Outcomes of a series of meetings held in 1990 by the Office of Educational Research and Improvement (OERI) Roundtable on Public School Choice are summarized in this document's six chapters. Chapter 1 discusses the components (including motivations, vision formation, leadership, the design process, and the types of choice available) involved in…

Private foundations are attempting to move away from educational reform approaches based on model development. The limits of the "Johnny Appleseed" (sowing seed and moving on) mode of grantmaking are coming clear. Persistence--a willingness to commit resources to an issue or institution for 5 to 10 years--will need to be an operating…

Describes how one elementary school implemented a New American School Design, the Audrey Cohen College System of Education, using interview data to describe local adaptations to and experiences with the design and highlight how political and economic conditions negatively affected implementation. By the program's third year, there was no evidence…

The Chicago School Reform Act provided a rare opportunity for those who were involved in the development of the legislation to be primarily responsible for the initial implementation of the plan. The governance model of the Reform Act, which is the subject of this study, provided for an elected school counsel at each of 542 schools and maintained…

One of five articles on professional development schools in this theme issue. Discusses six developmental stages of collaboration--formation, conceptualization, development, implementation, evaluation, and termination/reformation--in the implementation of professional development schools at the University of South Carolina, Columbia, including…

Within the arena of public school reform, teacher empowerment and participation in the decision making process at the building level are of paramount importance. A collaborative team of teacher educators and public school staff was assembled to assess various perceptions of site-based decision making throughout Georgia. A random sample of 400…