Educational reform in the United States is perpetually evolving. Much of the recent reforms have concentrated on high-stakes testing and assessment, but a parallel effort has been emerging in the field of vocational and career education. Prompted partly by federal legislation--most recently by the Carl D. Perkins Career and Technical Education Act…

The right to education is an internationally recognized right. As part of the global movement for Education for All in the past two decades, the right to basic education has emerged in international law, and it carries international obligations--political and legal--on account of collective commitments by the international community for its…

Reviews Cuban educational reforms, highlighting 1959, 1976, and 1980s initiatives. Compares Cuba's progress with John Kotter's eight-step process based on establishing a sense of urgency, creating a guiding coalition, developing and communicating the change vision, empowering broad-based action, generating short-term wins, consolidating gains, and…

Reviews Hong Kong's School Management Initiative implementation strategies (rational-empirical, power-coercive, and normative-reeducative), compares them with New South Wales, Australia's strategies, and suggests an appropriate strategy for future reforms. In Australia, changes were radical and thorough (using power-coercive strategies), whereas…

Examines implementation of educational reforms in the Latin American-Caribbean region during the 1990s, based on national case studies (Dominican Republic, El Salvador, Jamaica, and Paraguay), descriptions of nationally supported projects, and discussions with reformers and researchers. Despite similarities in reforms' origins and components, each…

Explains the main factors affecting implementation of curriculum innovations, including those related to teachers, innovations, and change agents. Introduces Hong Kong's Target- Oriented Curriculum initiative, a constructivist, active-learning framework, and shows how these factors enhanced or hindered program implementation. Teacher attitudes…

The future of educational design, development, and improvement lies in integrating "how" with "what" and "why." Critical strategic thinking factors include abandoning comfort zones; focusing on ends, not means; linking all three planning and result levels; starting with an ideal vision; preparing measurable…

Education reform, as a change process in daily teaching and learning activity, has never been easy. The No Child Left Behind Act (NCLB), a recent nationwide education reform initiative, demonstrates again that change is never easy and not always successful. As a matter of fact, "many innovations in education are either total or partial…