This monograph is written to help school administrators and policy makers, in addressing the question of safe schools, separate analytically what is "school" and what is "society" in order to better understand the real span of the school's control. The central question is: what are the characteristics of safe and effective…

A study assessed the formulas used to distribute funds to the states under the Workforce Investment Act (WIA) 1998. It identified mismatches that might exist between the formulas and WIA's program goals and populations served and identified where the formulas are most vulnerable to wide fluctuations in funding levels from year to year. Issues…

The State Higher Education Finance (SHEF) report is a tool to help policy makers and educators address broad public policy questions. SHEF seeks to inform policy deliberations with information and perspective on financial issues and national trends. The fiscal 2005 SHEF study builds on the work of Kent Halstead, who conceptualized and implemented…

This report summarized observations of administrators at nine colleges in the Academic Quality Consortium (AQC) who assessed the performance of their institutions using the Malcolm Baldrige criteria as a guideline. These criteria include leadership, information and analysis, strategic planning, human resource development and management, management…

This policy brief discusses how certain types of state funding provisions create fiscal incentives for more restrictive placements for students with disabilities. This most likely occurs when funding systems are tied to the location in which the services are provided and a more restrictive placement will generate more state aid in relation to…

The Extended Opportunity Programs and Services (EOPS) were established by the California legislature in 1969 to provide financial and academic support to educationally disadvantaged, full-time community college students residing in California. As part of its annual reporting requirements, the Chancellor's Office of the California Community…

Establishing instructional priorities in public schools is a worthwhile and important process. Because time and money are insufficient to increase staffing in schools, setting priorities is a necessary component of successful managing. Steps to be taken in setting instructional priorities are as follows: (1) Adopt a statement of mission describing…

The relationship between educational finance and organizational effectiveness or "health" in 50 Connecticut high schools was examined. Data were collected using existing organizational health questionnaires and archival data. A sample was randomly selected from the population of public high schools in Connecticut. Seven…

Drawing from site visits to 39 public and private colleges in Massachusetts, this report presents an evaluation of college programs in business administration and management and recommendations for improvement. Section 1 provides an overview of the statewide study and its findings. After identifying the colleges visited and the members of the…

Guidelines for assisting colleges and universities to improve the international dimension of their campuses are presented, with attention to administrative leadership, curriculum development, faculty development, student awareness, and resources. Each guideline consists of a definition, an interpretation of its potential contribution to…

This report discusses diverse economic issues involved in educational reforms aimed at improving economic growth. The focus is on elementary and secondary education in the southeastern United States. After a general overview of the economics of educational reform, section I discusses the issues involved in modeling and estimating the linkages…

Tables, graphs, and charts are provided in this report on trends in operational planning data in the Wisconsin Vocational, Technical, and Adult Education (VTAE) system for the period from 1979-80 to 1987-88. Four operational data sets are analyzed: full-time equivalent (FTE) and headcount enrollments and cost per FTE; VTAE graduates; operational…

Academic staffing practices used at four-year colleges and universities are identified, and recommendations are offered for achieving staffing flexibility in the face of conditions such as scarce resources. In addition to considering faculty flow models (e.g., Markov models and simulators) as a management/planning tool to evaluate personnel and…

A report on the future needs for higher education in Nebraska and the role of higher education in the state's economy is presented, based on the work of the Citizens Commission for the Study of Higher Education. The analysis focuses on the University of Nebraska, the state colleges, the technical community colleges, and the private institutions.…

This paper evaluates the equity dimensions of a grant-in-aid system based on the Resource Cost Model (RCM), as proposed by the Illinois State Board of Education. The first section is an independent evaluation of the conceptual and legal aspects of the RCM, focusing on both the weaknesses and the strengths of the model. In the second section, an…