Skip to main content Accessibility help

We use cookies to distinguish you from other users and to provide you with a better experience on our websites. Close this message to accept cookies or find out how to manage your cookie settings.

Close cookie message
×
Hostname: page-component-745bb68f8f-grxwn Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2025-01-30T13:46:44.867Z Has data issue: false hasContentIssue false

6 - School Improvement by Design

Why It’s Needed, How It Works and How It Can Be Improved

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  19 November 2021

By
Brian Rowan
Edited by
Colleen McLaughlin  and
Alan Ruby
Colleen McLaughlin
Affiliation:
University of Cambridge
Alan Ruby
Affiliation:
University of Pennsylvania
Get access

Summary

This chapter examines six externally developed ‘Instructional Improvement Programmes’ in the United States which have been subjects of a sustained programme of intervention studies. All six programmes sought to change instructional practice in both English Language Arts and mathematics and were adopted by schools both as a result of government incentives and normal ‘market’ processes. All six were externally evaluated by carefully measuring patterns of instructional practice and student achievement in order to assess the extent to which the programmes succeeded in changing teaching and improving student learning. Some programmes changed teaching and improved student learning, some changed teaching but did not improve student learning and some programmes did not change teaching or improve student learning. One proposition drawn from these evaluations is that successful external programmes of instructional improvement have well-specified designs for instruction and provide strong pressures and supports to encourage faithful implementation of these instructional designs in classrooms.

Keywords

instructional improvementimplementation fidelityschool reformUnited Statesschool improvement
Type
Chapter
Information
Implementing Educational Reform
Cases and Challenges
 , pp. 105 - 126
Publisher: Cambridge University Press
Print publication year: 2021

Access options

Get access to the full version of this content by using one of the access options below. (Log in options will check for institutional or personal access. Content may require purchase if you do not have access.)

References

Akerlof, G. A. (1978). The market for ‘lemons’: Quality uncertainty and the market mechanism. In Uncertainty in Economics. Cambridge, MA: Academic Press, pp. 235–51.Google Scholar
Balafoutas, L. and Kerschbamer, R. (2020). Credence goods in the literature: What the past fifteen years have taught us about fraud, incentives, and the role of institutions. Journal of Behavioral and Experimental Finance, 26, 100285.Google Scholar
Berman, P. and McLaughlin, M. W. (1975). Federal Programs Supporting Educational Change, Vol. 4: The Findings in Review. Santa Monica: RAND.Google Scholar
Bloom, H. S., Ham, S., Melton, L. and O’Brien, J. (2001). Evaluating the Accelerated Schools Approach: A Look at Early Implementation and Impacts on Student Achievement in Eight Elementary Schools. Washington, DC: MDRC.Google Scholar
Bodilly, S. (1996). Lessons from New American Schools Development Corporation’s Demonstration Phase. Santa Monica: RAND.Google Scholar
Borman, G. D., Hewes, G. M., Overman, L. T. and Brown, S. (2003). Comprehensive school reform and achievement: A meta-analysis. Review of Educational Research, 73:2, 125–230.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Borman, G. D., Slavin, R. E., Cheung, A. C., Chamberlain, A. M., Madden, N. A. and Chambers, B. (2005). The national randomized field trial of Success for All: Second-year outcomes. American Educational Research Journal, 42:4, 673–96.Google Scholar
Borman, G. D., Slavin, R. E., Cheung, A. C., Chamberlain, A. M., Madden, N. A. and Chambers, B. (2007). Final reading outcomes of the national randomized field trial of Success for All. American Educational Research Journal, 44:3, 701–31.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Boulay, B., Goodson, B., Olsen, R., McCormick, R., Darrow, C., Frye, M., Gan, K., Harvill, H. and Sarna, M. (2018). The Investing in Innovation Fund: Summary of 67 Evaluations: Final Report (NCEE 2018-4013). Washington, DC: National Center for Education Evaluation and Regional Assistance, Institute of Education Sciences, US Department of Education.Google Scholar
Bryk, A. S., Gomez, L. M. and Grunow, A. (2011). Getting ideas into action: Building networked improvement communities in education. In Hallinan, M. (ed.) Frontiers in Sociology of Education. Frontiers in Sociology and Social Research, vol 1. Dordrecht: Springer, pp. 127–62.Google Scholar
Camburn, E., Rowan, B. and Taylor, J. E. (2003). Distributed leadership in schools: The case of elementary schools adopting comprehensive school reform models. Educational Evaluation and Policy Analysis, 25:4, 347–73.Google Scholar
Clancy, C. M., Margolis, P. A. and Miller, M. (2013). Collaborative networks for both improvement and research. Pediatrics, 131(Suppl 4), S210–14.Google Scholar
Cohen, D. K., Peurach, D. J., Glazer, J. L., Gates, K. E. and Goldin, S. (2013). Improvement by Design: The Promise of Better Schools. Chicago: University of Chicago Press.Google Scholar
Correnti, R. (2009). Examining CSR program effects on student achievement: Causal explanation through examination of implementation rates and student mobility. Paper Presented at the Conference of Society for Research on Educational Effectiveness, Washington, DC, March.Google Scholar
Correnti, R. and Rowan, B. (2007). Opening up the black box: Literacy instruction in schools participating in three comprehensive school reform programs. American Educational Research Journal, 44:2, 298–339.Google Scholar
Correnti, R., Hansen, B. B. and Rowan, B. (2008). Early Implementation and Student Achievement Outcomes in Texas Schools using Agile Mind Algebra 1 Services. Ann Arbor, MI: Institute for Social Research, University of Michigan.Google Scholar
Crandall, D. P. and Loucks, S. F. (1983). A Roadmap for School Improvement. Executive Summary of the Study of Dissemination Efforts Supporting School Improvement. People, Policies, and Practices: Examining the Chain of School Improvement, Volume X. ERIC Number: ED240722. Andover, MA: Network of Innovative Schools, Inc.Google Scholar
Dusenbury, L. (2003). A review of research on fidelity of implementation: Implications for drug abuse prevention in school settings. Health Education Research, 18:2, 237–56.Google Scholar
Emrick, J. A., Peterson, S. M. and Agarwala-Rogers, R. (1977). Evaluation of the National Diffusion Network: Volume 1, Findings and Recommendations. Menlo Park, CA: Stanford Research Institute.Google Scholar
Hartong, S. (2016). New structures of power and regulation within ‘distributed’ education policy – the example of the US Common Core State Standards Initiative. Journal of Education Policy, 31:2, 213–25.Google Scholar
Kennedy, M. M. (1978). Findings from the Follow Through planned variation study. Educational Researcher, 7:6, 3–11.Google Scholar
Louis, K. S., Rosenblum, S. and Molitor, J. A. (1981). Strategies for Knowledge Use and School Improvement. Washington, DC: US Department of Education, Office of Educational Research and Improvement.Google Scholar
Malerba, F. and Vonortas, N. S. (eds.) (2009). Innovation Networks in Industries. Cheltenham, UK: Edward Elgar Publishing.Google Scholar
Meyer, J. W. and Rowan, B. (1978). The structure of educational organizations. In Ballantine, J. H. and Spade, J. Z. (eds.) Schools and Society: A Sociological Approach to Education. Thousand Oaks, CA: Pine Forge Press, pp. 217–25.Google Scholar
Moir, T. (2018). Why is implementation science important for intervention design and evaluation within educational settings? Frontiers in Education, 3, Article 61.Google Scholar
Orland, M., Hoffman, A. and Vaughn, S. E. (2010) Evaluation of the Comprehensive School Reform Program Implementation and Outcomes: Fifth-Year Report. Washington, DC: US Department of Education, Office of Planning, Evaluation and Policy Development, Policy and Program Studies Service.Google Scholar
Ouchi, W. G. (1980). Markets, bureaucracies, and clans. Administrative Science Quarterly, 25:1, 129–41.Google Scholar
Peurach, D. J. and Glazer, J. L. (2012). Reconsidering replication: New perspectives on large-scale school improvement. Journal of Educational Change, 13:2, 155–90.Google Scholar
Rhodes, R. A. W. (2006). Policy network analysis. In Goodin, R. E., Moran, M. and Rein, M. (eds.) The Oxford Handbook of Public Policy, Vol. 6. Oxford: Oxford University Press, pp. 425–47.Google Scholar
Rowan, B. and Miller, R. J. (2007). Organizational strategies for promoting instructional change: Implementation dynamics in schools working with comprehensive school reform providers. American Educational Research Journal, 44:2, 252–97.Google Scholar
Rowan, B., Hansen, B. B., White, M., Lycurgus, T., and Scott, L. J. (2019). A Summary of the BURST: Reading Efficacy Trial (Carried Out Under IES Award # R305A120811). Ann Arbor, MI: Institute for Social Research, University of Michigan.Google Scholar
Rowan, B., Miller, R., and Camburn, E. (2009). School Improvement by Design: Lessons from a Study of Comprehensive School Reform Programs. Philadelphia: Consortium for Policy Research in Education.Google Scholar
Schneider, E. C., Sorbero, M. E., Haas, A., Ridgely, M. S., Khodyakov, D., Setodji, C. M. and Goldmann, D. (2017). Does a quality improvement campaign accelerate take-up of new evidence? A ten-state cluster-randomized controlled trial of the IHI’s Project JOINTS. Implementation Science, 12:1, 51.Google Scholar
Watkins, C. L. (1997). Project Follow Through. Cambridge, MA: Cambridge Center for Behavioral Studies.Google Scholar
Williamson, O. E. (1981). The economics of organization: The transaction cost approach. American Journal of Sociology, 87:3, 548–77.Google Scholar

Save book to Kindle

To save this book to your Kindle, first ensure [email protected] is added to your Approved Personal Document E-mail List under your Personal Document Settings on the Manage Your Content and Devices page of your Amazon account. Then enter the ‘name’ part of your Kindle email address below. Find out more about saving to your Kindle.

Note you can select to save to either the @free.kindle.com or @kindle.com variations. ‘@free.kindle.com’ emails are free but can only be saved to your device when it is connected to wi-fi. ‘@kindle.com’ emails can be delivered even when you are not connected to wi-fi, but note that service fees apply.

Find out more about the Kindle Personal Document Service.

Available formats
×

Save book to Dropbox

To save content items to your account, please confirm that you agree to abide by our usage policies. If this is the first time you use this feature, you will be asked to authorise Cambridge Core to connect with your account. Find out more about saving content to Dropbox.

Available formats
×

Save book to Google Drive

To save content items to your account, please confirm that you agree to abide by our usage policies. If this is the first time you use this feature, you will be asked to authorise Cambridge Core to connect with your account. Find out more about saving content to Google Drive.

Available formats
×