Trust in Schools

Trust in Schools
Author: Anthony Bryk
Publisher: Russell Sage Foundation
Total Pages: 238
Release: 2002-09-05
Genre: Education
ISBN: 161044096X

Most Americans agree on the necessity of education reform, but there is little consensus about how this goal might be achieved. The rhetoric of standards and vouchers has occupied center stage, polarizing public opinion and affording little room for reflection on the intangible conditions that make for good schools. Trust in Schools engages this debate with a compelling examination of the importance of social relationships in the successful implementation of school reform. Over the course of three years, Bryk and Schneider, together with a diverse team of other researchers and school practitioners, studied reform in twelve Chicago elementary schools. Each school was undergoing extensive reorganization in response to the Chicago School Reform Act of 1988, which called for greater involvement of parents and local community leaders in their neighborhood schools. Drawing on years longitudinal survey and achievement data, as well as in-depth interviews with principals, teachers, parents, and local community leaders, the authors develop a thorough account of how effective social relationships—which they term relational trust—can serve as a prime resource for school improvement. Using case studies of the network of relationships that make up the school community, Bryk and Schneider examine how the myriad social exchanges that make up daily life in a school community generate, or fail to generate, a successful educational environment. The personal dynamics among teachers, students, and their parents, for example, influence whether students regularly attend school and sustain their efforts in the difficult task of learning. In schools characterized by high relational trust, educators were more likely to experiment with new practices and work together with parents to advance improvements. As a result, these schools were also more likely to demonstrate marked gains in student learning. In contrast, schools with weak trust relations saw virtually no improvement in their reading or mathematics scores. Trust in Schools demonstrates convincingly that the quality of social relationships operating in and around schools is central to their functioning, and strongly predicts positive student outcomes. This book offer insights into how trust can be built and sustained in school communities, and identifies some features of public school systems that can impede such development. Bryk and Schneider show how a broad base of trust across a school community can provide a critical resource as education professional and parents embark on major school reforms. A Volume in the American Sociological Association's Rose Series in Sociology

Organizing Schools for Improvement

Organizing Schools for Improvement
Author: Anthony S. Bryk
Publisher: University of Chicago Press
Total Pages: 328
Release: 2010-03-15
Genre: Education
ISBN: 0226078019

In 1988, the Chicago public school system decentralized, granting parents and communities significant resources and authority to reform their schools in dramatic ways. To track the effects of this bold experiment, the authors of Organizing Schools for Improvement collected a wealth of data on elementary schools in Chicago. Over a seven-year period they identified one hundred elementary schools that had substantially improved—and one hundred that had not. What did the successful schools do to accelerate student learning? The authors of this illuminating book identify a comprehensive set of practices and conditions that were key factors for improvement, including school leadership, the professional capacity of the faculty and staff, and a student-centered learning climate. In addition, they analyze the impact of social dynamics, including crime, critically examining the inextricable link between schools and their communities. Putting their data onto a more human scale, they also chronicle the stories of two neighboring schools with very different trajectories. The lessons gleaned from this groundbreaking study will be invaluable for anyone involved with urban education.

Handbook of Research in Education Finance and Policy

Handbook of Research in Education Finance and Policy
Author: Helen F. Ladd
Publisher: Routledge
Total Pages: 693
Release: 2014-12-17
Genre: Education
ISBN: 1135041067

Sponsored by the Association for Education Finance and Policy (AEFP), the second edition of this groundbreaking handbook assembles in one place the existing research-based knowledge in education finance and policy, with particular attention to elementary and secondary education. Chapters from the first edition have been fully updated and revised to reflect current developments, new policies, and recent research. With new chapters on teacher evaluation, alternatives to traditional public schooling, and cost-benefit analysis, this volume provides a readily available current resource for anyone involved in education finance and policy. The Handbook of Research in Education Finance and Policy traces the evolution of the field from its initial focus on school inputs and revenue sources used to finance these inputs, to a focus on educational outcomes and the larger policies used to achieve them. Chapters show how decision making in school finance inevitably interacts with decisions about governance, accountability, equity, privatization, and other areas of education policy. Because a full understanding of important contemporary issues requires inputs from a variety of perspectives, the Handbook draws on contributors from a number of disciplines. Although many of the chapters cover complex, state-of-the-art empirical research, the authors explain key concepts in language that non-specialists can understand. This comprehensive, balanced, and accessible resource provides a wealth of factual information, data, and wisdom to help educators improve the quality of education in the United States.

Influencing High Student Achievement through School Culture and Climate

Influencing High Student Achievement through School Culture and Climate
Author: Steven Busch
Publisher: Routledge
Total Pages: 148
Release: 2019-01-15
Genre: Education
ISBN: 1351205579

This book demonstrates how the school principal’s consideration of culture and climate of the school can significantly improve and sustain student achievement over time. Highlighting an innovative approach to organizational health and student achievement, this volume uses inferential statistical data analysis to quantify the way school leaders can strategically interact within school culture and systems to improve student achievement. A cutting-edge analysis of the importance of school climate, this book draws on current research from the Organizational Health Inventory diagnostic framework to provide data-based conceptual models of the relation between culture and leadership.

Handbook of the Economics of Education

Handbook of the Economics of Education
Author: Eric A. Hanushek
Publisher: Elsevier
Total Pages: 614
Release: 2010-11-11
Genre: Education
ISBN: 0080961827

How does education affect economic and social outcomes, and how can it inform public policy?Volume 3 of the Handbooks in the Economics of Education uses newly available high quality data from around the world to address these and other core questions. With the help of new methodological approaches, contributors cover econometric methods and international test score data. They examine the determinants of educational outcomes and issues surrounding teacher salaries and licensure. And reflecting government demands for more evidence-based policies, they take new looks at institutional feaures of school systems. Volume editors Eric A. Hanushek (Stanford), Stephen Machin (University College London) and Ludger Woessmann (Ifo Institute for Economic Research, Munich) draw clear lines between newly emerging research on the economics of education and prior work. In conjunction with Volume 4, they measure our current understanding of educational acquisition and its economic and social effects. - Uses rich data to study issues of high contemporary policy relevance - Demonstrates how education serves as an important determinant of economic and social outcomes - Benefits from the globalization of research in the economics of education

Students of Color and the Achievement Gap

Students of Color and the Achievement Gap
Author: Richard R. Valencia
Publisher: Routledge
Total Pages: 374
Release: 2015-03-05
Genre: Education
ISBN: 1317691067

Students of Color and the Achievement Gap is a comprehensive, landmark analysis of an incontrovertible racialized reality in U.S. K-12 public education---the relentless achievement gap between low-socioeconomic students of color and their economically advantaged White counterparts. Award winning author and scholar Richard Valencia provides an authoritative and systemic treatment of the achievement gap, focusing on Black and Latino/Latina students. He examines the societal and educational factors that help to create and maintain the achievement gap by drawing from critical race theory, an asset-based perspective and a systemic inequality approach. By showing how racialized opportunity structures in society and schools ultimately result in racialized patterns of academic achievement in schools, Valencia shows how the various indicators of the achievement gap are actually symptoms of the societal and school quality gaps. Following each of these concerns, Valencia provides a number of reform suggestions that can lead to systemic transformations of K-12 education. Students of Color and the Achievement Gap makes a persuasive and well documented case that school success for students of color, and the empowerment of their parents, can only be fully understood and realized when contextualized within broader political, economic, and cultural frameworks.

Teaching 2030

Teaching 2030
Author: Barnett Berry
Publisher: Teachers College Press
Total Pages: 273
Release: 2011-01-01
Genre: Education
ISBN: 0807751545

In the raging controversy over the purpose of public education and how to fix the nation's underperforming schools, the voices of America's best teachers are seldom heard. Now for the first time, in a provocative book about the future of teaching and learning, 12 of America's most accomplished classroom educators join a leading advocate for a 21st-century teaching profession to bring expert pedagogical know-how and fresh and provocative policy ideas to the national school reform debate. Together they identify four emergent realities that will shape the learning experience of children born in the New Millennium, and propose six levers of change that can ignite a bright future for students by ensuring they all have access to excellent teaching.

Handbook of the Economics of Education

Handbook of the Economics of Education
Author: Eric A Hanushek
Publisher: Elsevier
Total Pages: 853
Release: 2006-11-13
Genre: Business & Economics
ISBN: 0080465668

The Handbooks in Economics series continues to provide the various branches of economics with handbooks which are definitive reference sources, suitable for use by professional researchers, advanced graduate students, or by those seeking a teaching supplement. With contributions from leading researchers, each Handbook presents an accurate, self-contained survey of the current state of the topic under examination. These surveys summarize the most recent discussions in journals, and elucidate new developments. Although original material is also included, the main aim of this series is the provision of comprehensive and accessible surveys. *Every volume contains contributions from leading researchers *Each Handbook presents an accurate, self-contained survey of a particular topic *The series provides comprehensive and accessible surveys

Remaking College

Remaking College
Author: Mitchell Stevens
Publisher: Stanford University Press
Total Pages: 336
Release: 2015-01-07
Genre: Education
ISBN: 0804793557

Between 1945 and 1990 the United States built the largest and most productive higher education system in world history. Over the last two decades, however, dramatic budget cuts to public academic services and skyrocketing tuition have made college completion more difficult for many. Nevertheless, the democratic promise of education and the global competition for educated workers mean ever growing demand. Remaking College considers this changing context, arguing that a growing accountability revolution, the push for greater efficiency and productivity, and the explosion of online learning are changing the character of higher education. Writing from a range of disciplines and professional backgrounds, the contributors each bring a unique perspective to the fate and future of U.S. higher education. By directing their focus to schools doing the lion's share of undergraduate instruction—community colleges, comprehensive public universities, and for-profit institutions—they imagine a future unencumbered by dominant notions of "traditional" students, linear models of achievement, and college as a four-year residential experience. The result is a collection rich with new tools for helping people make more informed decisions about college—for themselves, for their children, and for American society as a whole.

Creating a New Teaching Profession

Creating a New Teaching Profession
Author: Daniel D. Goldhaber
Publisher: Rowman & Littlefield Publishers
Total Pages: 0
Release: 2009
Genre: Education
ISBN: 9780877667629

This edited volume is about the human capital systems that help determine the quality of the K-12 teaching workforce in the United States and how to improve them.