staff designed a program, "Success for All," with two underlying principles: (1) prevention, and (2) immediate, intensive intervention. The bulk of the article describes the program: (1) intensive, one-on-one reading tutoring; (2) ability grouping in reading; (3) individual academic plans and reading assessments; (4) half-day preschool and full-day kindergarten; (5) family support team; (6) on-site program facilitator; (7) special education; and (8) an advisory committee. Year-end evaluation showed that students in the program scored significantly higher on achievement tests than a control group. This superior performance held across grades one through three. Assessment and program revisions are still under way.
The Center presents a coordinated set of readings that elaborate on the process of implementing successful practice based on findings from Effective Schools research. Each reading is prefaced by a section that lists the rationale for its inclusion in the handbook and the goals and objectives to be met through reading the article. An extensive reference list follows each article. Topics include an overview of the history of U.S. schooling and the need for change, the research base of Effective Schools reform, leadership and empowerment, the creation and communication of a school mission, the role of the district, and building-level implementation.
Stedman criticizes the Effective Schools formula because the schools touted as effective perform below grade level and because other studies have challenged the six-factor formula. He proposes instead a new synthesis based on case studies of schools that have achieved grade-level success with low-income students. He puts forth his own nine-category formula of effective practices: ethnic and racial pluralism, parent participation, school governance shared by teachers and parents, academically rich programs, skilled use and training of teachers, personal attention to students, student responsibility for school affairs, an accepting and supportive environment, and teaching aimed at preventing academic problems. He closes his article with a warning that schools cannot serve as the sole instrument for social policy, but are only a part of a broader political agenda for revitalizing urban areas.
The authors note the problem of generalizing Effective Schools results obtained in elementary settings to secondary schools. The reliance of the research on student achievement creates problems within the high school context, which has several equally important goals--social, personal, vocational--besides academic. Salient measures for secondary schools include good discipline, lack of vandalism, and good attendance. Implementation of Effective Schools programs in high schools encounters difficulty because of decreased collaboration and increased complexity and resistance, compared with elementary schools. Secondary school teachers also find their students, who pursue their own agendas, much less malleable.
Farrar et al. propose an Effective Schools design for secondary schools, focusing on four areas: high school organization, faculty involvement, students' reactions, and parental/community involvement. They raise the issues of fragmentation and departmental conflict at the close of the article.
This often-cited article argues that Effective Schools constructs developed in elementary school contexts need to be modified when applied to secondary schools: (1) "climate"--because less agreement about teachers' role exists at the secondary level than at the elementary level, and (2) "instructional leadership," which may be more facilitative at the secondary level. Departmentalized arrangements, teachers as subject-matter specialists, and large staff sizes all militate against the type of leadership deemed effective at the elementary school level.
The authors compare staff relations in an elementary school to those of a work group, while relations at the secondary level approach those of members of a complex organization. Likewise, elementary school principals perform like head coaches of sports teams and secondary principals like chief executive officers of corporations.
The authors explore "organizational arrangements" for improving student performance in secondary schools. They are concerned about restructuring discussions that lack concrete examples, so they use specific cases of reorganized secondary schools to establish their points. They summarize the experience of several schools from around the country that are succeeding.
Levine and Eubanks conclude with an enumeration of the different kinds of changes that schools must be prepared to make to improve radically: implement strong and consistent discipline policies and alternative institutions for highly disruptive students, "leveling" of different ability groups to ensure that low-performing students achieve necessary learning skills (this contrasts with both homogeneous grouping and tracking), and insisting on and supporting higher levels of performance for students.
The core of the book is a set of five case studies of urban high schools undergoing improvement efforts in the mid-1980s. In addition, the authors present the main results of their survey of principals of 207 urban high schools attempting major reforms based on the Effective Schools literature. The primary finding from the survey is that few principals cite aspects of teaching and learning as central to their efforts; climate, discipline, and high expectations top the list of factors emphasized. In terms of effects, Effective Schools programs have greater impact on the cosmetic and administrative side of schools than on student achievement.
Following the case studies of the five high schools--two deemed successful, two struggling, and one unsuccessful--the authors extract cross-cutting themes that suggest what is needed to manage successful change efforts in urban high schools. They conclude that five issues are key: the history of the school and its current relationship to the district (change is facilitated when the district is less bureaucratic and yields latitude to the school); "evolutionary" planning that involves key leaders and quickly connects planning to action; building and creating consensus on a vision and promoting leadership by teachers; obtaining and reallocating resources, especially time and training; and the presence of coping skills for managing day-to-day problems of change efforts.
This book addresses the setting of the high school as distinct from the context of the elementary school. It calls for a rethinking of the meaning of "context" by taking a look at the multifaceted influences or "embedded contexts" that have effects on teachers' work. The authors build the case for constructing an understanding of teachers' work from teachers' own perspectives. There are three parts in this book. Part I focuses on sociocultural contexts--societal, professional, community and social class cultures. Part II looks at the organizational and policy contexts within schools. This includes a chapter on workplace reforms and a chapter on the significance of high school departments. Part III focuses on three "levers" for improving secondary schooling: professional development, school improvement, and curriculum reform.
This source provides a good overview of research related not only to secondary schools but to educational reform in general. Books and journal articles covering a wide range of topics are included, such as school choice, class size, restructuring, school climate, cooperative learning, increased graduation requirements, staff development, and testing and evaluation procedures. One section of this bibliography presents a list of references related to projects conducted at the National Center. These projects include the Adolescence Project, the At-Risk Student Project, the Higher Order Thinking Project, and the Quality of Teachers' Work Lives Project. All references are annotated.
This is an empirical study of 12 inner-city secondary schools in London. The authors sought the answers to two questions: Why do schools differ with respect to student behavior and attainment? How do schools influence students' progress? They employed four assessment measures in their evaluation of schools: (1) intake measures to establish baseline characteristics of student academic ability, parental occupation, and teacher-described student behavioral characteristics; (2) school process measures developed within the research group because none existed--staff interviews, pupil questionnaires, and fieldworker observations; (3) outcome measures of what schools saw as their main tasks, namely, behavior, attendance, examination success, employment, delinquency; and (4) ecological measures that included classification of geographic areas by social status, balance of intake (meaning the concentrations of students in terms of their academic ability, parental occupation, behavior, and ethnic background), interaction effects within schools, and parental choice of school.
The authors found a greater incidence of low attendance and early school leaving among low-ability or low-SES students, that differences between schools remained stable over time, and that, even after controlling for external factors, significant school effects remained. The authors also found crucial ecological differences even within a single local authority and between schools serving in an inner-city area. The two key contributions of this research: (1) intake characteristics of students did not fully account for persisting differences among schools; and (2) the school's functioning as a social organization accounted for essential differences between schools.
The authors reviewed the Effective Schools literature, developing their own conception of an effective school based on Purkey and Smith's 13 variables. They conducted an empirical study of 571 schools that had received national recognition. Wilson and Corcoran compared and contrasted their findings gleaned from observation with those stated in the Effective Schools literature. Successful secondary schools promoted collaboration and collegiality among their faculties, focused on and improved workplace conditions for teachers, sought to motivate students by setting high standards and expectations, and involved the community in various activities and partnerships. By examining the institutional vitality, the authors added to the literature on the process by which ineffective schools change into effective ones.
The authors report findings from a study of working conditions in urban schools in five districts. The study team observed and interviewed school staff in 31 schools as well as district staff, union officials, and board members. Overall, they found that most urban schools are difficult and demoralizing workplaces, which negatively affect teaching and learning.
Schools providing the best working conditions, defined by teachers' assessments, had a constellation of conditions that together resulted in high morale and effort of teachers: strong, supportive principal leadership; good physical working conditions; high levels of collegiality; high levels of teacher influence on school decisions; and high levels of teacher control over curriculum and instruction. The absence of one or more of these conditions was associated with considerably lower ratings.
This document reports the results of case studies of four districts that have acted on restructuring agendas: Jefferson County Public Schools (Louisville, KY), Dade County Public Schools (Miami, FL), Poway Unified School District (CA), and New Orleans Public Schools. The report presents information about five other districts that are also restructuring but that were not included as part of the formal case study sample: the ABC Unified School District (Cerritos, CA); Cincinnati, OH, Public Schools; District 4, East Harlem (New York City); Hammond, IN, Public Schools; and Rochester, NY, Public Schools. Insights from the four case study sites and the other five inform three summary themes expressed in each of the districts. First, the goal of restructuring is comprehensive change guided by a belief that schools can be stimulating workplaces and learning environments. Second, school staff need the skills, authority, and time to assume new roles and responsibilities. Third, restructuring requires new coalitions of support and new conceptions of accountability.
The premise put forth in this booklet contends that all cities have resources/assets that can be mobilized to improve urban education: an educated middle class (black, Hispanic, white, etc.), well-managed businesses, financial institutions, universities, local foundations, political and religious leaders. However, a failing educational system can turn around only if the entire community unites on its behalf.
Six big-city school systems showing promise of improvement--San Diego, Memphis, Cincinnati, Miami, Atlanta, and Pittsburgh--were studied for factors that (1) contributed to their success, and (2) were reproducible at other sites wishing to improve. Case studies identified four major actors in the community and strategies for improvement. Successful cities reached out to involve the larger community, made information about student performance and school resources broadly available, created community-wide agreement and understanding about educational goals, and made major changes in the dynamics of school administration.
This report documents the committee's investigation of nine districts and one county education office that are pursuing Effective Schools projects. Questionnaires with seven open-ended items were used to gather data from sites whose activities conformed to the effectiveness correlates of the reauthorized Chapter 2 program (ESEA, P.L. 100-297). Information on goals, implementation, indicators of success, and costs are compiled on districts in Caldwell, ID; Clovis, CA; Joliet, IL; Kansas City, MO; La Joya, TX; Pittsburgh, PA; Prince Georges County, MD; San Diego County, CA; South Harrison, MO; and Spencerport, NY.
[The Role of Principals in School Reform]