Download or read book Leadership for Low Performing Schools written by Daniel L. Duke and published by Rowman & Littlefield. This book was released on 2015-01-15 with total page 227 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: No greater challenge faces our society than improving the educational opportunities for millions of young people trapped in chronically low-performing schools. Overcoming this challenge requires talented and dedicated school leaders whose knowledge and skills extend far beyond what is covered in conventional principal preparation programs. This book draws on extensive research by the author and others on the actions needed to turn around low-performing schools. First, however, the book examines the personal qualities needed to undertake the turnaround process. Following chapters provide guidelines on diagnosing the school-based causes of low achievement and developing a school turnaround plan. The author focuses on the importance of continuous planning – a departure from standard practice. A major portion of the book is devoted to examples of first-order and second-order strategies for raising achievement. Specific recommendations for launching the turnaround process and sustaining gains beyond the first years of turnaround are provided. The concluding chapter addresses the role of school districts in supporting school-based turnaround efforts.

Download or read book Leading School Turnaround written by Kenneth Leithwood and published by John Wiley & Sons. This book was released on 2010-07-13 with total page 310 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: LEADING SCHOOL TURNAROUND Leading School Turnaround offers new perspectives and concrete, evidence-based guidelines for the educational leaders and administrators faced with the challenge of turning our low-performing schools around. Using the tools outlined in this groundbreaking book, school leaders can guide their schools to higher levels of achievement and sustained academic success. Based on research conducted in the United States, Canada, and England, Leading School Turnaround addresses in three parts the dynamic context of the turnaround environment, what turnaround leaders do, and the incredible challenges of moving from turnaround to "stay around." Filled with illustrative examples, the book outlines the best practices and behaviors successful turnaround leaders exercise. The authors include detailed information for applying the four main categories of turnaround leadership: direction setting, developing people, redesigning the school, and managing the instructional program. This important resource can help any school leader get their school back on the track to academic success.

Download or read book Turning Around Low Performing Schools in Chicago written by Marisa De la Torre and published by . This book was released on 2012-02-05 with total page 91 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: This report finds that four years after undergoing dramatic reform efforts such as turnaround, very low-performing elementary schools in Chicago closed the gap in test scores with the system average by almost half in reading and two-thirds in math. The improvements took time to develop; test scores were not significantly better in the first year of reform, but grew larger over time. The study examined five different reform models initiated by the Chicago Public Schools (CPS) in 36 elementary and high schools identified as chronically low performing. The five reform models were: Reconstitution; School Closure and Restart; School Turnaround Specialist Program; Academy for Urban School Leadership; and Office of School Improvement. Each is consistent with one of the four improvement models recommended by the federal government (turnaround, transformation, restart, and school closure). Despite the attention and activity surrounding the models, there is a lack of research on whether or how they work. To begin to address this knowledge gap, CCSR and AIR partnered to examine dramatic interventions in Chicago, an early adopter of such reforms. The report also finds high schools that underwent reform did not show significant improvements in absences or ninth grade on-track-to-graduate rates over matched comparison schools, however recent high school efforts look more promising than earlier ones. Changes in student populations varied across reform models. Schools that underwent these reforms and remained neighborhood schools generally served the same students, and the same types of students, as before intervention. Schools that were closed and replaced with charter or contract schools generally served more advantaged students after intervention. The teacher workforce after intervention across all models was more likely to be white, younger, and less experienced.

Download or read book Turnaround Principals for Underperforming Schools written by Rosemary Papa and published by R&L Education. This book was released on 2011-08-16 with total page 161 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: There's no mystery in turning around low-performing or failing schools, but there are also no recipes. In Turnaround Principals for Underperforming Schools Rosemary Papa and Fenwick English identify the essential ingredients for success. The causesof failure are complex and interactive. Schools are not inert structures but living organisms. Putting schools back together is a collaborative venture. It takes a team to turn around a school, but it all begins with the leadership. The key to success rests in a school leader who has a fundamental understanding of the dynamics of schooling, human motivation, and possesses the resiliency and energy to engage in altering the internal landscape of an unsuccessful school. Two veteran educators have put together a work based on their research and experience for the past half-century. They pull no punches. The challenge is not only to turn low-performing or failing schools around, but to enable them to become more socially just places for all students.

Download or read book International Perspectives on Leading Low Performing Schools written by Coby V. Meyers and published by IAP. This book was released on 2018-08-01 with total page 341 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Research is clear: School leadership quality matters. However, our knowledge of effective school leadership remains limited in at least three substantial ways. First, our understanding of school leadership effectiveness generally and school principal effectiveness specifically is limited to Western contexts, primarily North America and western European ones. Second, even in the confines of Western research and context, there has been relatively little specific focus on effectively leading low-performing schools. Third, even the conceptualization of leadership—do we mean the school principal, an administrative team, or a broader school leadership team—is a key factor in how we define and respond to the challenge of leading in low-performing schools. This book advances discussion and disseminates knowledge and global perspectives on what school leadership looks like, how it is enacted and under what circumstances, and when or where lessons might be portable. We anticipate this book having wide appeal for researchers, policymakers, and practitioners considering school leadership and how to support it effectively. The chapters suggest a noticeable level of convergence globally on how to lead low-performing schools effectively. Yet, there are clear political and culture differences that add significant gradation to how school leaders might enact best practice locally or inform policymakers and systems leaders about how to set up school leaders for success and subsequently support them. This book is one of the first that prioritizes the universality and nuance of leading low-performing schools globally.

Download or read book Rural School Turnaround and Reform written by Coby V. Meyers and published by IAP. This book was released on 2022-01-01 with total page 227 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: We have entitled the fourth book in the series Rural School Turnaround and Reform: It’s Hard Work! Overall, the body of scholarly work and research that examines school turnaround and reform in rural areas is slim; as such, this volume adds to the body of work and contributes to new knowledge in a much-needed area. In this volume, we present chapters that speak to the challenges, successes, and opportunities to improve low-performing rural schools. Chapters range from conceptual arguments to policy analyses or research findings, as well as some combination of these or other ways to consider rural school turnaround and reform.

Download or read book Turning High Poverty Schools into High Performing Schools written by William H. Parrett and published by ASCD. This book was released on 2020-04-28 with total page 225 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Schools across the United States and Canada are disrupting the adverse effects of poverty and supporting students in ways that enable them to succeed in school and in life. In this second edition, Parrett and Budge show you how your school can achieve similar results. Expanding on their original framework's still-critical concepts of actions and school culture, they incorporate new insights for addressing equity, trauma, and social-emotional learning. These fresh perspectives combine with lessons learned from 12 additional high-poverty, high-performing schools to form the updated and enhanced Framework for Collective Action. Emphasizing students' social, emotional, and academic learning as the hub for all action in high-performing, high-poverty schools, the authors describe how educators can work within the expanded Framework to address the needs of all students, but particularly those who live in poverty. Equipped with the Framework and a plethora of tools to build collective efficacy (self-assessments, high-leverage questions, action advice, and more), school and district leaders—as well as teachers, teacher leaders, instructional coaches, and other staff—can close persistent opportunity gaps and reverse longstanding patterns of low achievement.

Download or read book Improbable Scholars written by David L. Kirp and published by Oxford University Press. This book was released on 2015 with total page 271 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: In Improbable Scholars, David L. Kirp challenges the conventional wisdom about public schools and education reform in America through an in-depth look at Union City, New Jersey's high-performing urban school district. In this compelling study, Kirp reveals Union's city's revolutionary secret: running an exemplary school system doesn't demand heroics, just hard and steady work.

Download or read book Enduring Myths that Inhibit School Turnaround written by Coby V. Meyers and published by Contemporary Perspectives on School Turnaround. This book was released on 2017 with total page 0 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The concept of school turnaround--rapidly improving schools and increasing student achievement outcomes in a short period of time--has become politicized despite the relative newness of the idea. Unprecedented funding levels for school improvement combined with few examples of schools substantially increasing student achievement outcomes has resulted in doubt about whether or not turnaround is achievable. Skeptics have enumerated a number of reasons to abandon school turnaround at this early juncture. This book is the first in a new series on school turnaround and reform intended to spur ongoing dialogue among and between researchers, policymakers, and practitioners on improving the lowest-performing schools and the systems in which they operate. The "turnaround challenge" remains salient regardless of what we call it. We must improve the nation's lowest-performing schools for many moral, social, and economic reasons. In this first book, education researchers and scholars have identified a number of myths that have inhibited our ability to successfully turn schools around. Our intention is not to suggest that if these myths are addressed school turnaround will always be achieved. Business and other literatures outside of education make it clear that turnaround is, at best, difficult work. However, for a number of reasons, we in education have developed policies and practices that are often antithetical to turnaround. Indeed, we are making already challenging work harder. The myths identified in this book suggest that we still struggle to define or understand what we mean by turnaround or how best, or even adequately, measure whether it has been achieved. Moreover, it is clear that there are a number of factors limiting how effectively we structure and support low-performing schools both systemically and locally. And we have done a rather poor job of effectively leveraging human resources to raise student achievement and improve organizational outcomes. We anticipate this book having wide appeal for researchers, policymakers, and practitioners in consideration of how to support these schools taking into account context, root causes of low-performance, and the complex work to ensure their opportunity to be successful. Too frequently we have expected these schools to turn themselves around while failing to assist them with the vision and supports to realize meaningful, lasting organizational change. The myths identified and debunked in this book potentially illustrate a way forward.

Download or read book Turning Around Failing Schools written by Joseph Murphy and published by Corwin Press. This book was released on 2007-11-01 with total page 369 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: "This book provides critical understandings on the causes of organizational decline, a comprehensive conception of the turnaround process, and powerful insights for transforming failing schools into the kind we all want for our children." —Kenneth Leithwood, Professor of Educational Leadership and Policy Ontario Institute for Studies in Education "Murphy and Meyers do a first-rate job of mapping the territory of school turnarounds and identifying the options for educators to consider and researchers to investigate." —Daniel L. Duke, Professor of Educational Leadership and Research University of Virginia The guide to successfully restructuring schools in trouble! This insightful resource integrates research, strategies, and lessons from business, government, and not-for-profit organizations that have transformed their substandard performance into a proactive approach for renewal. The authors provide: A comprehensive overview of the literature on organizational deterioration An in-depth examination of the causes and symptoms of degeneration A two-part model for preventing educational collapse and crafting an effective turnaround A review of the efficacy of educational reform initiatives This indispensable text is ideal for district administrators, superintendents, policy makers, and individuals with an interest in organizational accountability and meaningful school reform.

Download or read book Holding NCLB Accountable written by Gail L. Sunderman and published by Corwin Press. This book was released on 2008 with total page 561 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: By mandating high standards for all students, the No Child Left Behind Act has promised to close the achievement gap and bring all students up to proficient levels by 2014. The challenge is in connecting the goals of NCLB legislation with the realities of change in the classroom.

Download or read book Reinventing America s Schools written by David Osborne and published by Bloomsbury Publishing USA. This book was released on 2017-09-05 with total page 433 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: From David Osborne, the author of Reinventing Government--a biting analysis of the failure of America's public schools and a comprehensive plan for revitalizing American education. In Reinventing America's Schools, David Osborne, one of the world's foremost experts on public sector reform, offers a comprehensive analysis of the charter school movements and presents a theory that will do for American schools what his New York Times bestseller Reinventing Government did for public governance in 1992. In 2005, when Hurricane Katrina devastated New Orleans, the city got an unexpected opportunity to recreate their school system from scratch. The state's Recovery School District (RSD), created to turn around failing schools, gradually transformed all of its New Orleans schools into charter schools, and the results are shaking the very foundations of American education. Test scores, school performance scores, graduation and dropout rates, ACT scores, college-going rates, and independent studies all tell the same story: the city's RSD schools have tripled their effectiveness in eight years. Now other cities are following suit, with state governments reinventing failing schools in Newark, Camden, Memphis, Denver, Indianapolis, Cleveland, and Oakland. In this book, Osborne uses compelling stories from cities like New Orleans and lays out the history and possible future of public education. Ultimately, he uses his extensive research to argue that in today's world, we should treat every public school like a charter school and grant them autonomy, accountability, diversity of school designs, and parental choice.

Download or read book Turnaround Leadership written by Michael Fullan and published by Jossey-Bass. This book was released on 2006-09 with total page 152 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The real reform agenda -- Turning schools around -- Change -- Turning a whole system around.

Download or read book HBR s 10 Must Reads on Leadership Lessons from Sports featuring interviews with Sir Alex Ferguson Kareem Abdul Jabbar Andre Agassi written by Harvard Business Review and published by Harvard Business Press. This book was released on 2018-01-16 with total page 158 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Leadership and management lessons from the sports world. The world's elite athletes and coaches achieve high performance through inspiring leadership, mental toughness, and direction-setting strategic choices. Harvard Business Review has talked to many of these high performers throughout the years to learn how their success translates to the world of business. If you read nothing else on management lessons from the world of sports, read these 10 articles by athletes, coaches, and leadership experts. We've combed through our archive and selected the articles that will best help you drive performance. This book will inspire you to: Improve on your weaknesses, not just your strengths Take care of your body for sustained mental performance Increase your confidence and manage your energy before an important event Turn a struggling team around Understand the limits of performance metrics Focus on long-term goals to overcome setbacks Understand where the analogy of sports and business doesn't work This collection of articles includes "Ferguson's Formula," by Anita Elberse with Sir Alex Ferguson; "Life's Work: An Interview with Greg Louganis"; "The Making of a Corporate Athlete," by Jim Loehr and Tony Schwartz; "The Tough Work of Turning a Team Around," by Bill Parcells; "How an Olympic Gold Medalist Learned to Perform Under Pressure: An Interview with Alex Gregory"; "Mental Preparation Secrets of Top Athletes, Entertainers, and Surgeons," an interview with Daniel McGinn by Sarah Green Carmichael; "SoulCycle's CEO on Sustaining Growth in a Faddish Industry," by Melanie Whelan; "Life's Work: An Interview with Kareem Abdul-Jabbar"; "Major League Innovation," by Scott D. Anthony; "Looking Past Performance in Your Star Talent," by Mark de Rond, Adrian Moorhouse, and Matt Rogan; "Life's Work: An Interview with Mikhail Baryshnikov"; "How the Best of the Best Get Better and Better," by Graham Jones; "Life's Work: An Interview with Joe Girardi"; "Why There Is an I in Team," by Mark de Rond; "Life's Work: An Interview with Andre Agassi"; and "Why Sports Are a Terrible Metaphor for Business," by Bill Taylor.

Download or read book Lead Fearlessly Love Hard written by Linda Cliatt-Wayman and published by John Wiley & Sons. This book was released on 2017-07-18 with total page 149 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: How leadership with love can make lasting changes, even in the toughest situations Lead Fearlessly, Love Hard offers real, actionable advice for those seeking to change the education system from within. While countless books, articles, and speeches decry the challenges disadvantaged students in low-performing schools face, no one has offered a clear path forward through these challenges—until now. Author Linda Cliatt-Wayman, principal of Strawberry Mansion High School in Philadelphia, grew up in the same North Philadelphia neighborhood where she now leads and fought every single day for the chance to become a part of the solution. Today, she is a turnaround principal and popular TED Talk speaker who helps children living in poverty achieve more than they ever thought possible. In Lead Fearlessly, Love Hard, she provides hope, optimism, and a call to action to help all students reach their true potential. Steadfast leadership and clear principles can overcome almost anything, and this book shows you how to focus your passion, apply your skills, and lead your students down the path to a better future. Discover and develop the leader within Take responsibility and move forward every day Give each student the critical interaction they crave Be a force for real, positive change in neighborhood schools Highlighting the intersection of strong visionary and strategic thinking with on-the-ground, day-to-day implementation, this narrative-driven guide tells the stories of real students and educators to show how clear principles and strong guidance can turn around schools—and the students they serve.

Download or read book Organizing Schools for Improvement written by Anthony S. Bryk and published by University of Chicago Press. This book was released on 2010-03-15 with total page 328 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: In 1988, the Chicago public school system decentralized, granting parents and communities significant resources and authority to reform their schools in dramatic ways. To track the effects of this bold experiment, the authors of Organizing Schools for Improvement collected a wealth of data on elementary schools in Chicago. Over a seven-year period they identified one hundred elementary schools that had substantially improved—and one hundred that had not. What did the successful schools do to accelerate student learning? The authors of this illuminating book identify a comprehensive set of practices and conditions that were key factors for improvement, including school leadership, the professional capacity of the faculty and staff, and a student-centered learning climate. In addition, they analyze the impact of social dynamics, including crime, critically examining the inextricable link between schools and their communities. Putting their data onto a more human scale, they also chronicle the stories of two neighboring schools with very different trajectories. The lessons gleaned from this groundbreaking study will be invaluable for anyone involved with urban education.

Download or read book Leading With Passion and Knowledge written by Nancy Fichtman Dana and published by Corwin Press. This book was released on 2009-03-17 with total page 241 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Become the “head learner” in your school by engaging in action research! Action research can serve as a critical element in the professional development of principals, administrators, and school leaders. Award-winning author Nancy Fichtman Dana guides leaders in identifying and exploring areas of interest for principal research, including staff development, curriculum development, individual teachers, community/culture building, leadership skills, building management, and school performance. With a step-by-step approach, this resource: Helps principals develop a question, collect and analyze data, and share the results of their inquiry Includes numerous examples of actual principal inquiry Provides exercises to guide principals through their own inquiry projects