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In 1975, a court-ordered busing program was launched to desegregate the schools of New Castle County, Delaware. It was by many accounts one of the most significant and successful desegregation programs in the nation (Armor & Rossell, 2002; Orfield, 2014; Raffel, 1980). In 1995, the districts of the county were declared "unitary" and the court order was lifted. Shortly thereafter, new policies were enacted allowing school choice, charter schools, and neighborhood attendance zoning. This study draws on primary and secondary data, including geographic, census, and enrollment data, and provides an account of the policy changes and a 26-year longitudinal analysis of changing enrollment trends and patterns. Segregation by race and income among schools accelerated after the policy changes. While the policy changes created greater segregation, enrollment trends varied by district and over time; segregation growth was moderate in two of the districts, small in the others. Our study illuminates the complexity of explaining segregation patterns and disentangling the contributing role of choice, charters, attendance zones, and residential demographics in explaining segregation patterns in school systems.

Objective of the Case--There is a large volume of theoretical and "how to" literature on professional learning communities (PLCs), but little documenting the challenges of implementation and even less on the challenges of system-wide implementation of PLCs. This case is about the role of the central office in initiating and supporting system level change to improve student learning through the implementation of PLCs. Change of this nature and scope raises many difficult challenges--decisions affecting resources, staff relationships, union policies, school scheduling, curriculum, professional development, and instruction--and these are challenges and decisions that prospective school and district leaders need to understand and anticipate in order to lead successful change. This case is intended to deepen learners' understanding of the theory and research behind PLCs and the complexities and challenges of implementing change at the district level. The case is also intended to promote skill development: in communications (writing, speaking, tailoring messages to specific audiences), strategic planning (clarifying objectives, analyzing options and consequences, allocating resources, budgeting, adapting to stakeholders' interests, establishing timelines), instructional leadership (professional development, curriculum improvement, best practices for instruction) and human relations (empathy, supportiveness, self-efficacy). The case has three main portions: (1) theory and research background; (2) the case narrative concerning the initiative to implement PLCs in Marshall County School District; (3) and the list of discussion questions and tasks to extend and apply the learning from the case. The case could be covered in three class sessions: the first session, discussing the background readings and understanding the theory and research related to system level leadership and implementing instructional change; the second, discussing the case narrative and the end-of-case discussion questions; and the third, presenting and debriefing on tasks selected for more in-depth assignments to complete.

Education leaders and much literature exhort teachers and school leaders to use data more often and more effectively to guide planning and decision making--called, "data driven decision making." This term is ubiquitous in literature and reform discourse, but "on the ground," so to speak, practitioners face significant challenges in analyzing, understanding, and applying data to improve practice. Obstacles faced by practitioners include insufficient expertise, tools, and time; also, organizational cultures in schools generally create few incentives for data analysis and as often as not sustain norms inimical to the collaboration and collective action required for data driven decision making. The case reported here illustrates these challenges through the actions of a principal identifying a problem of organizational culture and instructional practice and leading an initiative to promote collaboration, analysis, and reflection to help improve writing instruction in his school. (Contains 2 figures, 7 tables and 13 footnotes.)

This article offers lessons from an initiative refashioning the doctoral thesis in an education leadership program. The program serves a practitioner clientele; most are teachers and administrators. The new model for the thesis emphasizes leadership, problem solving, decision making, and organizational improvement. The former model was a traditional research-focused thesis. This article describes the rationale for the change and four features of the new problem-based inquiry model contrasted with the traditional research model. A central challenge of this initiative has been fashioning a model that is authentic problem solving and not merely applied research. Both faculty and doctoral advisees have firmly held assumptions and expectations about the thesis-as-research and limited experience with a problem-solving paradigm. Thus, applying an authentic model of problem-based inquiry to the doctoral thesis confronts significant conceptual and practical challenges. (Contains 3 notes and 1 figure.)

Decisions made in middle school allocate students to different high school course levels and tracks. Because African American students are disproportionately represented in the lower level tracks of high school curriculum and because track placement affects learning and postsecondary opportunities, it is important to explore determinants of track placement. Some theories emphasize academic determinants of track placement; other theories emphasize student background variables and peer influences; and still others, racial biases among educators. Research findings have been inconsistent concerning how much disproportionate representation in lower level courses is explained by prior academic achievement variables and how much it is explained by race. We examined the effects of race and 8th grade academic achievement variables--grades and standardized tests scores--on odds of placement in different levels of 9th grade English courses in a large high school. Our findings indicated that track placement decisions were strongly determined by prior grades and test scores; race did not have a statistically significant independent effect on track placement. We identify a need for more research on the role of grades as determinants of track placement. (Contains 3 tables.)

Despite a decade of advocacy and advances in technology, data driven decision making remains an elusive vision for most high schools. This article identifies key data systems design needs and presents methods for monitoring, managing, and improving programs. Because of its continuing salience, we focus on the issue of tracking (ability grouping). We provide specific examples of useful analyses for measuring the conditions and consequences of tracking. We also discuss how to make transcript data useful for analyzing inter-track mobility, for monitoring course placement decisions, and for drilling down to plan interventions for subsets of students.

Clarifies key propositions of the central-curriculum-control model and presents teachers' beliefs about effects of centralized policies on practice, based on interviews with teachers from three urban districts. Curriculum-control policies contribute to content standardization and standard setting. They control what is taught, rather than how it is taught or how students learn. Alignment among policies is essential. (96 references) (MLH)