The article describes a longitudinal professional development project in rural Florida (USA) schools that supports the efforts of inservice teachers to make pedagogical transitions from total reliance on prepackaged commercial programmes to making informed decisions about curriculum and pedagogy autonomously. It demonstrates that in order to…

With a view to basic formal education, this study explores actual experiences and potential values of current community-school initiatives in Africa. Using data from different programmes around the continent, it examines their dynamics in terms of various conceptions about alternative provisions for basic education. The wider policy question posed…

This study investigates an assumption used to legitimate charter school legislation, namely that such schools will reduce regulatory constraint burdening schools and school personnel. Reformers and policymakers have argued that charter schools will increase teacher empowerment and enable teachers to better carry out their education functions.…

When schools fail to improve, it is because educators do not think innovatively. What they do is largely a reflection of what they grew up with or what they were taught. Rather than do new things, they focus on working harder at the things that have produced limited success. That used to be the case at Holloway High School in Murfreesboro,…

Adopting policies of decentralization has become more or less a universal fashion among governments. Institutional redesigning as regard to affirmative state is favored by the political left and right in capitalist democracies. However, their arguments revolve around the decision-making powers of ordinary citizens. Some academics argue that the…

Having ownership of a dream is a core element for school improvement and effectiveness. Believing in the effectiveness of a programme is the beginning of reviving a school's internal capacities for improvement. Any improvement and development programme needs to be inviting and non-threatening, a holistic process involving all stakeholders. In this…

Argues that democratisation, localization, and national identity are indivisible in Taiwan. Explains that social pressure groups, teachers, and parents are empowered in policy making processes, while the power of school officials to respond to these groups is limited. Discusses the role of school curriculum in promoting ethnic cultures and…

Workforce remodeling in England has been presented as a means to empower school staff through a restructuring process which has possibilities to dramatically shift the ways in which they operate. This initiative has also included a number of legislative requirements intended to help embed the more technocratic aspects of the remodeling process.…

This qualitative multi-site case study examines Kentucky's female superintendents: their professional work, identity, and entry to the role. Data sources were extensive interviews from twelve districts--superintendents, central office administrators, and school board members, plus questionnaires and district documents. Results revealed a web-like…

The winds of decentralizing reform that have been driving their way through various government education systems across the globe over the best part of two decades have generated a great deal of conflict. In the late 1990s those working in the Western Australian government high school in which I conducted the research reported here found…

Teachers, parents, and older students need to understand the mechanisms that have subverted honest efforts to give working class children in the United States a decent education. This book discusses why this has happened and suggests ways to develop a pedagogy that makes progressive methods, education that empowers, and powerful literacy possible…

This paper describes ways that administrators can empower teachers and build strong, effective teams in a school. It opens by defining power and explains that traditional organizational hierarchical structures tend to motivate people to use power in self-protective ways. It claims that for empowerment to work, leaders must help people use their…

Describes discussions and changes currently taking place within the National Education Association concerning its relationship with the American Federation of Teachers and school improvement. Addresses the need to revitalize America's public schools from within by pursuing an aggressive agenda of excellence and reform and empowering teachers as…

Creating an empowering environment for learning in nursing education requires dramatic changes in teaching methods and faculty and student perception of their roles. Ongoing dialog among faculty and between students and faculty is also necessary. (SK)

Investigates the effects of four structural characteristics of instruction on student learning: (1) authenticity; (2) challenge; (3) demand for skills; and (4) allowance for student autonomy. Shows that high quality learning experiences are authentic, allow choice, and demand student skills. States that a boring and alienated experience results…