It is very difficult to know who controls such educational agencies as the home, television, the churches, youth groups, and factories. Control of the schools shifts a little bit daily among such forces as social class, American business, the sexes, teachers, administrators, racial and ethnic groups, the citizenry, the courts, and the young. (JM)

Notes that if the school really belongs to the community, then administrators have no more right to put a kid out of his school than to put their children out of the house. Discusses the implications of this ideology. (Author/AM)

It is the thesis of this paper that the most important task of many tasks of the community school director is to organize the various constituencies in his community. This does not mean that he organizes programs in which his constituents can participate, rather that he organizes people through the medium of activities. (Author)

A brief discussion of the growing conflict between teachers, administrators, school board members, legislators, and citizen groups over who should have how much control over various aspects of education. (JG)

The Chicago Public Schools have experienced major reforms since the late 1980s. This has resulted in increased power to local school communities and the creation of local school councils (LSCs) that employ its principals. This paper presents findings of a study that examined principals' perceptions of their changing roles under Chicago's school…

Discussing the professional expert involved in local projects, the paper examined the dilemma of trying to find the proper place for this resource person in the many community-based, action-oriented curriculum development projects being developed for Native peoples. The 3 broad categories of involvement are social, administrative, and technical.…

If schools are to be professionally responsive to and accountable to their clients, each school must have some control over decisions affecting its particular student body. These include decisions in the areas of policy, curriculum, staffing, facilities, resources (and related finances), evaluation processes, and participation in system-level…

Faced with a legal mandate to equalize educational resources available to its public elementary schools, can the Board of Education of the District of Columbia respond effectively to the public pressure for decentralization of its decision-making systems? The answer may be determined through the responses to two further questions: to what extent…

This paper examines the functioning of the Public School Safety Commission that was established in a large west coast city to study the problem of violence in the city's public schools. The commission was established by the board of education in the spring of 1974 and issued its final report in July 1974. Over 60 community organizations,…

This paper explores how the idea of community control came about, what the concept is, and some implications it might have for communication practices in school systems. Social and political conditions which led to the idea of community control of education are reviewed. Particular attention is given to the dissatisfaction of minority groups and…

The Program for Educational Opportunity, an institute based at the University of Michigan and established by the Office of Education pursuant to Title IV of the 1964 Civil Rights Act, is designed to assist school districts in the process of desegregation. The Program annually conducts a series of conferences. The Conference on The Personnel…

A case study of site-based governance councils in Salt Lake City (Utah) is described. The study was a test of whether building-based councils actually enable teachers and parents to exert substantial influence on school policy. The reason why research findings did not fit expectations is discussed. (SLD)

A unique choice to assume local control of schooling is now available to Canadian Indians. This description of the beginning of one such undertaking illustrates how the unanticipated emergence of pervasive role shock inhibits the expected positive results from autonomous local control of schooling. (Author)

This document, produced through an ESEA Title III grant, contains seven position papers on education evaluation from the standpoints of psychology, sociology, political science, business management, school administration, and computer science. The first paper summarizes the history of educational program evaluation and reviews current theories and…

This report is an overview of a conference on the reform of urban schools, focusing on the Chicago (Illinois) public schools. Panel discussions included the following: (1) "Parents' Role/Parental Involvement"; (2) "School-Based Management"; (3) "The Principal's Roles and Responsibilities"; (4) "Teacher…