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.     

School Effectiveness and School Attendance

ABSTRACT

Given that the British Government is proposing to require all schools to provide the Secretary of State with details of, amongst other things, their respective truancy rates, this article sets out to demonstrate that attendance figures, as well as examination results, should be modified before publication. It reports on a study involving 5,429 pupils in their final year of primary education attending 138 junior/primary schools in a single authority in Wales and utilises child, home and school data.     

关于学校文化建设与学校发展的问题

学校文化是学生一生发展的文化摇篮,优秀学校文化所给予的人格教育可以为学生一生的发展指明方向.学校文化建设决定着学校发展,决定着学校教育教学的创造力、凝聚力和竞争力.以先进文化推动学校发展应确立先进文化的建设方向、把文化建设融入学校发展战略并着力打造先进的文化风尚.     

全面建设校园文化 倾力打造特色学校

以科学发展观统领全局,努力构建＂前瞻型的观念文化＂;以师生共同发展为主线,努力构建＂民主型的制度文化＂;以积极推进新课程为重点,努力构建＂智慧型的课堂文化＂;以精致高效管理为抓手,努力构建＂和谐型的环境文化＂;以全面提升质量为目标,努力构建＂生态型的特色文化＂。在此基础上达到学校文化建设的终极目标,使学校成为符合国家教育方针的特色学校。     

学习型学校与科层制学校——两种学校的文化比较

科层制学校转变为学习型学校,本质上是学校文化的整体变迁。人本主义教育理念、管理理念和系统思考是学习型学校的精神基础,而科层制学校秉承工业时代的标准化、外在控制理念以及片面、静止的思维方式。学习型学校的规范性行为准则、宪法秩序、具体的制度以及器物安排,都不同于科层制学校。     

The Singapore School and the School Excellence Model

Nation', schools in Singapore are now asked to develop themselves into excellent schools. To support this change, the way that schools are being appraised has been changed since 2000. The school today is asked to do self-appraisal using the new School Excellence Model (SEM), which is adapted from a business excellence model. This article discusses the SEM, its major implications to the leadership and management of schools in Singapore and the areas still to be addressed in the implementation of the model. In particular, school leaders should focus on the substance and not the form of the SEM, be systemic in their approach to quality improvement in schools and truly lead the way by being the first believing and practicing member of this movement. Key Words: excellence, leadership, quality, school, self-appraisal     

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.     

学校效能研究与学校重建

追求学校教育质量与效能是当今世界各国基础教育改革的核心要旨.学校效能研究从揭示学校对学生的成就影响开始,其间经历有效学校运动到学校改进运动,其目的是改进学校,使学校成为有效能的学校.学校效能研究在40年的发展过程中在方法论上不断革新,试图揭示学校效能的因素,在实践层面为政府以及学校重建提供理论指引;同时学校效能研究面临着政治化、专门化和技术化问题,问题的解决有待于研究的进一步深化.     

Good School/Bad School: paradox and fabrication

This paper, drawn from an ESRC‐funded research project, deploys data from one secondary school to raise some general issues about the development of disciplinary technologies of surveillance and uses of performativity in education. It is argued that the use of Total Quality Management, School Development Planning and Ofsted (The Office for Standards in Education) Inspections, individually and collectively produce an intensification of teachers’ work, submit teachers more directly to the ‘gaze’ of policy, and encourage schools and teachers to ‘fabricate’ themselves for the purposes of evaluation and comparison. The paper is premised on the argument that schools cannot be represented adequately within research (or evaluation) by simple stories or single essentialising tags; ‘good/bad’, ‘successful/failing’ ‐‐ they are inherently paradoxical institutions.     

校史研究与学校发展

校史研究在学校发展中发挥了重要的作用,体现在制度建设、学科建设、资源建设、文化建设等多个方面。包括推动学校发展研究,丰富课程资源,促进特色非正式出版文献建设,搭建开放合作平台,促进培育校园文化,为大学文化建设提供更好的更全面的服务。     

Transition to School: Developmental Trajectories and School Experiences

Because of the premium now placed on a formal education as well as the changing demographics of American society, school failure is now more costly than ever. Given that academic difficulties experienced by children are traceable to problems in underachievement that begin during the first years of early schooling, a thorough understanding of the transition-to-school process is needed. We suggest two principal assumptions in examining this transition-to-kindergarten period. First, multiple risk factors associated with certain child, family, and child care characteristics are expected to predict early school experience, both in and out of the classroom, and, thereby, social and academic success and failure in the early school years. Secondly, it is expected that day-to-day experiences in the classroom and on the playground will exacerbate or mitigate risk, resulting in some children performing better than would otherwise be expected and others functioning worse than anticipated. Thus, a critically important problem involves the identification of child, family, child care, and schooling factors and processes which account for risk being realized or not realized with regard to subsequent academic and school performance.     

Transition to School: Developmental Trajectories and School Experiences

Because of the premium now placed on a formal education as well as the changing demographics of American society, school failure is now more costly than ever. Given that academic difficulties experienced by children are traceable to problems in underachievement that begin during the first years of early schooling, a thorough understanding of the transition-to-school process is needed. We suggest two principal assumptions in examining this transition-to-kindergarten period. First, multiple risk factors associated with certain child, family, and child care characteristics are expected to predict early school experience, both in and out of the classroom, and, thereby, social and academic success and failure in the early school years. Secondly, it is expected that day-to-day experiences in the classroom and on the playground will exacerbate or mitigate risk, resulting in some children performing better than would otherwise be expected and others functioning worse than anticipated. Thus, a critically important problem involves the identification of child, family, child care, and schooling factors and processes which account for risk being realized or not realized with regard to subsequent academic and school performance.     

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.     

论中小学校长的办学理念

校长办学理念是校长对办学实践的理性思考和理想追求,是校长办学信念的集中体现,具有理想性、全局性、实践性、独特性、稳定性的基本特征。重视办学理念,是中小学校长专业发展的内在需要,是学校组织发展的内在需要,也是时代发展的迫切需要。中小学校长应确立创新生活是学校的基本使命、爱是教育的基本途径、教师是学校发展的第一关键资源的办学理念,不断丰富自我人生实践和办学实践,自觉确立高远的人生信念,大力提升教育理论素养。     

学校发展的现实困境与可持续学校领导

当前中小学的发展已经陷入可持续性不足的困境中,主要表现为学生的浅表性学习与厌学情绪弥散,校长、教师的应付性工作与教育热情隐退,学校之间的过度竞争与发展能量消耗,标准化要求与学校种群单一。突破这一困境需要我们确立一种可持续学校领导观。可持续学校领导观强调学习的深入性,追求领导的广泛性,关注领导的延续性,坚持领导的正义性,珍视教育生态的多样性。要将可持续领导从观念落到实践,需要我们构建起可持续学校领导系统,形成学校领导共同体,做好学校领导更替工作,并关注学校领导在纵向时间上的关联。     

论学校信息和学校信息管理

教育活动是一种信息活动,学校信息的使用是学校教育活动正常进行的基本条件,信息动力是现代学校管理系统和学校教育系统运转和发展的强大动力。学校自身及校外有关系统运动变化所产生的各种有用信息,教职工掌握知识和信息的多少,学校校风,教职员工的爱好、志趣、好奇心等等所产生的推动力是学校教育和管理系统的信息动力的多种存在形式。而学校信息环境的优化是学校信息建设要注意的问题。现代学校的信息管理通常要借助于学校管理信息系统来完成,这个系统是由输入、处理、输出、反馈四个要素有机地组成的一个整体,是由收集、整理学校信息,加工、传输学校信息,贮存、反馈学校信息等基本环节构成的一个信息处理过程。     

儒家与墨家“仁”之比较

针对春秋战国时期混乱的社会局面,孔子和墨子提出了不同的见解。“仁爱”与“兼爱”的共同点在于他们的合理价值内核及最终的理想境界是没有分别的,他们真正的区别在于：“仁”的包容性大于“爱”;墨家主张爱无差等,儒家主张爱有差等。     

学校防毒教育的重要性及其对策

学校是预防毒品教育的重要基地。本文通过对学校防毒教育重要性的探讨以及青少年吸毒原因的深入分析,联系阿坝师专防毒教育工作的开展,在学校防毒教育的对策上进行了有益的探索。     

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