To make schools safer places for students, educators must incorporate eight conditions that promote young people's aspirations: belonging, community, and participation; sense of accomplishment; heroes (caring adults); curiosity and creativity; spirit of adventure; fun and excitement; leadership and responsibility; and self-confidence. (MLH)

Current brain research findings are amazing, but they are in tune with educators' best intuition and experience. The notion of learning as a body-mind activity accents and legitimizes educators' focus on emotion and provides important clues for implementation. Three starting points should be high-quality, nonthreatening interpersonal…

Offers insights and themes observed in six restructuring schools studied in 1991-92. Results show that principals' importance varies, sharing of power is fragile, leadership and power are often dispersed, changes in decision-making structures sometimes improve instruction, and power redistribution and shared purpose can foster either increased…

Principals can play an important role in the interpersonal relationships within a school building by exploring and assessing issues regarding cause and effect of the anxiety, stress, and tension that exist among personnel. (Author/MLF)

Principals need sensitive measures of school climate to diagnose problems and monitor progress in overcoming them. This article discusses the Effective School Battery developed by Johns Hopkins University and used to describe individual schools in terms of 34 specific aspects of environmental, teacher, and student characteristics. Includes one…

In response to the prevailing attitude in American education today demanding higher academic standards and greater student achievement, this article lists 25 programs designed to increase academic excellence while still promoting a positive learning environment within the school. (DCS)

This high school's successful suspension alternative assigns disruptive students to an alternative classroom for several days, where they are isolated from the remainder of the student body all day, and excluded from participation in or attending all regular programs and cocurricular activities. (DCS)

The increasing number of acts of senseless destruction in the schools are costing money--to repair the damage, and to protect the schools from further damage. Cites some possible reasons for the vandalism, and offers some suggestions for improving the problem. (Editor)

The authors suggests that educational change, like all societal change, takes place as a result of policies interacting with the environment. He explains why some environments are more receptive to change than others. (Editor)

The large school must organize itself to recognize individual human needs or face continual disruption. The author concludes that the specifics depend upon a constellation of factors inherent in any given situation. (Editor)

Nonpunitive approaches to discipline (changing the student, remediating learning problems, changing the school environment, and implementing alternative programs) can eventually reduce student misbehavior and should be considered as alternatives to punitive approaches for working with students who are discipline problems. (Author/IRT)

Describes a structure for designing staff development activities focusing on preventive strategies and positive relationships with all students. Positive discipline is based on optimism, respect, trust, and intentionality--essential ingredients of flourishing teacher-student relationships. Includes eight references. (MLH)

Creating successful schools for all early adolescent learners requires educators, parents, and community members to rethink current middle-school organizational structures, programs, and practices. The great challenge is recreating schools as inclusive communities that offer equal educational opportunities. Learning should be emphasized as…

Creativity is an abstract concept, not a measurable, observable behavior. There is little correspondence between intelligence and creativity functions. Educators need not pierce the mythology of genius or formally define creativity to foster creative thinking. Teachers can nourish the seeds of creativity by engaging students' learning styles and…

Current research supports the importance of positive school climate and the use of school-climate measures as school-effectiveness predictors. This article describes several instruments, including the Organizational Climate Index, the Organizational Climate Description Questionnaire, the Effective School Battery, the Charles F. Kettering Ltd.…