The Community Learning Centers program describes a comprehensive, top-to-bottom school design to dramatically increase the school achievement of all students. As such, the design is complex and exacting to implement in its entirety given long-standing school traditions, beliefs and policies. However, it is our conviction that only a systemic model for school change will raise American education to the level required for a sophisticated democratic society and the competitive world of the 21st century. More...

RESEARCH ON EFFECTIVENESS

This summary of research dating back to the Eight Year Study argues that experimental programs embodying Deweyan concepts have enormous advantages over the traditional. It raises further questions about the so-called back to basics movement. For more than 50 years now, studies have been documenting the effectiveness of nontraditional school programs in the United States. This research should cause us to question 95% of current educational practice. Much of this research is not well known. Until recent years, neither was the history of certain ethnic groups and of women in America. Just as history books must be revised to reflect more accurately the experiences of different groups, so must education histories be changed to include the startling, disturbing research which we summarize here. More...

STARTING NEW SCHOOLS: LESSONS FOR SUCCESS

The criticism prodding the nation's educators to bring schools into the modern age is reaching firestorm proportions. From President Bush, governors, state departments of education and parents, persistent demands are heard to raise student achievement, increase graduation rates, better serve poor and minority students and reduce self destructive student behaviors. Though the sum total of educational experimentation today surely ranks higher than at anytime in history, mainstream school practice has changed little and totally dominates the education scene. More...