The National Board for Professional Teaching Standards released its outline of what schoolteachers should know and be able to do to qualify for national certification. The guidelines specify that a teacher must make students and their education the top priority and that they must know the subjects they teach. (MLW)

Six "silver bullets" that could raise student achievement are (1) set national standards;(2) make sure all students can read; (3) improve the quality of teaching; (4) demand from vendors better textbooks and teaching materials; (5) encourage charter schools; and (6) collaborate, coordinate, and redefine resources. (MLF)

Warns of the limitations of educational reform via standards and standardization as seen in New York, NY. Focuses on "culturally responsive pedagogy," which is needed to build a system sensitive to the backgrounds and contexts of students and schooling. (CMK)

Nothing is more important to America's future than teaching children the skills they need to be successful. Every child must receive a quality education if America is to be a prosperous and hopeful country. The rapidly changing global economy is creating new industries that compete for highly skilled workers from around the world, and young people…

Continuous improvement in the quality of service offered to children, young people, parents and carers has been a key priority of the education system in Scotland over many years. Scottish pre-school centres and schools have well-established processes for self-evaluation based on the quality indicators in "How good is our school?" (1996,…

Standards-based reform calls for the setting of challenging standards in academic subject areas as an important means of improving student achievement. In 1994, Congress passed the Goals 2000: Educate America Act, which enacted the education goals into law and provided resources for the development of standards and assessments. This report offers…

Issues in the debate over national education standards for content and performance are examined in this journal issue. Interviews with three individuals in different areas of education were held, and each is described in narrative style by Anne Turnbaugh Lockwood. The first is with Linda Darling-Hammond, director of the National Center for…

Compares the educational productivity of the United States with that of Japan and explains how confusion of policies, lower standards, and demographic trends have contributed to this situation. States that, given the willpower, we can utilize research findings to increase our national achievement standards. (MLF)

Findings from a study of teachers' views of the Office for Standards in Education (Ofsted) in England and Wales as a mechanism for improving secondary schools. Examines how teachers perceive the inspection process, whether Ofsted's process generates changes, and whether Ofsted's priorities agree with the school's. (Contains 44 references.) (WFA)

National standards for education are important elements in the excellence process, but standards imposed by a central authority simply do not work in the Information Era. It would be wise to increase teachers' decision-making role in establishing and implementing local level excellence standards and train teachers to employ the Japanese "kaizen"…

Compares Goodlad's 1990 postulates on teacher education reform and the National Council for Accreditation of Teacher Education standards, examining the compatibility of renewal efforts and commitment to national accreditation. The article suggests that reform and required changes will result in programs that meet national standards of quality and…

National Staff Development Council (NSDC) standards guide the development of new staff-development programs in Maryland, and they have provided the framework that guides Maryland's teacher-training efforts. This article offers details on the NSDC standards and discusses how Maryland is making use of them. (SM)

Offers answers to four common questions concerning the National Assessment of Education Progress (NAEP) in order to assist music teachers in responding to questions asked by representatives of the press, administrators, parents, and other community members. Summarizes the key points that should be emphasized in responding to NAEP. (CMK)

In this article, the author analyzes and summarizes geographic education in Louisiana from a historical perspective with a specific emphasis on the degree to which geography was implemented into the state's standards. To accomplish that, he draws from the following three sources of information: active and retired social studies teachers from a…

The U.S. Department of Education's first-ever evaluation of how states are meeting requirements for English-language learners under the federal No Child Left Behind Act can be looked at two ways. One view of the report, which was released to Congress on March 15, 2005, is that states have made great strides in laying the groundwork for schools to…