Since 1987, Indiana Middle Grades Reading Network, funded by Lily Endowment, initiated a variety of projects designed to promote young adolescents' reading. A Reading Bill of Rights was developed to create communities of readers. Some valuable lessons emerged: attention must be given to teens' reading needs; schools must be central; students need…

Describes the Senior Project, a program at California State University, Fresno, designed to help children at risk of school failure. The project stresses one-on-one mentoring of at-risk, limited-English-speaking children by Liberal Studies/teacher preparation majors. Plans for most sessions feature reading and writing activities, simple science…

In January 1997, Michael Berenbaum became president and chief executive officer of Survivors of the Shoah Visual History Foundation, the organization established by filmmaker Steven Spielberg after completing "Schindler's List." Since 1994, the foundation has been recording eyewitness testimony on the Holocaust. Berenbaum's mandate is to share…

Explores the social ecology of classroom aggression, demystifying four common "response dispositions" (exquisite sensitivity, group offense patrol, slight trigger disease, and heavy into violence) that provide fertile ground for uncivil behavior. To create a climate of classroom civility, teachers should engage in self-analysis, imagine a civil…

Classic propaganda techniques (repetition, testimonials, transfers of one quality to another, and painstaking imagery) work best in "closed" environments--exactly the situation advertisers have in Channel-One classrooms. Private, vulnerable, and sacred, the human psyche is not a commodity to be sold. Yet, such commerce will continue until…

A Japanese editorial in an English-language daily harshly criticized Japanese education's failure to enhance students' spirit of independence; develop critical and artistic thinking skills; and promote social awareness and an international viewpoint. The United States finished fourth out of 60 in the (unpublicized) International Math Olympiad.…

By overruling both "Aguilar v. Felton" and its companion case, "School District of Grand Rapids v. Ball" as inconsistent with their current understanding of the Establishment Clause, U.S. Supreme Court majority held that "a federally funded program providing supplemental, remedial instruction to disadvantaged children on a neutral basis is not…

Although Americans still cling to the ideal of free public education, the broad mandate that once tied schools to this ideal and other social, economic, and political objectives is fading. Publics, created out of multitudinous self-interests, form via deliberation. Deliberative forums can produce an agenda for actions linked by a shared sense of…

In 1995, Public Agenda and the Institute for Educational Leadership joined forces to develop a means for citizens, community leaders, and educators to hold public conversations on issues facing America's schools. Conversations help community members build common ground for improving schools. Success hinges on credible local sponsors, group…

The executive director of Public Agenda describes the seven-stage journey toward public consensus, underlines the importance of genuine public involvement, and provides some common-sense principles to guide those seeking to foster public engagement. Reform-minded educators should listen carefully, create an ongoing process, seek diverse…

The Hattiesburg (Mississippi) Area Education Foundation (HAEF), a local fund serving the community's educational interests since 1988, recently evaluated its own organizational effectiveness and identified barriers to its work (multidistrict environment, business ambivalence toward education, and white flight). HAEF encouraged five districts to…

Directors of the American Association of School Administrators and the National School Boards Association discuss superintendents' and school boards' complementary roles in ensuring that all community members become public school stakeholders. Boards and superintendents must respect each other, stop sending mixed signals, clarify roles and goals,…

Due to time and monetary pressures on former supporters, schools must confront an exponentially changing society with antiquated structures and less external support. Transcending these difficulties will require the collective support of schools, parents, communities, businesses, and students. Schools must focus on their primary mission, adopt…

"Phi Delta Kappan" conducted 28 public forums exploring participants' views about public schools' purposes, effectiveness, and needed changes. Once engaged, community members were enthusiastic about discussing public schools' future, indicated they left the forums better informed, and found the three-question format productive. Planners should…

Pervasive mistrust in societal institutions may be keeping many community members from participating in forums on public education's future. If our democracy is to function, we must dispel distrust by talking face-to-face to one another. There is something especially meaningful about conversing one-on-one or in small groups about fundamental…