This report offers an insider's perspective into the world-leading Shanghai education system. After more than 40 years of reconstruction and reform, education in Shanghai has achieved remarkable results. In the Organization for Economic Co-operation and Development's (OECD) 2009 and 2012 Program for International Student Assessment (PISA),…

In this mixed-methods study, we examine the degree to which district- and building-level administrators accommodate teacher-quality and test-based accountability policies in their hiring practices. We find that administrators negotiated local hiring goals with characteristics emphasized by federal and state teacher-quality policies, such as…

The notion of being negligently and legally liable for poor teaching that results in the failure of students being able to achieve expected educational outcomes is an unimaginable prospect. However, there is an emerging trend of legal proceedings being brought against teachers, blaming them for low scores in literacy, numeracy or even the failure…

Congress has the opportunity to move forward on education reform by reauthorizing the Elementary and Secondary Education Act, or ESEA, to ensure all children achieve their greatest potential. Unfortunately, it has yet to find the will to do so, to the detriment of American students and schools. ESEA is the largest and most significant federal…

Fear can be conceptualized differently as experienced by those inside and outside the school organization. Internally, participants respond to fear in a politics of maintenance aimed toward protection against anticipated job loss(es). This article examines internal organizational participants' fear, with particular attention to teachers' fear of…

Teachers in South Africa deal with the remnants of an inherited education system based on segregation and exclusion of particular groups of students. While the previous practices of segregation resided within the context of racial groupings, exclusionary practices related to disabilities, academic abilities, and language competence are evident…

How happy are you about teaching science? Building on similar work from the Leverhulme Primary Project and the Primary Horizons, the authors pursued this question with 303 head teachers, science coordinators, and class teachers across England in a recent questionnaire survey. The findings point to very real progress being made in many areas of…

Mounting pressure in the policy arena to improve teacher productivity either by improving signals that predict teacher performance or through creating incentive contracts based on performance--has spurred two related questions: Are there important determinants of teacher productivity that are not captured by teacher credentials but that can be…

This paper is the third in a series of reports that examine the impact of No Child Left Behind, the newly revised Elementary and Secondary Education Act, on state policy and policymaking. It focuses on teaching quality. The first section explains that a highly qualified teacher is one who has been fully licensed or certified by the state and not…

The purposes of this study were to provide an appraisal of preservice teacher education programs by Utah teachers and administrators, and to determine the extent to which public school teachers had been educated in six areas considered for possible certification by the Utah State Board of Education: (1) handling classroom discipline; (2) working…

The primary intent of this program evaluation was to determine the degree of inclusion of students with disabilities in general education classes in four elementary and four secondary schools; the similarities and differences in how special education services were offered; and the ways in which students with disabilities were supported in the…

This report is the second in a series of policy papers on the education of educators. It identifies several model teacher education programs, but also finds that the majority of the nation's teachers are prepared in programs that have low admission and graduation standards and cling to an outdated vision of teacher education. Both state…

This report is the second in a series of policy papers on the education of educators. It identifies several model teacher education programs, but also finds that the majority of the nation's teachers are prepared in programs that have low admission and graduation standards and cling to an outdated vision of teacher education. Both state…