A survey of assessment and instructional approaches to literacy education in middle schools was distributed to coordinators of reading programs in schools state-wide in Illinois to determine the alignment between existing schools' literacy program organization and new directions mandated by researchers for instruction for young adolescents. This…

This article critically reviews two bodies of literature that potentially share common concerns, yet rarely overlap: distributed leadership and educational micropolitics. Alternative explanations for the split between these two analytical approaches to school organization are explored in sections on problem framing, methodology, and the…

Critical Small Schools: Beyond Privatization in New York City Urban Educational Reform features the most current empirical research about the successes and challenges of the small schools movement and the implications of such for urban public educational policy. Situated in a climate of hierarchical reform, many of the principles of the original…

Since the days when the country was dotted with one-room schoolhouses, many changes have taken place in school governance and management. In 1940, there were over 117,000 public school districts in the United States. In 2000, there were fewer than 15,000, even though the student population of the country had doubled in that time. While school…

Both in the United States and the United Kingdom there has been a recent resurgence of interest and support for "new localism" in response to the need to provide local solutions to national complex problems. In this paper, the authors begin by exploring the contextual framework in the U.S. and the UK, explaining recent policy reform and…

The gap between Blacks and Whites in educational outcomes has narrowed dramatically over the past 60 years, but progress stopped around 1990. The author reviews research suggesting that increasing the quantity and quality of schooling can play a powerful role in overcoming racial inequality. To achieve that goal, he reasons, our knowledge of best…

Anthony Bryk is president of the Carnegie Foundation for the Advancement of Teaching. Previously, he held the Spencer Chair in Organizational Studies in the School of Education and the Graduate School of Business at Stanford University as well as the Marshall Field IV Professor of Urban Education and Sociology at the University of Chicago. Dr.…

Background: For over a hundred years, there have been efforts to change the way that schools transmit knowledge. Most of these efforts have failed. The most common explanations found in educational research for this are either: 1) macro-social, according to which social interests and powers hinder these changes. 2) teacher-oriented, according to…

Outlines the kind of research that must be done before the best class size can be determined. (Available from The Ontario Council for Leadership in Educational Administration, Suite N1201, 252 Bloor Street West, Toronto, Ontario M5S 1V5, Canada) (IRT)

This postdoctoral fellowship program involved the following three phases: 1) systematic instruction in the sociology of complex organizations with particular emphasis on the organizational analysis of schools and schooling; 2) systematic instruction in multivariate regression approaches to non-experimental research with particular emphasis on…

Reported is an investigation designed to (1) utilize the Carroll model as a framework for implementing a mastery learning strategy in a nongraded setting, (2) identify the Carroll model as a possible theoretical basis for administrative decisions regarding the organizational structuring of schools, and (3) test certain hypotheses derived from the…

Describes program organizations and the scope of course offerings in high schools of different enrollment classifications. (Author)

Examines the relationship between some bureaucratic characteristics and teachers' sense of power. (Author)