Author Brig Leane introduces the PLC Dashboard, a tool designed to help administrators and teachers efficiently implement the PLC at Work® process. This resource utilizes a seven-step learning cycle, complete with illustrative examples, concise templates, and reflective exercises. The dashboard helps clarify and strengthen the PLC process to…

The National Standards and Benchmarks for Effective Catholic Elementary and Secondary Schools (NSBECS) were published in 2012 to serve as both a guide and assessment tool for PK-12 Catholic school effectiveness and sustainability. The NSBECS rest on the conviction that adhering to these standards and benchmarks with fidelity will result in highly…

Wide variation exists with respect to how Literacy by 3 is implemented. Though the Literacy by 3 program has been in the Houston Independent School District (HISD) since the 2014-2015 school year, there remains wide variation with respect to which aspects of Literacy by 3 are implemented in classrooms and to what extent the practices are utilized.…

In this article the history of global education goal- and target-setting is traced from 1990 to 2015. After the highly inclusive process of developing the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) and their targets, a much more technical process has produced the global indicators. The challenge of securing the ambitious targets for education in SDG 4…

The purpose of this study was to examine the relation between "district capacity" as measured by the District Capacity Assessment (DCA) and the "initial, depth, scale," and "sustained" implementation of an evidence-based practice (EBP), Positive Behavior Interventions and Supports (PBIS). This exploratory analysis…

Content standards, not performance standards, have been almost the sole focus of state policies and recent conversations about academic standards. Without rigorous content and performance standards, we cannot adequately prepare students for the global marketplace. A recent AIR study shows that state performance standards are consistently low and…

The pivot point for educational change is now firmly placed with the district, rebalancing the position of the state and the school relative to the local education agency (LEA). The state education agency (SEA) has been shifting its emphasis for decades, from a compliance-focused authority to a change agent equipped with systems, processes,…

Teaching mathematics has long required the use of technology due many powerful affordances. More recently, education technology has been developed to support personalized learning through the use of adaptive learning systems. Through the use of educational technology in online learning, there is great potential for improving students' mathematics…

In this article, the author discusses how to implement the Common Core State Standards in the classroom. She presents examples and activities that will leave teachers feeling "rosy" about tackling the new standards. She breaks down important benchmarks and shows how other teachers are doing the Core--and loving it!

This report presents a multi-year study of how states are implementing their state college- and career-readiness standards. In this report, the Southern Regional Education Board's (SREB's) Benchmarking State Implementation of College- and Career-Readiness Standards project studied state efforts in 2014-15 and 2015-16 to foster effective…

Differentiating state services to support district and school improvement makes sense for two reasons: (1) support is most effective when targeted to the specific needs of the district or school, based on both performance data and diagnostic data about prevailing operational and professional practice; and (2) state resources of time and money are…

This report focuses on the progress made and challenges faced by the nine states in achieving the first three objectives for which they were held accountable for use of their Race to the Top Early Learning Challenge (RTTELC) funds. It discusses discrete findings related to these objectives in relevant chapters of the report: Tiered Quality Rating…

This paper is written for state educational agency (SEA) leaders who are considering the benefits of collaborative benchmarking, and it addresses the following questions: (1) What does benchmarking of best practices entail?; (2) How does "collaborative benchmarking" enhance the process?; (3) How do SEAs control the process so that "their" needs…

Increasing attention to "Implementation Research" and the "Implementation Problem" has given rise to confusion about matters such as the role of "empirically-supported practices," "fidelity of implementation," and "monitoring fidelity of implementation." To clarify the matters, we approach these topics from the broad perspective of efforts to…

All of the 15 states in this study have recently been involved in school accountability system reform. Since 2011, the states have taken advantage of a federal program to give them flexibility around certain accountability requirements of the "No Child Left Behind Act" of 2001 (NCLB), the most recent reauthorization of the Elementary and…