Each state is going to set its own education standards, but unless state leaders talk to each other, there are going to be huge unexplained differences in state performance standards for student achievement. What states say they want their students to be taught is quite similar, but they appear to have very different standards for what students…

Progress of Oregon's State Prekindergarten Program (SPP) during its first 3 months of program operation is reported. Serving mostly low-income, 3- and 4-year-old children, the SPP offers health, nutrition, education, and social services to children and their families. Parent involvement and education are important program components. This progress…

This paper presents a set of general observations about state-sponsored school improvement initiatives with data from several sources. One major source is the Research for Better Schools, Inc., Philadelphia (Pennsylvania), implementation study, "Facing the Challenge: Selected Programs and Practices of the Urban Initiative's Operation School…

The Georgia Prekindergarten Program was established in 1993 to provide the state's 4-year-olds with high-quality preschool experiences. Beginning in the 1996-1997 school year, a sample of 3,639 children enrolled in 1 of 203 randomly selected Georgia prekindergarten classes was selected for a 5-year longitudinal study. The study examined how…

Urban school superintendents from Pennsylvania and New Jersey met to consider issues related to the improvement of urban secondary schools. Although the public is pessimistic about all urban public schools, it regards secondary schools with particular pessimism. There are 70 urban high schools in New Jersey and 81 in Pennsylvania. Superintendents…