Over the last three decades, a significant amount of research has sought to relate educational institutions, policies, practices and reforms to social structures and agencies. A number of models have been developed that have become the basis for attempting to understand the complex relation between education and society. At the same time, national…

This essay is an attempt to view American higher education as a social system with a discernible structure and characteristic ways of functioning. Chapters 1, 2, and 3 describe the system as a whole, its units, and the functioning of the system in comparison with other systems of higher education. Chapters 4 and 5 deal with undergraduate…

This book maintains that educational reform cannot occur in a vacuum. The theme of the book is that the problems faced by education are systemic and deeply embedded in family and social problems. Schools themselves must assume responsibility for change, and change must occur in the ways in which schools relate to outside constituencies. The…

National educational reform must be interpreted from a broader sociopolitical vantage point. Following the introduction, "The Change Process and Educational Reform" by Val D. Rust, the four papers in part 1 are devoted primarily to conceptual issues related to educational reform. They include: (1) "Problems of Educational Reforms in a Changing…

Serious confrontation of the problems facing education requires a reform of the organizing principles of learning: a shift from an instrumental purpose to the moral and political purpose of cultural renewal, from learning for economic purposes to learning for citizenship. This book focuses on the work of secondary schools in the contexts of…

This book opens with a discussion of the impact of education in reducing inequality--educational, socioeconomic, and otherwise. The topic of public policy and education is explored, and the work of Christopher Jencks and his associates, published in late 1972 as "Inequality: A Reassessment of the Effect of Family and Schooling in America," is…

This book suggests the adoption of a critical pragmatic approach to the problems of educational change. It offers a set of criticisms by which theories and reform proposals may be judged and tested, and proposes the reconstruction of schools in place of school restructuring. A primary question to be asked is, "How shall social institutions be…

"The Opportunity Gap" aims to shift attention from the current overwhelming emphasis on schools in discussions of the achievement gap to more fundamental questions about social and educational opportunity. The achievement gap looms large in the current era of high-stakes testing and accountability. Yet questions persist: Has the…