Settings for School Improvement

The last two decades have witnessed tens of thousands of attempts to improve schooling for primary and secondary school students. Some attempts are highly local; others range in scope from small (a cluster of schools) to very large (a nationwide school system). Many school reform efforts have simultaneously built upon and contributed to our knowledge base about school improvement, but we have much to learn if we are to make school improvement systematic and sustainable. The area of school reform provides a case in point for this conference's theme-- Celebrating the Past: Envisioning the Future . It also provides an excellent vehicle for celebrating the life and work of Professor John Elkins. Through his work and example, John has helped lead the way in exploring how we can improve literacy outcomes, particularly for students whom schools have failed to teach adequately--diverse students, students with disabilities, and students with few economic resources. In this paper I will briefly review some of the findings from research and practice in school reform, with a special focus on literacy outcomes and in schools with students at risk. We know quite a few very useful things. But what has been missing from the discussion about school reform is a seminal concept first articulated by Seymour Sarason 30 years ago in a little-known classic, The Creation of Settings and the Future Societies. I will describe the concept of "settings," show video examples of effective settings for school improvement, and argue that without these settings systematic and sustainable school improvement is unlikely.     

未来技术学院如何引领未来

率先在全球范围内推动未来技术学院建设,对于中国跻身未来技术全球竞争、促进人才培养模式变革具有关键意义.本文从理论、实践两个维度对未来技术学院的概念、方法、标准等展开了讨论,对比分析了中国科学院大学和麻省理工学院的未来技术学院建设路径.研究认为,未来技术竞争的核心是未来技术人才培养所依托的高等教育体系、政策、制度的比拼,...     

Systemic Change for School Improvement

Despite the nationwide emphasis on school improvement, the complexities of accomplishing desired systemic changes have been given short shrift in policy, research, training, and practice. This article focuses on the problem of expanding school improvement planning to better address how schools and districts intendto accomplish designated changes. Specifically, weframe and outline some basic considerations related to systemic change, and, to encourage a greater policy discussion of the complexities of implementing major school improvements on a large scale, we propose a set of policy actions.     

School Culture,School Effectiveness and School Improvement

The relevance of the concept of culture to school effectiveness and school improvement is explored. Two typologies are developed. The first proposes four ‘ideal type’ school cultures, based on two underlying domains; the second, a more elaborate and dynamic model, proposes two ‘ideal type’ school cultures, based on five underlying structures. Each is discussed for its heuristic, conceptual, methodological and explanatory potential in research in the fields of school effectiveness and school improvement. In distinguishing collegial cultures from collaborative styles, the article advances recent writing on collaboration. From the theory hypotheses about the relationship between school culture and school effectiveness and improvement can be derived as well as techniques to test such hypotheses.     

Standards and Certification for School Improvement Guides

Children depend on the support of adults in their schools to master the skills and knowledge they need to succeed. How those adults learn and work together matters. Judith Hale and Deb Page researched how those who effectively guide improvement help adults make needed changes. They developed the Certified School Improvement Specialist performance standards and job certification to support and recognize those who do this important work in schools.     

论公平有质量的学校管理改进

如何解决当前中国基础教育发展过程中在公平和质量上面对的问题,基础教育学校管理在其中承担着不可替代的责任和义务.公平和质量交融贯穿于学校管理的始终,兼顾公平和质量的学校管理改进是保障每一个受教育者身心潜能得到全面发展的基础,也是每一个适龄受教育者的基本权利.目前,在教育公平上还缺失全纳教育的理念,学生的基本权益没有受到应有的重视.在教育质量上,还没有形成支持性学校氛围,教学忽视与孩子生活的相关性.在公平与质量的机制上,学校还没有形成参与与合作的畅通机制.其缺失原因包括成人的控制与教育“致命的自负”、儿童视角的缺失与“让孩子赢在起跑线上”、“发展等同于增长”与教育不公平.为此,学校管理改进在公平上要注重所有儿童的全纳性,要尊重儿童权利;在质量上学校要建立支持性的学校氛围,关注学习的有效性和相关性;学校要建立学生、家庭和社区参与学校生活的机制.     

Future School Administrators' Perceptions of the School Counselor's Role

The authors examined the perceptions of future school administrators regarding the role of the school counselor. The study was designed to assist counselor educators and school counselors in identifying potential barriers that could interfere with establishing comprehensive developmental counseling programs that are supervised by principals and superintendents. Future administrators rated crisis intervention, assisting with transitions, and personal counseling as the most important duties of school counselors; however, some respondents identified administrative and disciplinary duties as significant ones for the counselor.     

Inspection and School Improvement

This paper questions a central assumption of OFSTED, that inspection is an effective and, moreover, a cost‐effective method for improving schools. In particular, doubts are expressed about the capacity of OFSTED inspections to identify the ‘worst’ schools and provide them with a sure mechanism for improvement. It is argued that applying OFSTED inspections to all schools discourages diversity and encourages conformity to the OFSTED school model. This would appear to be in contradiction to the Government's avowed policy of diversity and choice. A case is made for ‘reforming’ OFSTED so as to carry out a modified form of the original HMI functions of monitoring, identifying good practice and offering advice and assistance. Some further specific suggestions are given as to how the new OFSTED would operate     

宪章学校是美国教育的未来吗？

本文对美国的宪章学校及其产生的背景做了简要介绍．并对宪章学校的发展现状和利弊做了深入分析。     

宪章学校是美国教育的未来吗?

本文对美国的宪章学校及其产生的背景做了简要介绍,并对宪章学校的发展现状和利弊做了深入分析。     

School Effectiveness and School Improvement: Sustaining Links

Ideally, school effectiveness research and school improvement might have a relationship with a surplus value for both. In reality, this relationship is often troublesome. Some problems can be attributed to the intrinsic differences between effectiveness and improvement, such as different missions. However, an analysis of the current situation in effectiveness and improvement shows that there are many possibilities at all stages of research studies and improvement projects for a more fruitful relationship. In this article, stronger links between effectiveness and improvement are advocated. Such links can be achieved by better‐guided processes of application and reconstruction of knowledge during effectiveness research and improvement. These processes, illustrated by some successful projects which have started recently, are described under the heading of sustained interactivity.     

School Climate,School Improvement and Site-based Management

This article examines the relationship between school organisational climate and the school's preparedness to undertake restructuring and improvement. Over the last two decades, much research into school improvement and effectiveness has indicated the importance of school climate for a school's efforts to change. For school-level personnel, an understanding of the nature of the prevailing climate would seem valuable in determining the school's willingness and capacity to embark on school improvement initiatives and to evaluate the impact that such initiatives have on the nature of the school's climate. The research reported here was conducted in three phases. The first phase involved the assessment of the prevailing organisational climate in 30 secondary schools drawn from three State education systems in Australia. The second phase involved analysing and documenting the principles and school-level process associated with the establishment of site-based management in the three State education systems. The third phase sought teachers' perceptions about the impact of site-based management on school improvement planning, collaboration and curriculum leadership, and classroom practices. The research indicated the existence of an important relationship between organisational climate and the school's capacity to implement and sustain authentic site-based management. Where the prevailing organisational climate is negative, tailored ‘front-end’ strategies designed to improve the climate might be undertaken prior to the school embarking on substantial school improvement initiatives. Finally, assessing organisational climate can provide information about a school's preparedness to undertake change, and a re-assessment of climate following a change initiative can provide evaluative data about the extent of change within the school. This revised version was published online in July 2006 with corrections to the Cover Date.