An Educators' Guide to Schoolwide Reform

Introduction

Dear Colleague:

Much has been written lately about schoolwide programs, those efforts that promise to improve student learning by changing the entire school. Most of the prose describing these approaches remains uncomfortably silent about their effectiveness.

And that's what brought a group of us together: the need for our collective memberships to determine what works, and what just holds promise, among the variety of schoolwide approaches now available for adoption.

This report examines the claims for 24 schoolwide approaches. It draws on the expertise of the American Institutes for Research (AIR), an independent, internationally recognized research organization. First, the approaches to be examined were identified; then AIR was asked to rate their effectiveness in raising student achievement and to describe the approaches along a number of dimensions.

Due to the nature of this review, quantitative achievement measures are highlighted. This is not to discount the validity of qualitative research or the importance of such outcomes as a more positive school atmosphere and increased student satisfaction. However, it is through measurable achievement outcomes—test scores, grades, graduation rates—that students and their schools are held accountable. Thus, before agreeing to launch a large-scale reform, most school staffs, parents, and policymakers want to know the probability that students will benefit in measurable ways.

This review found that only a few approaches have documented their positive effects on student achievement. Several approaches appear to hold promise, but lack evidence to verify this conclusion. In some cases, this lack of evidence is understandable: the approach is just too new to have collected the necessary data. In other cases, the approach's developers and the school systems that use it never got around to conducting a systematic evaluation. These approaches may still be effective; that being the case, we can only hope that rigorous evaluations of their effectiveness occur soon.

This complicated exercise introduced us to excellent developers, enlightened policy-makers, and courageous educators. Together they are improving educational opportunities for children. But it also introduced us to two challenges that confront those concerned about educational improvement.

First, the nation's educational research and development enterprise needs to be strengthened. More research is needed, to be sure. But just as important, the federal government should invest more in what is known as programmatic research and development.

Further, private industry should share this enormous responsibility by investing in ongoing research as well as engaging in the development of school reform programs. That is, funds are badly needed to enable researchers and developers to build on new knowledge to create schoolwide approaches that integrate curriculum, instruction, assessment, and professional development. Some of the 24 approaches we examined emerged from such a process. More are needed.

Second, once they have been introduced in schools, approaches need to be studied carefully over time to determine their effectiveness. Before making adoption decisions, educators should have sufficient data to answer such basic questions as: Does this approach raise achievement as its developer claims? Is it compatible with state and districtwide reform initiatives? With which groups of students does it get the best results? Are most school staffs able to use it as designed? Can it be implemented at a reasonable cost? What kind of implementation support does the developer provide?

No reform will work everywhere every time. But if we could get answers to these questions, everyone would know which approaches constitute their "best bets." Educators could then significantly increase the odds of choosing a successful approach that addresses their students’ most pressing needs. At the same time, teachers and administrators also would know which developers provide the kind of assistance needed to implement their approaches successfully.

While more work needs to be done, we believe this initial in-depth review allows us to suggest that school systems do have choices, and good ones at that, when it comes to improving student achievement. We urge our members to read this report. We believe it can be the catalyst for meaningful discussion among educators, administrators, and parents as they go about the challenges of improving the performance of their schools.

In the meantime, we pledge at the national level to continue our advocacy for more approaches that can demonstrate their ability to help improve teaching and learning.

Sincerely,