Improving Achievement in Low-Performing Schools : Key Results for School Leaders

Rating:
Summary: Sample checklists illustrate the key principles
Review: Ably edited by Mary Ann Burke, Improving Achievement In Low-Performing Schools: Key Results For School Leaders by academician Randolph E. Ward is a practical and professional guideline especially for teachers, and education professionals concerning innovative management practices to improve low performance in multi-stressed schools. Chapters focus upon how to improve student achievement in core subjects, creating safe, clean, and secure facilities, forging stronger links with parents and the community, raising the level of management effectiveness and accountability, and much more. Sample checklists illustrate the key principles outlined for dynamically improving the conditions and results of an educational institution.

Rating:
Summary: Key Results
Review: Dr. Ward authors an excellent vision that translates the best of abstract educational-change theories into a concrete prescription to improve school facilities, student achievement, and fiscal efficiency. Improving Achievement in Low-Performing Schools is an excellent guide to turn a district that is culturally, academically, financially, and technologically bankrupt into a high-performance urban learning organization. The research based `key results' discussed in the book are concisely represented in checklists that may be immediately utilized by district and site administrators. The authors describe how urban school leaders can move beyond compliance to the realm of quality instruction and significantly more students being accepted into prestigious universities. In sum, this book should be required reading for all educational policymakers, school district administrators, and principals.