For over 30 years, researchers and practitioners have identified challenges unique to small, rural community colleges. The purpose of this study was to examine the distinctive problems facing rural community colleges today and the challenges those institutions must address to fulfill their mission in rural America. There are 5 current challenges…

This monograph contains five presentations delivered during the course of an attempt made in November 1992 to amend the state constitution of Illinois in such a way as to make education a fundamental constitutional right. The effort failed to garner the 60 percent of the vote required to pass the amendment. These presentations made a strong…

In a poor state such as Arkansas, progress is often a slow and painful process. Particularly in the area of teacher salaries, school funding plans are often thwarted by budget shortfalls. Court decisions and efforts to stabilize and equalize school funding and local property taxes have led to political battles over taxation. Constitutional…

This paper examines the emergence of privatization in Israel's educational system. The first part provides an overview of the provision of educational services in a welfare state. The second part describes educational privatization in a welfare state, and the third part presents examples of two forms of privatization that have emerged in the…

Educational issues of concern to southwestern state legislatures are reviewed in this educational policy bulletin. Information from a survey of legislative education committee members and legislative aides in Arkansas, Louisiana, Oklahoma, New Mexico, and Texas is used to develop profiles of each state's unique educational concerns and political…

Issues in the national school choice debate are examined in this paper. Proponents of school choice have included the last two Republican Presidents, the Education Commission of the States, and many state governors and business community leaders. Gallup polls conducted during 1989-91 indicate that school choice (among public schools) is a popular…

Findings of a study that examined the relationship between Ohio school district income levels and student testing performance are presented in this paper. The first statistical analysis categorized districts by residents' average income, and the second analysis classified them according to the percentage of families receiving Aid to Dependent…

This paper examines systematic ways in which school districts differ and the implications of these differences for how schools work and for the implementation of reform proposals. Data from the California State Department of Education and Florida State Department of Education were analyzed to examine the effect of organizational and resource…

Although recent research studies have questioned the efficacy of certification testing, Georgia's Department of Education, with help from National Evaluation Systems, developed the Georgia Certification Test in Administration and Certification (GCT). Since 1983, the test has been required for both certification and recertification. The present…

The current basic grant formula of the Carl D. Perkins Vocational Education Act has the following components: distribution of funds is based primarily on state population, but allocations are adjusted to compensate those states with younger populations, to compensate states with fewer resources, and to ensure that no state receives less than a…

To determine where given Virginia institutions of higher education stand in the aggregate regarding administrators' salaries among similar institutions, salary information provided by chief academic officers of eight senior public-supported institutions in Virginia for their administrative faculty was compared with data from other United States…

Public education in British Columbia has been profoundly affected by replacement of Ministry-appointed superintendents with those locally employed and by eligibility of applicants other than former superintendents for the positions of deputy minister and assistant deputy minister. The single greatest influence in increasing awareness of…

Instead of concentrating on improving educational quality for children and adolescents, present reform machinations are centered on school leadership and accountability issues. This article discusses three educational reform paradoxes (equity, teacher empowerment, and school effectiveness) that are ignored in most reform reports. Included are 14…

Using High School and Beyond longitudinal data for 1980, this paper shows that government subsidized student aid substantially improved access to higher education for low income individuals. The analysis also shows that wealth neutrality (equal probability of college attendance across all incomes) was not achieved. (10 references) (MLH)

In 1999, Illinois enacted its tuition tax credit law, which offers tax credits to taxpayers whose own children are attending school, as opposed to tax credits to businesses and/or individuals who contribute to tuition scholarship programs. Recent data suggest that the Illinois tax credit program is benefiting middle- and upper-class families more…