This guide aims to present district instructional leaders and staff with a core set of criteria for what high-quality professional development entails. What makes this particular document different and useful is the focus on practical issues of district-level implementation in multiple teaching and learning environments. This is a guide designed…

Topics discussed are: what the city is, what a good urban school is not, and criteria of good urban schools. Approaches that maximize and utilize the city as a center for learning are given through an examination of five models of urban schools. (Author/AM)

Maintaining that urban teaching and learning is characterized by many contradictions, this book proposes that there is a wide range of social, cultural, psychological, and pedagogical knowledge urban educators must possess in order to engage in effective and transformative practice. It is necessary for those teaching in urban schools to be…

Contends that the nature of U.S. urban life has created profound challenges for urban schools. Asserts that music educators must examine innovative trends in policy, programming, and curricula to determine how music can contribute to better schools and a better quality of life in urban areas. (CFR)

This book tells the stories of two young male first-grade teachers in an urban public school. From the perspective of a white male teacher, the book describes the complexities of establishing a personal and professional relationship with a co-teacher of different ethnicity (Hispanic American) and somewhat different philosophy, and the difficulties…

The objective of this book is to present techniques that urban elementary school teachers reported using successfully to handle specific problems. The information comes from a larger national study of teacher training and teaching in urban schools which used a sample of 248 teachers, none of whom had been teaching for more than five years. Half…

The Cleveland Collaborative for Mathematics Education (C2ME) intends to change the role and status of teachers of mathematics in Cleveland's public secondary schools. This report presents the perceptions, beliefs, and practices of the teacher members of the collaborative project. This research is based upon descriptive and historical data gathered…

This report describes the ways in which the Center for Minority Achievement works to reform public education for early adolescents in six New York City schools. It consists of edited conversations among the three central staff members of the program and vignettes and quotes from a school student and from staff affected by the program. These…

This book focuses on research conducted in the last 20 years that shows what urban teachers can do to add new knowledge and skills to their repertoire of teaching so that students can increase their own achievement. Dedicated to the idea that all children can learn, it provides hundreds of practical educational strategies. Some approaches that are…

This sourcebook is designed to give urban educators new information and strategies for working with parents of elementary school students through grade 6. Its five workshops explore how family life, school programs, teacher practices, and district policies can help build school-family partnerships for learning. Threaded through these workshops are…

Research on microcomputers in education suggests that this new technology may be widening the gap between rich and poor schools and talented and underachieving students. Public schools in poor districts and small parochial schools are the least likely to own computers. One survey indicates that while 66 percent of affluent school districts have…

In February, 1985, the Ford Foundation launched an experimental program to strengthen mathematics education in inner-city high schools. Five grants helped establish urban mathematics collaboratives (UMC) in Cleveland, Minneapolis-St. Paul, Los Angeles, Philadelphia, and San Francisco. Later, additional UMCs were set up in Durham, Memphis, New…

This document on the working conditions of urban teachers reports data from a survey of 31 elementary, middle, and secondary schools in five urban school districts. More than 400 interviews were conducted with teachers, school administrators, central office personnel, district officials, board members, and union officials. The observations,…

This book shares the stories of 13 successful urban teachers who offer advice on effective instructional strategies, gaining students' cooperation, managing the classroom, and developing curricula that match students' interests and academic levels. Ten chapters are: (1) "Why Teach in an Urban School?" (the lives of urban teachers and what urban…