Site-based Management Research Articles

Enacting Site-Based Management: A Political Utilities Analysis

Enacting Site-Based Management: A Political Utilities Analysis

Site-Based Management: A Survey of Nevada Principals

Site-Based Management: A Survey of Nevada Principals

A Time for Review : Implementing Site-Based Management: Overcoming the Obstacles

Site-based management can be an effective way to empower teachers and communities to improve their schools. However, carefully consid ered strategies are necessary if exist ing obstacles to implementation are to be overcome.

Franchising technology education: Issues and implications

In a field that changes as rapidly as educational technology, instructors must be willing to accept and use technological training. Franchised programs have a strong motive for accepting and implementing new technology-profit. In the public sector, training is not always recognized as a part of doing business. Often seen as an “extra” to be completed in an instructor’s spare time, training can be limited or eliminated entirely. We believe that the trend toward site-based management and the growing presence of the private sector in educational technology focuses attention on using technology in education. It increases public awareness of the field and raises questions about the value of programs. This may force the public sector to become more accountable to the community it serves. The private sector has learned much from the public sector, perhaps it is our turn to return the favor.

Reform Efforts in Florida's Middle Level Schools: Shifting from Mandate to Accountability Through Deregulation

AbstractOver the past two decades, Florida has made various statewide attempts to implement the middle school concept. In the early 1970s, some school districts began reorganizing its schools. The PRIME (Progress in Middle Childhood Education) was passed in 1984 and funded in 1985. This legislation mandated some programs and practices normally associated with the middle school concept and encouraged others through special funds. In 1991, PRIME legislation was placed in abeyance and Accountability/Blueprint 2000 legislation now stipulates site-based management and accountability. This evolutionary cycle of middle school programs and policies is the basis of this research project.Data documenting the impact of PRIME legislation during the years 1984–1989 served as a beginning point to this study. The four research questions that guided this study focused on the overall impact of PRIME legislation and categoricalfunding on middle level schools in Florida, the conditions of implementation that lead to institu...

Site-Based Management in a Collective Bargaining Environment: Can We Mix Oil and Water?

Don't think that, by itself, [school-based management] will produce anything. —Albert Shanker president of AFT, 19881 The school-based management that has been heralded in this town is bogus. — High school headmaster Boston Public Schools, 1991 We shall never learn to & respect our real calling & unless we have taught ourselves to consider everything as moonshine, compared with the education of the heart. —Sir Walter Scott

Ellis's "potential" integrative strategy instruction model: an appealing extension of previous efforts.

Today's teachers face a formidable challenge—how to facilitate the acquisition of basic skills, demanding content knowledge, and personal problem-solving capabilities for all students in increasingly diverse and competitive learning environments. Among the six national educational goals for the year 2000 (U.S. Department of Education, 1991), we seek to achieve (a) a high school graduation rate of at least 90%; (b) the demonstration of students' competency in challenging subject matter, including English, mathematics, science, history, and geography, and their readiness for responsible citizenship and productive employment; (c) the highest global standing for U.S. students in science and mathematics achievement; and (d) literacy and essential skills for every adult American. As educators concentrate on these goals and the accompanying educational reform directed toward their achievement, there is a fervent search for new ideas, along with an unprecedented tolerance for mold-breaking initiatives undertaken in both the public and the private sector (e.g., curriculum reform, site-based management, movement toward inclusion or unified special education/general education programs for students with and without disabilities, for-profit schools, national outcome measures). Across these diverse initiatives, commitment to the development of increased competency in academics, problem solving, personal development, and social responsibility represents a unifying theme. Ellis's article focuses on one critical challenge—the integration of traditional teacher-directed approaches to content instruction with instructional approaches designed for teaching information processing and problem solving designed . . . [to] maximize students' acquisition of new knowledge and their ability to use effective and efficient information processes and problem-solving skills. Termed Integrative Strategy Instruction (ISI), the potential model is especially relevant for general education and special education teachers employed in systems seeking to increase the amount of time students with specific learning disabilities (and other disabilities) spend in the general education program. For those who have followed the development and use of instruction designed to promote learning, Ellis's ISI model is a natural and appealing extension of previous efforts. It incorporates findings from foundation research, including work conducted by the University of Kansas Institute for Research in Learning Disabilities (KU-IRLD) research team, of which Ellis has been an active collaborator for many years. Drawing on a rich foundation of strategy or cognitive instruction research and information-processing theory, Ellis presents a well-articulated model with accompanying illustrative examples depicting how teachers can help adolescents, including those with learning disabilities, acquire an enriched content knowledge base necessary for independent and successful functioning and become good or strategic information processors and problem solvers. As with previously described models (e.g., Deshler & Lenz, 1989), this approach is based on the premise that efficient and effective learning is enhanced through the creation of learning environments that foster the development of behavior and are sensitive to learner attributes. In such environments, students develop learning strategies or tools that can be used to facilitate the analysis of task demands, determine how to best approach a problem, guide task completion, and monitor the effectiveness of their problem-solving process along the way. Distilling the presentation, the ISI model involves teacher-mediated instruction to facilitate acquisition of declarative, procedural, and conditional knowledge and presentation of information-processing strategies within four interacting subthemes (i.e., use of prior knowledge and experiences, various cognitive strategies, metacognition, and selfmotivation techniques). Ellis views the model as being particularly useful for teaching content area subjects to stu-

Integrating Site-Based Management and Effective Schools Research for Policy Development

Shared decision making is a central tenet of site-based management. Effective educational policy should be an outgrowth of this shared decision making and provide direction for educational practice. To this end, this article provides a sequentially integrated approach to policy development. By incorporating analyses of foundations of educational decision making, accepted practices of site-based management, sound educational research, assessment of policy values, and a disciplined decision-making process, campus management teams can provide the effective, proactive leadership that society and the educational community demand and deserve. The model outlined is designed to provide educational leaders with an enhanced context within which one can effectively integrate site-based management principles and effective schools research that will result in policies and practices for more effective schools.

Site-Based Management in Public Education: Opportunities and Challenges for School Social Workers

Site-Based Management in Public Education: Opportunities and Challenges for School Social Workers

Restructuring Special Education Services

Research and reform in special education has focused on the inclusion of students with disabilities in general education settings. Collaboration and consultation strategies, including cooperative teaching and cooperative consultation, are among the strategies being used to facilitate integration. Site-based management and shared decision-making are now being used widely in the general education community to bring about school improvement. An opportunity exists for aligning reform efforts in special education and general education. In this paper we review the philosophical, political, policy challenges encountered in the institution of collaborative teaching for serving students with disabilities in public schools engaged in substantive general education reform. Strategies for confronting and overcoming these challenges are also presented, as well as research methods for collecting evaluative data.

Coaching for Leadership: Moving Toward Site-Based Management

Here is an overview of the process one school district is using to effect the transformation from a centralized administration to site-based management.

Levels of Environmental Uncertainty of a Site-Based Management School within a Minority/Majority Context

The focus of this study was the perceived environmental uncertainty (PEU) of teachers in two selected elementary schools in a minority/majority context. It attempted to determine the sources of uncertainty that are perceived by teachers in a site-based management (SBM) elementary school and a non-site-based management elementary school. Specific items were examined to determine which indistrict and out-district matters were related to uncertainty and to explore whether or not the two groups of teachers in the selected schools were different regarding their perceived environmental uncertainty. A basic causal-comparative design was employed and the Perceived Environmental Uncertainty Index (PEUI) developed by Singh (1991) was used to collect data. Means, standard deviations and t-tests were calculated to quantify and summarize the data. Findings indicate that the PEU levels for the SBM school were lower than that of the non-SBM school; specific in-district and out-district items rated as most unclear and significant are different for both schools. However, both schools were concerned with the impact of state legislature on job. There is a significant difference in in-district PEU, out-of-district PEU and total PEU between the two schools. These results seem to suggest that site-based management is a viable alternative for reducing and coping with environmental uncertainty. However, further research needs to focus on other levels of school following a SBM approach. Additional studies should address correlations between perceived environmental uncertainty and student success.

The Management Profile and Site-Based Management: An Idea Whose Time Has Come

Here's how the Management Profile model can be used to implement a site-based management plan.

Ten Commandments for Successful Site-Based Management

The 10 "commandments" this writer offers are designed to help principals survive the transition to site-based management.

Establishing a Climate That Supports RE:Learning/ Site-Based Management

The Delaware RE:Learning project followed 10 years of state—district col laboration and connects several other initiatives. The writer traces that development.

Special Education in the Restructured School

Two significant, overriding trends in reform have emerged in special education at all levels from policy to program implementation during the past decade. These are, first, the movement to integrate students with severe disabilities and those with low-incidence disabilities into general education schools and classrooms for their educational programs; second, the effort to retain students with mild and moderate disabilities in the general classroom as an alternative to pull-out programs. These trends are closely associated. Until recently, parallel trends in general education reform have tended to focus on improvement in curriculum and in instructional techniques. Most recently, however, these reform efforts have shifted in the direction of systematic reorganization of school governance structures, policy, and resource utilization at the school site. This shift presents an opportunity for amalgamation of these various related viewpoints through broad-based, school restructuring policy reform. This amalgamation is particularly reflected in those aspects of restructuring that are concerned with regulatory waivers, site-based management and budgetary control, shared decision making, and full infusion, with school site coordination, of federal, categorical program resources into the general education program. Sufficient parallels exist between the general and special education reform agendas to suggest that the time may be at hand for a shared educational agenda.

The Role of the Curriculum Specialist in Site-Based Management

The principal's role must be redefined in such a way that renders the current curriculum content expert's role expendable, say these writers, who reflect on the impact of site-based management.

Principal's Perceptions of Site-Based Management and Teacher Empowerment

Presented here are the results of a survey designed to assess principals' attitudes about teacher autonomy.

Site-Based Management as a Tool for Reform

The current state of education—including music education—signals a need for improvement. Joyce O. Eastlund outlines the advantages of site-based management in changing education for the better.

Restructuring Teaching: An Assessment of Frequently Considered Options

One approach to improving education is to restructure teaching to change teachers' roles. This article suggests that such changes should enhance five working conditions: support for teaching& collegiality, influence, recognition and advancement, and time. Five policies are then evaluated in terms of how well they facilitate these conditions and how feasible their implementation is. These policies are career ladders, site-based management, schools with learning communities, extended year or day, and school incentive programs. Tactics for implementation are also suggested.