This paper describes the context and conditions leading up to the November 1998 Jersey City Education Association (JCEA) strike, including the JCEA's history, state takeover of the district, and constraints in New Jersey's collective bargaining law that hampered the union's ability to address teacher dissatisfaction with curricular issues that…

Anchoring, a term rooted in the seafaring world, is a useful metaphor for contemplating the role of music in schooling, and particularly for thinking about the implications of including music in the professional development school (PDS) reform movement. In 1999, the College of Education at William Paterson University (Wayne, New Jersey) joined two…

A study examined whether a field placement in a preschool program enhanced preservice teachers' understanding of the emerging literacy process. The study was conducted in two preschool classrooms in an urban school district in central New Jersey during the spring semester of 1996. Subjects were 26 graduate and undergraduate preservice teachers who…

The seminar began with a report of some research that W.M. Phillips, Jr. had done in Newark. Three purposes guided the design of that study of educational change and race from 1958 to 1972: First, there was the fundamental curiosity to discover the changing nature of participation by the Black community in the creation and implementation of public…