The purpose of this study was to determine the congruence among W. E. Deming's 14 points for Total Quality Management (TQM), the organizational health of school districts, and student achievement. Based on Kanter's (1983) concept of a Culture of Pride with a Climate of Success, healthy districts were defined as having an organizational culture…

Explores relationship between teacher perceptions of structural coupling in their schools and their perceptions of school robustness and effectiveness in study of 79 participating schools. Results suggested that teacher perceptions of relatively tight coupling of goal direction and work supervision structures and relatively loose coupling of…

From time to time critics of the middle level publish works that suggest that our philosophy is too much "feeling good" and not enough academic substance. Confusing this debate is the current trend of districts (especially large urban ones) to reconfigure their schools to K-8 neighborhood schools. In this article the author takes a long look at…

This personal account of a central office administrator's involvement in the Riverside (California) Unified School District's decentralization effort discusses the problems facing the rapidly growing district in the early 1960's, kinds of interventions required to break out of old attitudes toward schooling and school administration, and some…

In 1966, Powel Elementary School initiated an ungraded system to discover if this program would meet the needs of its students and community. In 1967-68, an evaluation of this ungraded program was made to determine if the reading and arithmetic performance levels of the students at Powel were higher than those of a matched graded school. An…

Defines and clarifies the role of educational public relations in relation to student achievement. This communications process, which improves organizational understanding and climate through broad community involvement, should be given top priority by educators and citizens. (CJH)

Explored the implementation of middle level reform components in both high- and low-performing middle schools, seeking to identify factors linked to student achievement. Found that organizational health, which includes academic focus, teacher affiliation, and resource support, more directly influences student performance than simple implementation…

The evidence does not support Chubb and Moe's conclusions that current methods of school governance are responsible for poor student achievement. Organization and other variables (such as family background and student ability) combined account for less than 5 percent of student achievement variations. Market principles applied to education could…

Working in tandem with the powerful National Education Association's KEYS initiative (Keys to Excellence in Your Schools), this second edition focuses on how to change a school's organizational structure and culture to improve the quality of teaching and learning. Each chapter, revised and updated to address continuous improvement and narrowing…

In response to an evaluation conducted by the Netherlands Inspectorate of Education of the nation's elementary schools, the Institute for Educational Development and Advice (Christelijk Pedagogisch Studiecentrum, CPS) undertook a 3-year intervention to revitalize 5 schools experiencing problems with student achievement, curriculum,…

A report is given on the second phase of a 3-year study on change in American high schools. Data are presented from 17 schools for two of the study questions: What types of changes are occurring and what are the key units of change? Information was collected through approximately 28 hours of interviews in each school with students, faculty, and…

Reported is a study of the effects of locus of control and the school organization on science achievement of 122 students in non-graded schools and 181 students in graded schools. The dependent variable of the study was scores on the Stanford Achievement Test in Science and the independent variables were the student scores on the Children's Locus…

Presents a reply on a previously written article on school district organization and student achievement along with a further rebuttal by the authors of the article. (Author/AM)

British comprehensive schools have been criticized by the left for failing to provide equality for everyone and by the right for sacrificing academic standards for equality. Such simultaneous criticisms suggest that the schools have been assigned either impossible or contradictory objectives, but have managed to achieve a reasonable compromise.…