Restructuring large schools into smaller, more personalized learning communities focused on developing students academically, socially, and emotionally has the potential to produce better outcomes for students. Although small school reform in large urban high schools has been the focus of the research literature on school reform in the last…

The Baltimore City Public School System (BCPSS) is one of the first urban districts in the country to undertake large-scale high school reform, phasing in small learning communities by opening new high schools and transforming large, comprehensive high schools into small high schools. With support from the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation, a dozen…

This article provides an overview of the approach, methodology, and key findings from a theory-based evaluation of the district-led instructional reform effort in San Diego City Schools, under the leadership of Alan Bersin and Anthony Alvarado, that began in 1998. Beginning with an analysis of the achievement trends in San Diego relative to other…

Literature on school reform has emphasized the need for principals to expand beyond their traditionally administrative role and become instructional leaders. This article examines the relationship between the practice of site-based instructional leadership and the professional development that teachers received in the context of a district-wide…

This study was designed to examine the effects of a whole school reform, the Knowledge is Power Program (KIPP), specifically designed to raise academic achievement of at-risk urban middle school students by establishing an extended school day and year, a rigorous curriculum, after-school access to teachers, and increased family-school connections.…

Comprehensive school reform (CSR), a federally funded program, is designed to raise student achievement via the implementation of whole school reforms. Unfortunately, although close to 400 CSR models have been adopted by schools nationally, there is relatively limited empirical evidence from rigorous research studies regarding the effectiveness of…

This article reports on 4 distinct Illinois reform initiatives that attempted to connect assessment to curriculum, instruction, and school improvement. Using quantitative and qualitative data obtained from principals and teachers involved in local reform efforts from 1993 through 2002, this study indicates that the lack of development of local…

We evaluated the role that social capital among teachers plays in affecting teacher pedagogy in the context of comprehensive school reform (CSR). CSR implementation was designed to change school- and classroom-level processes, including organization and governance, curriculum and instruction, professional development (PD), and parental…

One of the greatest challenges to comprehensive school reform (CSR) is sustaining reform over a period long enough to produce substantial effects. This article highlights the importance of studying sustainability as well as the importance of being clear about what is being sustained, distinguishing between a sustained reform relationship and…

No Child Left Behind (NCLB) accountability mechanisms have the potential to derail comprehensive school reform (CSR) implementation. For those pursuing CSR, the question is how to reconcile the implementation of NCLB accountability mandates with ongoing CSR efforts. Drawing from longitudinal data from a national study of CSR, this article explores…

The process through which a school adopts a comprehensive school reform (CSR) model has been suggested to be a key element in the lifecycle of school reform, contributing to stakeholder buy in and subsequent implementation. We studied the model adoption process, both on a national scale with survey data and in more depth with qualitative case…

Comprehensive school reform (CSR) is only as effective as its implementation. By using data collected for the National Longitudinal Evaluation of Comprehensive School Reform (NLECSR), this article explores the factors that predict CSR model implementation and the ways that CSR model implementation varies. We found little difference in the fidelity…

Despite comprehensive school reform (CSR) model developers' best intentions to make school stakeholders adhere strictly to the implementation of model components, school stakeholders implementing CSR models inevitably make adaptations to the CSR model. Adaptations are made to CSR models because school stakeholders internalize CSR model practices…

In 1998, the New Jersey Supreme Court ordered schools in 30 urban school districts to adopt comprehensive school reform (CSR) models as a part of the long-running Abbott v. Burke school finance case. Five years later, the Court would relax that mandate, resulting in a major education policy shift as the New Jersey Department of Education formally…

Elementary school principals who received a Comprehensive School Reform (CSR) award in January or August 2002 (n = 21) were invited to be interviewed in the late spring and summer of 2003. A total of 19 principals consented to audiotaped interviews. The interviews focused on several CSR dimensions, including principals' beliefs about the extent to…