State sector education policy in England aims to deliver raised standards of attainment and equality of educational opportunity by offering fair access to schools for all pupils from any background. During the lifetime of the previous Labour government (May 1997 to April 2010) a key policy tool used to tackle entrenched low levels of academic…

Education has rarely been absent from local and national public discourse. Throughout the history of modern education spanning more than a century, individuals have as a culture lamented the failures of public schooling, often making such claims based on assumptions instead of any nuanced consideration of the many influences on teaching and…

Although the for-profit retail and nonprofit education markets are not identical, many of the strategies used by reformers to improve markets for banking and food services could nonetheless benefit public education. As district and community leaders, charter school authorizers, and policymakers expand the marketplace of schools, they would be…

This study explored the factors that influenced parental decisions to exit a public school and enroll their children in a private school. It also explored why parents chose the specific private school their child attends and the level of satisfaction they have with their private school choice. The key reasons for leaving public education were: (a)…

School choice improves parents' satisfaction with their children's schools, and public schools that face competition have shown improved performance, yet opponents continue to oppose reforms that give parents the opportunity to choose their children's schools. State and federal policymakers should reform existing education policies to give all…

Since the development of magnet schools in the 1960s--and more recently, the proliferation of charter schools in the last fifteen years--school choice has been a pervasive element on the education reform landscape. With this growth has come the need for information tools to help site-based educators manage, grow, and improve their schools. This is…

Education reform often appears a zero-sum battle, one that pits crusaders demanding accountability and choice against much of the traditional education establishment, including teachers unions. The political skirmishes in Florida, including court fights over vouchers and charter schools, and ongoing struggles over a parade of different merit pay…

During the course of each calendar year since 2003, staff of the Center for Evaluation & Education Policy (CEEP) at Indiana University evaluates the benefits of continuing the Annual Public Opinion Survey on K-12 Education in Indiana. In 2008, the Indiana legislature determined that school corporations would no longer use property tax revenues…

Twenty-five years after the seminal report "A Nation at Risk," American education remains in a state of crisis. Millions of students continue to pass through the public schools without mastering basic skills and knowledge. Policymakers and the public must recognize both this persistent failure and the attendant need for systemic reform…

Australia has been one of the countries to most enthusiastically embrace the neo-liberal conditions conducive to the dismantling of equitably provided public schooling. The article argues that part of the explanation for the absence of any effective challenge to this trajectory lies in the contradictory nature of the Australian identity. The…

The chapters in this volume give an account of the process of modernisation and educational reform in Russia, variously considering the cultural and political dilemmas provoked by democratisation, the structural and policy challenges associated with the reform of higher and vocational education, and the deep divisions exposed as socio-cultural…

This article reports that special interest groups opposed to charter schools and high-stakes testing have hijacked Massachusetts's once-independent board of education and stand poised to water down the Massachusetts Comprehensive Assessment System (MCAS) tests and the accountability system they support. President Barack Obama and Massachusetts…

Many arguments in favour of school voucher programs are based upon libertarian free agency principles. Viewed at the organizational level, allowing persons to exercise choice in education would seem to offer incentives for all educational organizations within that framework to improve overall product quality and thus more effectively obtain the…

In November 1997, 140 researchers, administrators, and others interested in the support of nonpublic schools gathered at the University of Dayton to develop a research agenda for American private education. What developed over the several hours of intense sessions was an agenda that has given direction to researchers well into the 21st century.…

This article reviews educational initiatives of state and federal government that were designed to remedy the effects of racial segregation on Black public school students in the United States after the famous "Brown v. Board of Education" decisions. Several policy and legal initiatives are reviewed, including school desegregation,…