There are two types of school leadership initiatives. One takes existing leaders and gives them increasing leadership responsibilities. The other engages in an organic process that grows leaders from a crop of teachers who, at first may not appear to be leaders at all. This article presents a story about the second type of initiative and how it…

This article describes the use of standards to guide the reform of a struggling high school in Grant Michigan. The author describes the challenges and obstacles that the school was facing, and admits that school reform was difficult. Turnaround seemed impossible, but it held the promise of something larger than life: successful students who become…

This article presents a plan to create a united approach to improve high quality instruction in Robbinsdale Cooper High School in New Hope, Minnesota, a suburb of Minneapolis. Professional learning communities were in their infancy, conversations around data were about autopsies of annual standardized tests, and there was no description of what…

High school students who are not proficient readers struggle in content classes and often do not graduate from high school. However, they have promise to do so with well-designed and implemented reading curriculum and effective instruction. Without it, they may have difficulty competing in the global workplace (Gordon & Oliva, 2012). One…

This article describes an initiative designed to improve the content-area literacy skills of all students at a Massachusetts high school and to demonstrate the important role teacher leaders play in bridging the various elements of school improvement efforts. Meeting students' language and literacy needs within content-area classrooms is…

Adopting new curricula presents both a need and an opportunity for professional development to advance teacher content knowledge and instructional practices for achieving curriculum-specific student outcomes. This study examines two modalities of professional development: face-to-face in a summer workshop and online that included two days of…

Saskatoon Public Schools made the decision 10 years ago to undertake major changes in how it supports professional learning. The district began with two major priorities: increasing literacy in elementary schools and transforming high schools to increase student engagement. The district appointed a facilitator for each priority in central office,…

While teachers face new expectations for student learning and more equitable educational outcomes, instruction and assessment remain rooted in traditional approaches that are largely inequitable, culturally irrelevant, and intellectually disengaging, contributing to gaps in academic achievement across student groups (Darling-Hammond, 2010; King…

E.A. Johnson High School is located in Mt. Morris, Michigan, near Flint, where the city has felt deeply the impact of the area's economic decline. 72% of the student population qualify for free and reduced lunch. The staff was willing to make the changes necessary for success, but needed more than a book study. Many of the structures for…

Formed in 2007, the Riverpoint Partnership for Math and Science is a group of Spokane K-12 and college administrators who came together to use their combined resources and knowledge to focus on improving student learning. With a grant from the U.S. Department of Education, the group launched the Riverpoint Advanced Mathematics Partnership project…

Through learning communities, schools can change to strengthen educator practice and improve student learning outcomes. So can districts. For 20 years, the authors have helped states, districts, and schools in the United States and Canada implement Whole-Faculty Study Groups, a design for learning communities. During the 2010-11 school year, they…

A teacher can be the most important resource in a school. When the teacher's attitude derives from asset-based thinking, positive impact can occur for both teacher and student. Asset-based thinking is defined as "a way of viewing reality." Those who embrace this model approach things from a positive as opposed to a negative perspective.…

Everyone is appalled at reports of rampant cheating among high school and college students, primarily by cutting and pasting from the Internet without providing citations. There are situations in real life where an individual suffered serious consequences for plagiarizing work. Many schools incorporate such scenarios in character education…

Hillsborough County (Fla.) Public Schools had a concern. A review in 2008 of teacher evaluations in the district found that more than 99% of the 12,000 teachers were rated satisfactory or outstanding, and nearly half of high school teachers received perfect scores. While Hillsborough is a high-performing district and has several high schools on…

In Essex County, New Jersey, whose county seat is Newark, students have the option of attending one of four vocational high schools. The Essex County Vocational School District draws students from the county seeking instruction in a multitude of career and technical areas. North 13th Street Technical School is one of the four vocational options.…