This paper presents an analysis of how education reform in Denver Public Schools (DPS) fails to reach its targeted goal of closing achievement gaps between white students and Students of Colour based on its investment in Whiteness. Using a theoretical framework grounded in critical whiteness studies, we trace a history in DPS that includes legal…

In response to numerous calls for more rigorous STEM (science, technology, engineering, and mathematics) education to improve US competitiveness and the job prospects of next-generation workers, especially those from low-income and minority groups, a growing number of schools emphasizing STEM have been established in the US over the past decade.…

School choice is increasingly the new normal in urban education. But in cities with multiple public school options, how can civic leaders create a choice system that works for all families, whether they choose a charter or district public school? To answer this question, the Center on Reinventing Public Education (CRPE) researchers surveyed 4,000…

Deficient urban schooling remains one of America's most pressing--and stubborn--public policy problems. This important new book details and evaluates a radical and promising new approach to K-12 education reform. "Strife and Progress" explains for a broad audience the "portfolio strategy" for providing urban education--its…

This study evaluates how welcoming thirty American cities--the twenty-five largest and five smaller "hotspots"--are to "nontraditional" problem-solvers and solutions. It assumes that the balky bureaucracies meant to improve K-12 education and hold leaders accountable are so calcified by policies, programs, contracts, and…

A critical question in school choice programs is whether relatively low-income urban parents have the ability to gather the information they need to make good choices for their children. Choice is expanding, particularly in American cities. Without good information, the benefits generated from expanding public school choice (via No Child Left…

The Center on Reinventing Public Education (CRPE) has launched a new initiative entitled "Doing School Choice Right." Funded by the Bill and Melinda Gates, Annie E. Casey, and Lynde and Harry Bradley Foundations, the initiative's goal is to help state and local leaders handle practical issues whose resolution can determine whether school…

This compilation of appendixes to "Operation Gap-Stop: A Study of the Application of Communications Techniques in Reaching the Unreachable Poor, Vol. I" (VT 005 937) includes the questionnaire, the scripts for the eight television programs and promotional material used to conduct the project. (CH)

This study examines the Lao Hmong, an Indochinese refugee group that has resettled in the Denver-Boulder, Colorado, area. Characteristics examined are the following: (1) migration; (2) location; (3) housing; (4) acculturation; and (5) life satisfaction. An extensive literature review discusses the history, ethnography, and culture of the Hmong in…

Do you feel that schools are only for teachers, principals, and people who have special training in education? Well, Centennial schools need help from parents. You don't need any special skills or training. All you have to do is care about making schools better places for children to learn. How can you help your children's schools do a better job?…

In this article, the author discusses a partnership between Baylor University and the Waco public schools that embeds every teacher-candidate--from the freshman year on--into the K-12 system. To test whether professional-development schools, modeled after teaching hospitals, can be scaled up so that all of a college's teaching candidates--not just…

In its efforts to promote equity and excellence for Hispanic children, Western Service Systems, Inc. (WSS) serves parents, teachers, administrators, and public officials through research, creative thinking, design and implementation of new programs, coalition building, communication, and information. During 1983-84, WSS addressed the issues of…

In presenting a complete program of occupational education for the Denver metropolitan area, this proposal offers 12 criteria for consideration in conjunction with a particular occupational need. The purpose of the criteria is to provide guidelines for determining in which level of school a program should be offered. The criteria include factors…

This report presents a pioneering effort in the use of television in bringing to a particular sub-population, the disadvantaged, the particular kinds of information which could dispel ignorance in certain key informational areas. From information gathered by a 337-item questionnaire covering demographic characteristics, attitudes, communication…

Academic socialization is a process whereby students acquire the competencies necessary to function in the classroom. Academic competencies include not only a high level of proficiency in English, critical thinking skills, and the ability to control the relationship between language and logic, but also social and cultural skills. Although academic…