In Uxbridge, Massachusetts, a small working-class mill town, free-market reform rhetoric has become reality. The tiny district has adopted controversial changes, such as giving vouchers to parents of Title I students, reimbursing home-schooling parents, lengthening the school day and year, adopting flexible scheduling, allowing credit for Internet…

This fall, about 700 charter schools will be operating in 26 states. Superintendents acknowledge that their own role often depends on a specific state's legislation. Some districts, like two Colorado systems, offer intensive support to charters. Some superintendents find working with charters to be risky and contentious, as staff struggle to…

Stories of five superintendents who are trying different approaches to reach the same organizationwide goal--learning communities in their school districts. Also a first-person perspective by Illinois Superintendent Thomas W. Many on his district's early steps to achieve this goal. (Contains 11 references.) (MLF)

The latest manifestation of the decentralization trend is a push to redefine state education agencies' duties. Kentucky, Virginia, and other states are turning toward a helping rather than a regulating role. Bureaucracies are being dissolved, reorganized, or compressed to help districts struggle with local restructuring efforts. Numerous examples…

Currently, at-risk children have little chance to enter and complete a university program. A new system combining public schools and higher education could reverse the growing failure rate of America's urban, predominantly minority youth. It is no longer conscionable or feasible to maintain two separate and unequal educational systems. (MLH)

A school administrator, who became minority staff director for the United States Senate Subcommittee on Education, Arts, and Humanities, forecasts that early childhood programs will achieve funding at the expense of the block grants of Chapter 2. (MLF)

Since 1990, over 40 Illinois and Massachusetts school districts have built capacity for sustained improvement through vertically structured, district-level Learning Leadership Teams. Originated by Motorola executives, LLT was based on an understanding of organizational change derived from the National Science Foundation's definition of systemic…

The most likely legal issues to arise concerning charter schools include teacher employment and qualification issues, liability concerns, special-needs student issues, due process, religious issues, and contract rules. School leaders can head off problems by clarifying who is in charge, spelling out the mission statement, and dealing up front with…

School boards should focus on knowledge, skills, and attitudes students need to function in tomorrow's world, instead of determining what education programs the community wants and can afford. Results-oriented evaluation is a house of sand, because students come from varied backgrounds and most results are caused by the system originating them.…

The crisis concerning attention-deficit-disorder students is overblown as a legal matter. Although perceived acutely by particular parents and advocated aggressively by the Children and Adults with Attention Deficit Disorders (CHADD), the needs of ADD/ADHD students range from noneligibility to entitlement for full services under the Individuals…

School administrators' failure to take action against teacher incompetence results in decreased student achievement, low teacher morale, diminished confidence in schools, teacher and administrator liability, and increased litigation. To break the cycle of "inarticulitis" (nonstraightforward communication about marginal performance), a new paradigm…

Discusses three aspects of changes underlying the "New Multiculturalism": intermarriage, "tipping" of racial and ethnic balances (due to differential birthrates and immigration patterns), and transnational cultures. Educational ramifications include changes in administrative record keeping, evolving student identities,…

A Montana superintendent and presidential appointee explains federal initiatives (funded programs and directives) that school leaders can apply to their own violence-prevention work. These include support for zero-tolerance policies, community programs, afterschool activities, and school-uniform policies. Resource centers are listed. (MLH)

Pioneer district/charter-school contracts try to balance the quest for autonomy with accountability requirements. Districts' experiences in three states (Colorado, Oregon, and Wisconsin) and their chosen navigation tools offer clues to developing productive processes and relationships for negotiating successful contracts. A sidebar defines the…

Following corporations' lead, school districts' annual reports have become glossier, but also more substantial and sophisticated. They focus on what communities want to know, articulate a vision, and describe its implementation, displaying hard numbers and trend projections. Winners in a National School Public Relations Association contest are…