Describes the Reading Excellence Act (REA) model. Shares insight that the author has gained through her experiences as she describes her work at the national, state, and local levels. Concludes that knowledge at the building level is what really matters. (SG)

About 30 states have statutes on educating the gifted and talented. Identifying and teaching gifted children are a challenge. With states in a growing fiscal crisis and the costs of tests mandated by the No Child Left Behind Act, gifted education will struggle to maintain what it has rather than build. (MLF)

Discusses the political import of a controversial bill currently being debated in the upper house of Brazil's legislature that seeks to curb the use of English in all but a handful of situations. Examines the ambivalence toward the language and suggest it has to do with the difficult geopolitics of the region and the contradictions in has…

Discusses a complex and charged change program and its management at a Scottish higher education institution. Discusses the difficulties of the educational change process in higher education, the complexities surrounding notions of organizational cultures and communities of practice, and issues of power and management including the new…

Addresses the relationships of qualitative researchers to the policy-making process. Uses the example of the Reading Excellence Act to demonstrate that qualitative researchers have many points of access to the policy-making process. Suggests qualitative researchers must provide relevant information, communicate in a straightforward manner,…

Discusses the benefits of reflection in higher education, highlighting one academic's reflections on herself as a woman in academia and how the attitudes she learned during her childhood and youth created problems during her own higher education and in her work as an academic. Also looks at educational discrimination against other minority groups.…

Compares the role of legislation in educational decentralization in Britain and Israel, countries with strong centralized educational policy implemented by strong centralized Ministries of Education. Both countries went through extensive decentralization during the 1980s-90s, initiated partly by their central governments. Despite their contrasting…

Describes the process of educational policy making in Latvia, discussing why it has been so complicated and examining the role of the Ministry of Education and Sciences. The article introduces the new educational sector policy paper recently distributed by the Soros Foundation--Latvia, "A Passport to Social Cohesion and Economic Prosperity:…

Analyzes the relationship between educational reform in Hong Kong and the changing political system. Finds that political problems (regime legitimacy, destructive political culture) have obstructed the meaningful implementation of educational reform. Thus reform initiatives have been largely symbolic. (Contains 30 references.) (PKP)

Discusses origins and analyzes shortcomings of Manitoba education reform agenda. Offers suggests for improving success of province's reform efforts. (PKP)

Investigates the grammar and style checker in MS WORD software in depth, focusing on its theoretical underpinnings. Contrasts the approaches to grammar and style embodied in the software with those found in current composition pedagogy. Concludes with suggestions that go beyond customizing the Grammar Checker to advocating more thorough…

Discusses political, legislative, and equity issues related to educational voucher programs in Cleveland, Ohio; Milwaukee, Wisconsin; and Florida. (Contains 22 references.) (PKP)

Discusses desegregation of parochial schools, examining the Roman Catholic Church's struggle to reconcile its moral imperative to desegregate its parochial schools with temporal pressures to resist, as documented in the archives of the Catholic Council of Human Relations in New Orleans, Louisiana, home of the largest number of African American…

Considers how public opinion and entire theories of teaching reading are based in the false Just So story--Just Sound Out, and you can read. Explains why sounding out is a handicap. Suggests a better alternative, teaching by recognizing words. (SG)

Describes how a committee of five people (three selected by the Pennsylvania governor and two selected by Philadelphia's mayor) will manage schools in Philadelphia. Notes that because the revised U.S. Elementary and Secondary Education Act includes provisions for sanctions and takeovers for schools that fail to meet federal and state testing…