This paper describes a partnership between a university and an urban school district, formed with a goal of preparing mathematics teacher leaders to conduct professional development (PD) at their schools. The university and district partners worked together to achieve the district's mission of providing every student with high-quality instruction…

Using a community-partnered research framework, the goal of this study was to rapidly assess coronavirus disease (COVID-19) impact on teachers, students, and families and guidance received to navigate distance learning. Participants were teachers (N = 430) working in elementary schools (n = 301), middle schools (n = 56), high schools (n = 60), and…

This research examines social justice leaders' community activism in response to three local and national political contexts. Grounded in literature that advances ecological models of school leadership, we analyzed how seven urban school leaders conceptualized community activism as linked to school outcomes, and how leaders conducted activism…

In the ongoing effort to improve standards-based instruction in the nation's urban public schools, the Council of the Great City Schools published a second edition of "Supporting Excellence: A Framework for Developing, Implementing, and Sustaining a High-Quality District Curriculum." This document is designed to help districts: (1)…

This study evaluates a "nudge letter" to parents intervention designed to reduce chronic absenteeism among students in one urban district. Using a regression discontinuity design (RDD), it estimates the impact of the intervention on improving student attendance. The forcing variable for the RDD was 2016-17 attendance rate, with a…

Despite reform efforts to involve parents, parent--school relationships in urban districts are rare. This qualitative study used a constructivist grounded theory approach to gain an understanding of how parent social networks, specifically relationships with other parents in the school, influence parent perceptions of their role in the educational…

We used multilevel mixed modeling to test the extent to which students' music achievement scores were related to their reading and math achievement scores. Of the four levels examined (individual students, classrooms, schools, and districts), only individuals and districts accounted for a significant portion of the total variance in achievement…

Research-practice partnerships (RPPs), where researchers and practitioners work in concert to address persistent problems of practice, provide promising mutualistic benefits in urban school settings. Drawing on an integrated framework, this case study explores the initial development of an RPP between six small and rural school districts and two…

Before COVID, the shortage of qualified, skilled teachers was among the top challenges facing education leaders. And with the stress of the pandemic, survey data showed that almost half of the public school teachers who left the profession since March 2020 cite COVID-19 as the main reason. As school systems ramp up hiring for next fall, concrete…

Many who attempt district-charter collaboration point to "politics" as a constraint that affects their work, but little is understood about why some collaborations enjoy broad support while others become mired in conflict. Drawing upon CRPE's multiyear study of district-charter collaborations in dozens of cities as well as research on…

Teachers in a Nevada district office have been reading and discussing Sandra Cisneros' book, "Hairs/Pelitos," and are collaborating on a poster that uses figurative language to describe 38 a character from the text. The participating teachers are preparing to lead this same activity with their elementary students who are newcomers to the…

Scaffolding ensures multilingual learners (ML) are adequately challenged and supported at school while learning English and subject area content. Due to the dynamic nature of language development, teachers may struggle to anticipate how to adequately scaffold lessons or reflect on their practice to identify areas for improvement. This paper…

Purpose: This study builds on research scrutinizing school autonomy in policy and school governance by shifting the focus from a formal structural view of autonomy to examining how principals negotiate autonomy in their daily work. Drawing on multiple dimensions of autonomy and street-level bureaucracy, this study examined how principals, as both…

English Language Learners (ELLs) struggle in many schools in the United States. Instructional leaders and their communities need greater understanding of the leadership practices of principals that can enhance the achievement of ELLs. The purpose of this qualitative exploratory case study was to examine the leadership practices that elementary…

English foreign language has recently become an obligatory subject in the elementary school curricula since the first grade in Albanian education system. This paper presents the attitudes of high school students towards the context of learning the language, addressed by two scales, according to International Attitude Motivation Test Battery,…