Through programs aimed at enhancing educational effectiveness, states can play important and substantive roles in helping local schools, students, teachers, and principals improve, according to the study "State Strategies to Support Local School Improvement: Cross Site Analysis." The study identifies the key elements of the local change process that improve the skills of teachers and principals and transform schools into effective organizations. These key elements and their sequencing and linkages form a general implementation structure that schools can adopt for their own implementation efforts. The research used a case study approach to analyze data from 10 states and about 40 schools between 1983 and 1985. The study sought to identify effective state school improvement strategies, the conditions under which state strategies work effectively at the local level, and the methods by which effective strategies work. The effects of the state environment, the local environment, the state program, the local program, and program outcomes were examined. The state programs studied involved both instructional improvement programs and schoolwide improvement programs. This report reviews state and local environmental factors affecting success, then identifies influential variables at four stages of the implementation process: initiation, initial implementation, complete implementation, and institutionalization. The causal network in all four stages is presented in diagram form. (PGD)