Incorporating school-site management into the nation's educational systems will demand wholesale changes involving the very structure and organization of schools. Aimed at practitioners desiring to implement school-based management (SBM), this book is organized into chapters designed to enhance the sequential phases of application. Chapter 1 discusses the rationale behind decentralization, based on past lessons gained from educational innovation, school effectiveness studies, national commission reports, and the public school choice movement. Chapter 2 describes the advantages of local control and presents management techniques to implement and enforce decentralization. Chapter 3 covers planning and role change issues involved with implementing a system of schools to replace the outdated education bureaucracy. Chapter 4 tells how to develop a clan-like climate among staff members for building a winning team; while chapter 5 is directed at specific techniques to empower teachers and provide for collegial controls. Chapter 6 explains how to integrate accountability into a decentralized governance systems and chapter 7 presents questions most frequently asked of those supporting school-based management. The answers provided are designed to help administrators and change agents apply decentralization and assure those harboring doubts about SBM's effectiveness. A bibliography of several pages is included. (MLH)