This literature review focuses on the role of schools'"common properties" in planned educational change and everyday school operations. Common properties include those features that are either present in all schools, relatively stable and unchanging, or central to the concept of schools today. The author first examines five ways in which common school properties have been identified and investigated, including objective observation, speculative analysis, comparative analysis, typological classification, and empirical research. He then analyzes the relationship between schools' common properties and schools' solutions to their "dilemmas," or choices, of operation and change. Based on this analysis, his review of the literature yields 37 common properties, grouped under nine different dilemmas, as well as a list of the properties' possible causes or antecedents. The 37 properties touch on such areas as school goals; attitudes toward students; governance of students and teachers; relationships with parents, the community, and all levels of government; the outcomes of education; relationships to educational research and theory; patterns of school power and influence; and reaction to innovation. A final section suggests many areas for further research on common properties. (RW)