Prior to the fall semester of 2017, the elementary preservice teachers who were enrolled in a science methods course engaged in a variety of field experiences across different settings, mostly informal. Beginning in the fall semester of 2017, students enrolled in this science methods course completed their field experience in formalized classroom…

With more than half of all higher education institutions in the United States located in or near urban areas, higher education institutions are particularly vulnerable to challenges faced today by cities, such as underperforming public schools, poverty, crime, economic disinvestment and residential abandonment in areas that surround their campuses…

Partnerships between universities and school districts are increasingly being identified as a means to overcome the difficulties of preparing the next generation of urban high school principals. This article examines the development of such a multiorganizational partnership with a large urban school district, two universities, and a national…

Teachers need to read books by other teachers, yet there are few available on the important subject of parent-teacher relationships. Lynne Yermanock Strieb fills the gap with this engaging account of her 30-year career teaching children in urban classrooms. Drawing on an extensive archive of documents she kept as a first- and second-grade …

Only a quarter of the class of 2008 graduated from Alain Locke Senior High School in Los Angeles after four years. This was unsurprising since nearly 60 percent of the class had left Locke by the end of their sophomore year. A majority of Locke teachers--frustrated with the school's mediocrity--petitioned to allow charter management organization…

The School District of Philadelphia (SDP), established in 1818, is the eighth largest school district in the United States, with a student enrollment of 184,560 K-12 students. Like most of the other large urban school districts in the United States, its student population consists of more minority students than non-minority students. As the white…

This article takes the history of teacher research in one large urban school district over a period of 20 years as a telling case of the intensely local character of this work. Beginning with an overview of the variations and different conceptions of teacher research in the USA, we argue that teacher research is continually being invented and…

Over the past two decades, community organizing has emerged as an effective force for school improvement. In the context of shrinking education funding, stubborn opportunity and achievement gaps between low-income and wealthy children and between children of color and White children, and polarizing debate on school reform, community organizing…

The body of research work presented in this dissertation integrates critical ethnography with video and conversation analyses in order to provide ways to articulate and understand the complexities associated with social life enactment as it unfolds during cogenerative dialogues and in the science classroom as the teacher and her students engage in…

This narrative case study research project focused on African American women principals and the leadership qualities and competencies that they bring to an urban school setting. The purpose of this study was to explore the lived experiences of African American women principals and examine the influence of this past experience, identify common…

This article consists of the second part of an interview with John Sole and David Schrader on the Redesign of the High Schools in Philadelphia: Integrating Project Project-Based Learning and the Architectural Process January 2006. The first segment examined the work of educator John Sole. He emphasizes an active, self-directed project-based,…

West Philadelphia High School has had many different projects and organizations working inside of the school, including the Philadelphia Student Union (PSU). PSU, a youth-led organization, is committed to making changes in the school and communities of its members. When four PSU students from West Philadelphia High School joined a nonprofit…

The millions of public educators are working tirelessly and the US is spending billions of dollars annually to solve one of the country's most vexing social problems, education achievement gap and its horrific life consequences for millions of children, particularly of color. The problem is a stubborn one, with deep-rooted impediments to its…

IT IS HELD THAT THE PUBLIC SCHOOLS ARE ONE OF THE MOST STRATEGICALLY PLACED STAGING AREAS FROM WHICH TO MOUNT VIGOROUS, COMPREHENSIVE AND PREVENTIVE PROGRAMS TO ACHIEVE THE MAXIMUM DEVELOPMENT OF THE HUMAN POTENTIAL LYING UNCHALLENGED IN URBAN SLUM AND DEPRESSED AREAS. STRONG CRITICISM HAS BEEN DIRECTED TOWARD SCHOOLS FOR NEGLECTING THEIR JOB OF…

This publication is a resource book for Pennsylvania educators and those providing services to homeless children and families. It presents five models for effective coordination between schools and homeless shelters. The five models are those that have been developed in the following: (1) a large urban school district; (2) two medium size urban…