Past federal educational policy failures can be traced to three sources. The first is unrealistic expectations about schools' capacity for social reform, about the time needed to produce significant change, and about the degree of federal leverage over local school district behavior. The second source is the misconception that improving…

This report reviews and synthesizes the findings of the survey and fieldwork as presented in Volumes II and III. In particular, it summarizes the evidence concerning the effects of federal change agent policy. Section 1 introduces the report. Section 2 describes the theoretical approach that served as the basis for data collection and analysis.…

Under the sponsorship of the U. S. Office of Education, Rand is conducting a several-year study of federally funded programs designed to introduce and spread innovative practices in public schools. These change agent programs normally offer temporary federal funding to school districts as "seed money" or "risk capital." If an…