This monograph considers the prospects for improving teacher engagement in urban schools through professional and organizational reform. Urban education is a special context for teaching, with the complications of social, political, and organizational conditions that make the schools difficult settings. One of the problems is increasing teacher…

A pilot study describes the prototype design and classroom implementation of "Kid's Space," a response-based multimedia application for literature teaching and learning. "Kid's Space" was designed around the metaphor of a universe populated by the individual student's world. Each world supports a variety of personal spaces in…

The Special Education Professional In Training (SEPIT) program is a tuition assistance program designed to alleviate critical shortages of special education teachers and clinicians in New York City Public Schools. It gives individuals the opportunity to pursue post-baccalaureate study and obtain placement in bilingual and monolingual special…

A study explored the role of peer collaboration in literacy development as a case study in the broader inquiry on the social nature of learning and cognitive development. Fourteen low-achieving 7- to 9-year-old children in a third-grade urban classroom used a word processor to write four stories individually and three stories collaboratively with…

Case studies of seven black school superintendents in the 1970s reveal the magnitude and complexity of problems they face. This 1980 book begins with a chapter on urban crisis, examining deprivation and deterioration in the inner cities. The role of the superintendent and the challenges and deficiencies of urban education are discussed. Profiles…

New York City's Special Education School Articulation Program, which fosters informed student and parent choice about available high school program options, is described. Initial program objectives for the 1990-91 school year included hiring of school articulation coordinators and development of specific articulation plans by middle and high…

The Professional Development Laboratory (P.D.L.) is a collaborative teacher development program in New York City which promotes collegiality and provides an environment in which new and experienced teachers can update skills, learn and practice new skills, and share classroom techniques with one another. Participants spent 3 to 4 weeks in the…

The High School State Incentive Grant was established to improve the quality of instruction given to New York students with handicaps by providing high school special education teachers with an intensive staff development program designed and implemented at the school, district, and citywide levels. The program consisted of three major components:…

This paper reviews the suitability at the kindergarten level of Philadelphia's new K-12 Standardized Curriculum in terms of concerns expressed by a group of Philadelphia kindergarten teachers. The teachers' objections spring from two different conceptions of early childhood education. According to one argument (rejected by the district but…

The Home-School-Community Agent (HSCA) Project of the Columbus, Ohio Public Schools was successful in identifying disruptive pupils and helping them make some positive adjustment to those aspects of their lives that interfere with their success in school. Even though definitive gains in pupil attitudes fell slightly below the project goal, the…

In 1984, Miami-Dade Community College (MDCC) received an Urban Community College Transer Opportunity Program (UCCTOP) grant to develop a successful transition model to encourage minority student enrollment at MDCC, North Campus, to improve minority students' success in transferring to four-year institutions, and to improve the retention rate of…

According to recent studies, families with children are now the fastest-growing segment of the homeless population: 40 percent of the homeless population consists of members of families. Forty-three percent of homeless children do not attend school, which provides children with a much-needed sense of place and continuity that they otherwise lack…

Teacher and paraprofessional ratings of the support received from the New York City Board of Education's Division of Special Education's Summer 1987 Federal Emergency Immigrant Assistance Program exceeded the program objectives. The Federal Emergency Immigrant Assistance Program provided instructional support to teachers of 280 eligible immigrant…

This report comprises papers delivered at a conference assessing the impact of the Supreme Court decision in the case of Brown v. Board of Education 30 years after it was passed in 1954. The following papers (and authors) are included: (1) "Reflections on Brown after Thirty Years" (Linda Brown Smith); (2) "School Integration and the…

Although the two countries differ vastly in wealth and resources, Cuba was selected as the second subject in this comparative study of the American effective schools movement and a socialist educational system because of: (1) the successes of the Cuban literacy campaign; and (2) similarities between the racial composition of the two countries. In…