In response to a report from the President's Council of Advisors on Science and Technology, President Obama issued a challenge to the U.S. education system to create more than 1,000 new STEM-focused schools, including 200 high schools. Inclusive STEM-focused high schools--which focus their efforts on females, minorities, and students who are…

If you can believe the daily flood of mass media stories, journal articles, and white papers, the United States is facing a STEM worker crisis. Business leaders and politicians warn that the nation is falling hopelessly behind in the global economic race because our students are unprepared for and uninterested in science, technology, engineering,…

"Improving Schools: What Works?" is the theme chosen for this issue of "Educational Leadership (EL)," and this theme should help dispel just one of the myths that have grown up about school reform: that educators are stuck in the status quo and don't care to implement change. This and some other myths about school…

School improvement programs that work in some places don't work in others. School improvement programs that work with some students don't work with others. Programs that appear to have positive effects in the hands of some teachers don't work for other teachers. If we can't be confident that a program will travel well, from one…

The key practices that improve struggling schools, writes Chenoweth--a researcher who's studied successful high-poverty schools and their leaders--aren't a mystery. From both decades of research and the craft knowledge of educators who've jumped in and turned around schools, we know these practices generally yield improvement: (1) a…

For the 12 years that Michael Bloomberg was mayor of New York City, the Big Apple was home to the nation's largest experiment in implementing the business model of education reform. The numbers of public school closings and new charter schools soared, while the high school student assignment system was overhauled to be driven by choice. By…

School leaders are often drowning in data but are unsure which forms of data will help them create a portrait of student achievement that will motivate staff to look beyond simple trends and delve deeper into root causes. Teachers often wish for more guidance on the kinds of data analysis and teaching strategies that will help them move the needle…

In 2005, the graduation rate for the Council Bluffs Community School District was, at 68 percent, the lowest in Iowa. District leaders knew that to improve, they needed to create a cultural change throughout the community. They began by getting community members involved in creating a strategic plan and mission statement that included a guarantee…

It must have seemed simple to the framers of No Child Left Behind. For years, they had poured more and more money into federal programs for schools, yet reading performance had not improved. It appeared that the money had gone down a rat hole, and Congress was ready to hold schools accountable. It was time to get tough. Unfortunately, the…

School improvement initiatives can be like New Year's resolutions. They begin with a cherished vision of possibility and a spirit of commitment, and at first they make genuine progress. But over the long run, they fizzle out. In this article, David N. Perkins and James Reese explore four factors that help determine whether a change effort…

Improved teacher morale and improved learning for all students go hand in hand. But what, exactly, do we mean by student learning? And what is the aim of this learning? According to Nel Noddings, the success of our efforts to boost teacher morale through greater collegiality, creativity, and continuity will depend on how we answer these questions.…

The teaching profession in the United States is under assault. A regimen of reforms threatens educators with sanctions under No Child Left Behind and Race to the Top. Pay-for-performance measures are a slap in the face, implying that teachers need financial carrots dangled in front of them to ensure they work hard. And there's also the public…

What's the best way to turn around a persistently low-performing school? Is it better to simply replace the principal and teachers, or is it necessary to reopen under new charter management? Maybe policymakers are asking the wrong question, writes Halley Potter. What if, instead of replacing the adults at the school, we changed the mix of…

The video "Wealth Inequality in America" sets forth a compelling animated chart depicting three ideas: (1) how Americans think wealth is distributed in the United States;(2) how they believe wealth ideally should be distributed; and (3) how the estimated $54 trillion of U.S. wealth is really divided. The hard-to-miss conclusion of the…

It's easy to make excuses for not integrating technology into classes, and some of these excuses do have merit. If teachers plan on making the effort to overcome these difficulties, they must believe strongly in the strategies they select and stick to them long enough to at least test their effectiveness. Technology use is sometimes referred…