Strategies that school superintendents use to develop and implement school improvement plans in response to state mandates were studied through interviews with 30 Maine superintendents and assistant superintendents. Results indicate that imposition of state standards may ignore superintendents' interpretations that shape the approach to meeting…

Most systems of administrative control include both formal and informal, explicit and implicit evaluative mechanisms that sense deviation from standards and activate corrective actions to return subordinates to acceptable levels of performance or to correct beliefs. A review of prior studies showed, however, that few school districts have specific…