This research examined pre-service teachers' perceptions of urban schools and urban students before and after an 80-hour field experience in an urban K-12 district. The fieldwork placements were structured through a school-university partnership, and supported by university coursework. Quantitative data collected from 150 students over three…

This paper focuses on the implementation of Proposition 227 and its impact on the education of English learners in California's K-12 public schools since its passage in 1998. The paper begins with an examination of the sociopolitical context surrounding the proposition and its implementation. The implementation of the new law is then discussed,…

There exist many actors within the realm of education policy planning and implementation, namely: the policy makers; the national, local and regional institutions engaged in the dissemination and interpretation of these policies; and the educational institutions that implement these policies at the ground level (schools). While schools are largely…

There is great enthusiasm in Philadelphia and in districts across the country now for "data-driven decision-making" -- using the information from assessments of student learning to guide plans for what to teach and how to teach it. The core curriculum has been aligned with state standards in different content areas, and the mandated…

The purpose of this study was to establish the relationship between urban school mobility and school ratings, one of the performance indicators mandated for schools under the 2001 No Child Left Behind Act (NCLB) by the Ohio Department of Education (ODE) and the U.S. Department of Education. While many studies have linked school mobility and…

Schools with more targets to meet under NCLB were far more likely to be branded as in need of improvement. Some critics of the federal No Child Left Behind Act (NCLB) have argued that large schools and schools with a diverse student population are penalized by the law's provisions. School performance results from 2004 in Philadelphia appear to…

Three teachers in an inquiry group reflect on what it takes to be an excellent, persistent urban teacher. Analysis of the data generated from this inquiry included such themes as teaching as intellectual work and teaching as democratic practice. Highlights problems confronting urban schools, among which are teacher retention; teacher diversity and…

This keynote address introduces the concept of educational sovereignty (the need to challenge the arbitrary authority of the power structure to determine the essence of the educational experience for Hispanic and other minority students), concluding that communities must create their own infrastructures for development including mechanisms for the…

This conversation between two educators begins by examining what brought them to their interest in looking at learning from an ethnographic perspective. Though they come from different viewpoints in regard to education, they agree that they got interested in ethnography through teaching. They discuss time, space, and language in relation to…

Describes what the Tellin' Stories Project (TSP) Action Research Team discovered about meaningful family involvement during a 3-year study of teachers', students', and parents' stories of meaningful family roles. The TSP uses the power of story to engage parents, primarily from diverse low-income backgrounds, as purposeful partners in education.…