Since 1946, four major efforts to improve educational outcomes through shifts in governance have occurred in North Carolina. The 1989 reforms were characterized by an increase in rhetoric about local control and initiatives, teacher involvement, and school-based management. This paper surveys the last 50 years of educational reform policy in North…

Many people fail to realize the extensiveness and comprehensiveness of federal and state child labor laws. Although the 1994 School-to-Work Opportunities Act did not detail the legal compliance needed by its state-funded agencies, it clearly indicates that federal and state child labor laws will apply to its employment and employment-related…

This report was prepared in response to requests by Senators Specter and Kennedy for information regarding charter schools. It presents data on the following: the number of charter schools approved under state law; characteristics of charter-school instructional programs; factors for school autonomy; accountability mechanisms; and the challenges…

This paper describes the history of education reform in Washington State since the early 1980s. Specifically, the paper traces the educational system's transition to one based on performance and student learning. During the 1980s, education reform measures in Washington were targeted at segments of the system, rather than at the whole system. In…

A state mandated evaluation study was done of certain programs and activities of the Mississippi Commissioner's Office of the Institutions of Higher Learning (IHL) including the Commissioner's Fund and operations of university foundations and athletic programs. This report presents findings, recommendations, and documentation, as well as responses…

To fulfill an agreement with the 1992 General Assembly, the Virginia Department of Education conducted a study during the fall and winter of 1992-93 of school divisions' implementation of their Family Life Education (FLE) programs. The program was to provide comprehensive, age-appropriate, and sequential instruction in 10 specified content areas…

The feasibility of an educational voucher plan proposed by the Pennsylvania legislature is assessed in this paper. Reasons against passing House Bill 1133 and Senate Bill 992 include the large initial cost; lack of evidence that the plan would expand choice; the fact that market forces increase inequities; the need to distinguish choice from…

This vocational program book is intended to assist vocational rehabilitation counselors in moving toward the goal of community employment for people with autism. The first section considers vocational issues for this population and discusses the following: autism and work, educational experiences/programming, vocational evaluations, purposes of…

Recently, legislators have become interested in school privatization as a tool to increase educational choices, introducing more than 400 bills related to privatization during the 1998 session. The education privatization movement is a compilation of many different efforts to expand the role of private schools in education. The efforts include…

In Brigham et al. v. State of Vermont (1997), the Vermont Supreme Court struck down the previous state-funding system and directed the legislature to come up with a new system that would eliminate the inequities among the local school districts. An analysis of this decision and its consequences is offered here. The paper recaps the funding system…

In an effort to improve student achievement in low-performing districts, 22 states have developed academic bankruptcy laws, allowing them to intervene in districts that consistently fail to satisfy state education performance standards. This policy brief presents an overview of these statutes. The text offers a comparative summary of state…

Using Guilford County (North Carolina) School District's implementation of North Carolina ABCs legislation as a backdrop, this paper discusses the unintended consequences that school-improvement plans create for administration. The ABCs legislation ties a large-scale testing program to a requirement that each school develop a community-supported…

One of the consequences of Ohio's educational accountability efforts mandated under Ohio Senate Bill 55 (SB 55) and the traditional testing programs of Ohio school districts is the generation of huge amounts of data. In order for school-based educators to organize and explore these voluminous amounts of information, they need exposure to…

This report provides an analysis of faculty salaries in the University of California and California State University systems. The report contains the parity percentages obtained through analysis of the data submitted to the University and State University by their respective groups of comparison institutions; estimated faculty salary parity…

The study reviewed the legal relationship between the National Collegiate Athletic Association (NCAA) and its member institutions and the national reform movement in intercollegiate athletics, and proposed legislation that would mandate due process guarantees in all association proceedings with its member institutions. Legal research confirmed…