Throughout the history of the United States there have existed gaps in the educational achievement outcomes of different groups of students. One of the most well-known and persistent achievement gaps is seen in the academic performance of Black versus White students, which is also known as the Black-White student achievement gap (BWSAG). The BWSAG…

This case is to help district leaders and community partners understand the complexity of pursuing a principles-based approach to improving early school readiness. Wyckoff Public Schools adopted the Boston Basics to support young children's early learning and readiness for school. It required district leaders and partners to work across…

Purpose: The purpose of this essay is to honor, position and reflect on key themes related to high school reform within the careerlong scholarship of Karen Seashore Louis. It is presented in relation to my own and others' key studies and book-length arguments regarding educational change, knowledge utilization, professional communities and…

Tenure is intended to protect teachers with demonstrated teaching skills against arbitrary or capricious dismissal. Critics of typical tenure processes argue that tenure assessments are superficial and rarely discern whether teachers in fact have the requisite teaching skills. A recent reform of the tenure process in New York City provides an…

Our urban school systems struggle because so many of their students live in poverty, but they also struggle because they were designed a hundred years ago, for an industrial society. In an increasing number of cities, they are being replaced by 21st century systems, in which the central administration does not operate all schools and employ all…

Improving low-achieving schools is a critical challenge facing urban education. Recent national policy shifts have pressed states to take an expanded role in school improvement efforts. In 2009, a federal grant competition called Race to the Top (RttT) compelled states to improve their capacity to implement ambitious education reform agendas.…

School district officials have faced the urgent task in recent years of ensuring that all schools, not just a lucky few, benefit from sure-footed leadership by professionals who know how to focus on instruction and improve it. The question boils down to this: How can districts develop a pipeline of great school principals? Research about a Wallace…

As more colleges and universities commit to a public mission, it is critical that our work as anchor institutions have a sustainable and positive impact, and that we collaborate fully with the diverse voices and expertise beyond our campuses--the most valuable assets of our multicultural cities. Taking Syracuse, New York, as a microcosm, the…

The Learning Partners Program (LPP) is designed to promote interschool collaborative learning. Using the Framework for Great Schools as a lens, the program creates triads of schools by matching a host school with strong practices in a specific learning focus area (LFA) with two partner schools interested in strengthening their practices in that…

School district officials have faced the urgent task in recent years of ensuring that all schools, not just a lucky few, benefit from sure-footed leadership by professionals who know how to focus on instruction and improve it. The question boils down to this: How can districts develop a pipeline of great school principals? Research about a Wallace…

Although national trends of urban adolescent reading underachievement suggest that schools are unable to adequately support this population's reading development, some studies have demonstrated that urban schools can operate to raise student achievement, thereby disrupting national trends. In this study, the author investigates one such school…

Urban high schools are in trouble--high dropout rates, low student academic achievement, and graduates who are unprepared for college are just some of the disappointing indicators. However, recent research points to a select number of approaches to improving student outcomes and reforming underperforming schools--from particular ways of creating…

The increased demand for educational reform and accountability has resulted in a renewed focus on the relationship between building leaders and district leaders, particularly on how district leaders can support principals to ensure the academic success of students. The No Child Left Behind Act of 2001 (NCLB) and Race to the Top (RttT) legislations…

A Bangladeshi girl who spends her out-of-school time translating documents for her parents' immigration hearings. A group of Chinese high school boys whose teachers can't figure out why they're so disengaged. A Vietnamese boy who speaks almost no English and is the only Asian student at his low-performing school. A Korean-American girl at the top…

Mayoral control and accountability is one of very few major education reforms that aim at governance coherence in this nation's highly fragmented urban school systems. A primary feature of mayoral governance is that it holds the office of the mayor accountable for school performance. As an institutional redesign, mayoral governance integrates…