Every teacher's classroom practice is embedded in a system of overlapping contexts that interact with their day-to-day decisions. In this paper, I focus on sociocultural context and how it interacts with teachers' subjective responses to accountability instruments. Drawing on interviews with secondary school teachers in Finland and Singapore --…

The public narrative surrounding efforts to improve low-performing K-12 schools in the United States has been notably gloomy. But what is known empirically about whether school improvement works, which policies are most effective, which contexts respond best to intervention, and how long it takes? We meta-analyze 141 estimates from 67 studies of…

The discussion of enrollment of students with disabilities in charter schools focuses on fundamental questions related to equal access and has not typically explored the quality of special education programming available. However, absent quality support and services, access to charter schools is essentially a hollow promise. This report examines…

In this article the authors report findings from a practice-based study that examines the cultural practices of data use among 59 science and engineering faculty from three large, public research universities. In this exploratory study they documented how faculty use teaching-related data "in the wild" using interviews and classroom…

Developmental education is often criticized for its expense. Some believe that it represents a failure of secondary education and is, therefore, a redundant expense. Others believe that developmental education serves a vital role in preparing students for college and is, therefore, a necessary expense. This article provides a review of the…

Since the 2001 passage of the No Child Left Behind Act (NCLB), test-based accountability has been an organizing principle--perhaps "the" organizing principle--of efforts to improve American schools. But lately, accountability has been under fire from many critics, including Common Core opponents and those calling for more multifaceted…

"Disenchantment" has been a popular trope in the social sciences since Max Weber's appropriation of the term nearly a century ago. In recent years, however, scholars have come to argue that, in contrast to the standard modernization story of unabated rationalization, organizations have long been subject to countervailing forces. In this…

Students who have followed routes to Western universities other than the 'traditional' one--that is, an uninterrupted path from school to university--face greater challenges to their democratic participation in higher education than their "traditional" counterparts. Until recently, universities have predominantly expected students with…

In keeping with the theme of the 40th anniversary issue of "EJTE," this article looks back and forward at US teacher education accountability. It argues that "holding teacher education accountable" has been the major approach to reforming teacher education in the US for the last two decades, assuming that enhanced teacher…

In recent years, there has been an increase in the popularity of personalized learning (PL) and educational technology in American K-12 schools. In particular, school models that use technology to deliver personalized learning experiences for students have proliferated. Still, few studies have investigated these phenomena in K-12 contexts, with no…

This paper is a critique of the school education productivity evaluation and two research constructs germane to it, "teacher quality" and "teacher effectiveness." The paper will argue that policy inceptions of "teacher quality" and "teacher effectiveness" proxy for the productive capacity of schools and more…

Ralph Wolff is founder and president of The Quality Assurance Commons (https:// theqacommons.org) and an independent policy consultant focusing on accreditation and quality assurance processes in the United States and internationally. He served as president of the Western Association of Schools and Colleges (WASC) Senior College and University…

This study investigates knowledge structures and scientific communication using bibliometric methods to explore scientific knowledge production and dissemination. The aim is to develop knowledge about this growing field by investigating studies using international large-scale assessment (ILSA) data, with a specific focus on those using Programme…

In the context of high-stakes accountability, education-related policy efforts have aimed to address the improvement of persistently low-achieving (PLA) schools via turnaround reform strategies. Such strategies provide opportunities for educational leaders to influence the process; however, limited research examining the role of the assistant…

Purpose: The purpose of this paper is to gain insights into how a group of novice principals, all in schools that deployed principles of autonomy as mechanisms for improvement, conceptualized what the authors label "controlled autonomy"--a condition in which school leaders are expected to both make site-based decisions and be accountable…