In the early 1990s, the Finnish government embarked on a strategy to remold Finland into a knowledge society. A key element in this strategy was to raise the knowledge and skill levels of the population by doubling higher education enrollments by the end of the century. Recognizing that it would be neither affordable nor desirable to double…

This book provides information on the concept and practice of community colleges in both the United States and India. It is intended to serve as a guideline for the development in India of institutions and programs modeled after American community colleges. The foreword discusses the findings of a survey of colleges in India on…

This field guide provides a look into education in relation to a concept that has already been established in science, business and therapy. This book will encourage and educate readers about systemic thinking through examples and ideas pertinent to education and its reform. Following a Foreword (Michael Fullan) and Introduction (Blane Despres),…

The decline in Federal funding for state-provided social services during the 1980s triggered a transformation in the states' roles in family policymaking. This booklet documents four state initiatives designed to bring about systems change: (1) Healthy Start (California); (2) the Governor's Families and Children Initiative (Colorado); (3) the…

School organizations must become responsive and flexible to address rapidly changing social, economic, and demographic conditions. Reform attempts to date have not worked because they were layered on old structures and perceptions in a fragmented, piecemeal fashion. The fundamental transformation of education that is required demands a paradigm…

This handbook guides college and university business officers, from small liberal arts colleges to community colleges to research universities, through the complex set of decisions and actions associated with replacing financial management systems. It lists the steps necessary to evaluate an institution's current hardware, network, and software;…

The "virtual campus" is a metaphor for the electronic teaching, learning, and research environment created by the convergence of several relatively new technologies including, but not restricted to, the Internet, World Wide Web, computer-mediated communication, video conferencing, multi-media, groupware, video-on-demand, desktop…

Too many educational researchers have been too attentive to innovations and too inattentive to how educators organize to cope with them. The use of anthropological concepts and methods in analyzing the educator subculture could improve planning and implementation of innovations. A study of the attempt to develop a variant of a planning,…

Current school improvement tools are largely piecemeal and often lack credible supportive evidence. Knowledge Work Supervision (KWS) is built on the premise that schools must develop the capacity for sustaining districtwide improvements. Chapter 1, "The Past Before Us Is Not the Future," summarizes the key elements of the four phases of…