Middle schools are a critical element in preparing for postsecondary education. Students must be offered a challenging curriculum, moral support, and guidance that strengthens their commitment to education. Few reform efforts have consciously emphasized this role in precollege preparation. There is a need for detracking and increased emphasis on…

A unique partnership between Empire State College (New York) and the New York telephone company is offered as an example of a new educational model. The program enables company employees to earn associate and baccalaureate degrees while working full-time. Such partnerships are seen as helping rebuild the competence of the American workforce.…

Examines school-based management as an effective strategy for optimizing the individual performance of teachers, students, and parents. Under school-based management, principals and teachers are given total responsibility for budgeting, selecting textbooks, scheduling, and hiring. This system provides flexibility in relationships with the broader…

Based on experiences at Brandeis University libraries, and findings from management literature, a discussion (with figures) is presented on the challenges faced by libraries in integrating technology and information services. Reviews reasons why change is needed, examines information services as a team-based approach, and presents management…

Discusses methodologies for school improvement and suggests that teacher-librarians should assume a leadership role in helping teachers and students become successful consumers of information. Topics include the quality movement; using the corporate world as a model; attitudes to change; strategic planning; continual improvement; lifelong…

A pharmacy student's suggestions for improving pharmaceutical education include increased emphasis on thinking skills in instruction and testing, incorporation of computer modules for independent study, a requirement that faculty periodically spend time in the field, review of laboratory experiments for relevance to practice, and improved…

Discusses educational performance assessment and alternative assessment practices. Currently, achievement assessment involves classical psychometrics, performance-based evaluation, and cognitive theory, which must all be invoked to improve understanding of student achievement. This article suggests developing performance tests from a coherent…

Issues related to the production of more generalists in medicine are discussed, including economic, practice-related, and scientific forces favoring practice of specialty medicine; the influence of the medical school experience on career choice; strategies for correcting the balance inside and outside academic medicine; and resulting alternative…

A research project is reported that incorporates foreign language study into a transition program at the University of Tennessee designed to improve academic performance and "demystify" the college experience. The immediate goals of the foreign language component as well as its broader implications for minority student achievement are…

The study of liberal arts and sciences and teacher training have drifted apart, reinforcing polarities between theory and practice, intellect and action, collaboration and competition. Brooklyn College (New York) has reorganized its curriculum to bring them back together. Students write and reexamine autobiographical accounts of their own…

Discusses influences that electronic technologies are having on academic libraries. Highlights include the combination of computer technology and telecommunications; the impact of integrated systems; adding value to information through the use of workstations and online databases; teaching and learning roles of librarians; library user fees; and…

Presents 12 articles that are abbreviated versions of presentations at the Wilson Symposium on the Future of Public Libraries. Highlights include rural library needs; community needs; librarians' role in planning for community change; cooperating to meet specialized needs; future staffing requirements; distance education; library technology; the…

Proposes resolutions about the relationship between a short course on science instruction and specific changes in teaching strategy. Identifies teachers' existing knowledge base as an important factor for the examination of new pedagogical ideas. Suggests that loyalty and demonstration provide a mechanism by which teachers may enhance their…

Discusses the poor transfer of theory taught and skills learned in college to classroom teaching practice, examining reasons for preconceptions that student teachers bring to teacher education programs. The paper offers several teacher educator interventions to help student teachers build world images with consequences for their teaching. (SM)

Discusses ways to achieve science-technology-society (STS) goals in education, focusing on various technology educators' perspectives on and approaches to STS (understanding the STS relationship, recognizing limitations and usefulness, appreciating intellectual stimuli, understanding applications and decisions, and gaining knowledge and…