Abstract: Current educational reforms in the U.S. contain a pervasive discourse of participation. Although calls for participation of teachers, students, parents, communities, business, and numerous other stakeholders in schools are central to most reforms, there is increasing evidence that much participatory reform is either bogus, superficial, or ineffective (Beare, 1993; Hargreaves, 1994; Malen & Ogawa, 1988; Smyth, 1993). In this article, I discuss the various influences on the discourse of participation and the ways it is currently being promoted and implemented by diverse constituencies. More specifically, I analyze (a) how participation becomes a form of public relations to create greater institutional legitimacy for current educational practices, (b) how participation mechanisms, viewed as disciplinary practices, become more sophisticated technologies of control, (c) how structures set up for greater participation often become sites for collusion, and (d) how movements promoting parental school choice in an...

Abstract: This book offers a unique record of the realities of parental choice and competitive pressures on schools. On the basis of research involving thousands of parents and eleven secondary schools monitored over several years, it sets out: * empirical findings on parents' preferences and experience of choice, how schools respond to competitive pressures, and local dynamics of quasi-markets * theoretical implications for understanding quasi-markets in education and the public interest * implications for educational policy, if schools are to be more responsive and inequalities lessened The book provides insights into whether pressures for choice and diversity are in the greater public interest, or if they benefit only the few, and suggests a notion of the public-market as a model for analysing public services.

Abstract: While educators, parents and policymakers are still debating the pros and cons of school choice, it is now possible to learn from choice experiments in public, private, and charter schools across the country. This book examines the evidence from these early school choice programs and looks at the larger implications of choice and competition in education. Paul Peterson makes a strong case for school choice in central cities, and coeditor Bryan Hassel offers the case for charter schools. John E. Brandl offers his vision of school governance in the next century. The book's other contributors--economists, political scientists, and education specialists--provide case studies of the experience with voucher programs in Indianapolis, San Antonio, Cleveland, and Milwaukee; survey charter schools; analyze public school choice; discuss constitutional issues; and study the effects of private education on democratic values. Contributors include David J. Armor, George Mason University; Chester E. Finn Jr. and Bruno V. Manno, Hudson Institute; Caroline M. Hoxby, Harvard University; Brett M. Peiser, Partnerships in Learning; and Joseph P. Viteritti, New York University.

Abstract: This study examines the educational decentalization and privatization of schools in Chile, integrating the country's political and economic problems during the reform process of the Pinochet regime of the early 1980s It presents data from a survey of 726 households in the Greater Santiago area

Abstract: Theory: Market-like reforms, such as school choice, can work effectively in spite of the low levels of information commonly found among citizen/consumers. Hypothesis: We hypothesize that (1) parental knowledge of school characteristics is a function of ability, incentives, and whether parents believe a particular school attribute to be important; (2) parents will select schools for their children that rate high on the dimensions that they value; (3) the "marginal consumer" will be more knowledgeable about schools than other parents; and (4) marginal consumers will have more accurate information on dimensions that they value and are more likely to select schools for their children that rate high on these dimensions. Methods: Multiple regression is used to predict parents' knowledge of reading test scores, racial composition of the school, and number of violent incidents. Multiple regression is also used to determine the extent to which consumers have enrolled their children in schools that are high on the dimensions about which they care. Results: We find that on average low-income parents have very little accurate information about objective conditions in the schools. However, even in the absence of such objective knowledge there is evidence of a matching process in which children are enrolled in schools that are higher on the dimensions of education that their parents think are important. We then shift our analysis away from the behavior of the "average" parent and identify a subset of parents who are in fact informed about the conditions of the schools. We demonstrate that there is a tighter match between what these parents want and the conditions of the schools in which their children are enrolled.

Abstract: The Milwaukee voucher program was enacted by the Wisconsin State Legislature in the summer of 1990. Beginning that August, it allowed students to attend private schools with public vouchers for the first time in the United States. This article provides a summary of the results of the first five years of that program. I begin with a brief discussion of the theoretical and research issues—brief because these issues have been thoroughly aired many times (Cookson, 1994; Henig, 1994; Smith & Meier, 1995; Wells, 1993; Witte & Rigdon, 1993). Following a description of the initial program and subsequent changes, I outline who participated in the program—including characteristics of students and families and schools. I then describe the results in terms of the effects on families and students and on schools. I conclude with a discussion of the implications of this type of program and more openended voucher programs.

Abstract: 1 Introduction 2 Diversity, Differentiation and Hierarchy: School Choice and Parental Preferences 3 Marketing Quality: Traditional and Modern Versions of Educational Excellence 4 School System Responses to External Change: Implications for Parental Choice of Schools 5 Opting into the Past? Grant Maintained Schools and the Reinvention of Tradition 6 Schools Responsiveness to Parents' Views at Key Stage One 7 Parental Involvement and School Choice: Israel and the United States 8 Parental Choice and Special Education 9 The Impact of Competition on Secondary Schools 10 The Education Market, Labour Relations in Schools and Teacher Unionism in the UK 11 Policies for School Choice: What can Britain Learn from Abroad? 12 Admissions to Schools: A Study of Local Education Authorities 13 Changing Admissions Policies and Practices in Inner London: Implications for Policy and Future Research 14 Review and Implications

Abstract: Every year, in one out of three big cities, the school superintendent leaves his or her job, sending local community leaders back to square one. Cleveland, Baltimore, and Washington, D.C., are struggling to recreate their failed school systems, and many more cities are likely to follow. City leaders need more than new superintendents. They need stable reform strategies strong enough to move an entrenched system. Unfortunately, it is not clear where they can turn for help. Education experts are deeply divided about whether teacher retraining or new standards are enough to reform a struggling city system, or whether more fundamental changes, such as family choice and family-run schools, are needed. Based on new research, this book identifies the essential elements of reform strategies that can transform school performance in big cities beset by poverty, social instability, racial isolation, and labor unrest. It also suggests ways that local leaders can assemble the necessary funding and political support to make such strategies work.

Abstract: This paper uses longitudinal data from the secondary schools in six of the new unitary authorities in South Wales—Cardiff, Swansea, Merthyr Tydfil, Dridgend, Caerphilfy and Rhondda Cynon Taff local education authorities—to provide an empirical test of the academic debate concerning the likely effects of school choice on the social composition of differing schools. Using several measures of segregation between schools, including a new one calculated from eligibility for free meals, the study concludes that the introduction of choice reforms for England and Wales in 1988 may have had a small but significant positive effect on the pre‐existing social stratification between schools. In coming to this conclusion, the study inevitably raises questions about the findings generated by some previous qualitative studies of markets and choice in education.

Abstract: This paper notes some similarities between school choice policies in England and the US and considers how far any convergences can be explained, on the one hand, by broader social changes and, on the other, by evidence of policy exchange. In the first case, it discusses the usefulness of concepts such as post-Fordism and post-modernity and indicates their limitations. In the second case, it identifies relevant neoliberal policy networks within and between the two countries but finds more evidence of the use of overseas examples to legitimate policies at home than it does of direct policy borrowing. Reflecting upon both sets of explanations, it argues for a clearer conceptualisation of the relationship between accounts of the micro-politics of policy making and macro-level theories of change.

Abstract: This paper uses data from the 1992-93 Vietnam Living Standards Survey (VLSS) to examine the nature of private schooling in Vietnam. Although the number of private schools is small, it is growing in both urban and rural areas, and the cost to parents of most private schools is not much higher than the cost of attending public schools. At a more general level, this paper demonstrates how detailed household survey data can be used to understand schooling choices in developing countries. Estimates of the determinants of the choice among public, private and semi-public schools indicate that better off households are less likely to send their children to semi-public schools but more likely to send them to private schools. Results also suggest that the marginal cost to households of switching from public to private schools may be small. No significant effects of religion or ethnicity are found. Wage regressions indicate that individuals who attended private school receive higher wages than individuals with the same level of school attainment from public schools. The importance of parental education as a determinant of children's ultimate attainment is confirmed. One implication is that any targeting efforts, such as voucher or scholarship provisions, should consider using parental education to determine eligibility.

Abstract: The last decade has seen a rise in research on and practices of school, family and community involvement in the education of youth. This trend can be attributed to a number of factors. Low achievement and high dropout rates, especially for poor and marginalized youth, have led educators and social scientists to become more aware of the importance of family and community involvement for school effectiveness and positive student outcomes. Moreover, communitarians and others have pointed to the loss of community and collective life that many people feel in their neighbourhoods, workplaces and schools as well. In this chapter, Sanders and Epstein make the case that in order for schools to educate all youth effectively, families and communities must become full partners in the process.

Abstract: Findings from a recent national assessment of the state of Catholic education show that Catholic schools are on the verge of becoming a system of proprietary schools that educate growing numbers of non-Catholics, children from the wealthiest strata of the society, and increasing numbers of children who do not consider themselves religious at all, Mr. Baker and Mr. Riordan assert. Over the past century, very few American institutions have survived the kinds of ups and downs that the American Catholic elementary and secondary schools have experienced. Like the family farm, the economically viable small town, and the orphanage, the Catholic school played an important role in the early 20th century, but like so many other 19th-century developments. by midcentury it was on the verge of extinction. However. Catholic schools have undergone a 180-degree reversal of fortune in recent years. In part, this change has come about as a result of the surprising role that Catholic schools have come to play in the national debate over the quality of education that has raged during the past 15 years. But the improved fortunes of Catholic schools stem mostly from changes that began in the 1970s and have quietly and steadily made of them something few would have predicted from their humble origins in the poor. immigrant, ethnic neighborhoods of the 19th century. Findings from a recent national assessment of the state of Catholic education show that Catholic schools are on the verge of becoming a system of proprietary schools that educate growing numbers of non-Catholics, children from the wealthiest strata of the society, and increasing numbers of children who do not consider themselves religious at all. In short, the old common Catholic school is fast becoming an elite private school in which indoctrination into the faith seems to be taking a back seat to academic preparation. And surprisingly, neither national leaders of Catholic education nor those who suggest that Catholic schools offer a model for fixing deficiencies in public schools have acknowledged this transformation and its implications both for the future of the nation's largest set of private schools and for the debate about educational quality in the nation. Our tale will no doubt strike various readers differently. For those who are primarily interested in the future of Catholic schools themselves, the newly uncovered national trends suggest that Catholic education may be on the verge of a major crisis of identity. The new breed of students attracted to Catholic schooling and other changes in faculty and tuition threaten the very core of the traditional mission: the education of the masses of Catholics. Furthermore, since the achievement advantage of Catholic schools relative to public schools is clearly and consistently limited to students who are economically disadvantaged, this march toward affluence could mean that the advantage that Catholic schools enjoy will diminish among regular students. For Catholic school educators, these trends should serve as a wake-up call for addressing the uncertain future of these schools. For those readers interested in national education policy and reform, our tale will be a sobering one. Much caution is called for in extrapolating from studies of the effectiveness of Catholic schools to the problems facing public schools. Like some institutional version of the mythical phoenix, by the early 1980s the once moribund Catholic schools had become the darlings of the political Right and of influential social scientists bent on "saving public schools." Among the latter group, the Catholic school is held up as a sort of shining example of effective education for all children that, if used widely, could pull the public school system out of the educational doldrums. For example, extrapolating from the Catholic school experience has led to greater interest in school choice, in core academic curricula, and in school uniforms, to name a few issues. …

Abstract: In 1990, Milwaukee (Wisconsin) became the site of the first publicly funded school-choice program providing low-income parents with vouchers that could be used to send their children to secular, private schools. An evaluation of Milwaukee's school-choice experiment was conducted by a team of researchers, headed by John Witte at the University of Wisconsin at Madison, during the years 1991-95. That study concluded that choice was not an effective way to improve the education of low-income, central-city students. The data were made available on the World Wide Web in February 1996. This paper presents findings of a study conducted by the Center for Public Policy at the University of Houston (CPP) and the Program in Education Policy and Governance at Harvard University (PEPG) that analyzed the University of Wisconsin-Madison database and research methodology. The CPP/PEPG study examined student performance as measured by standardized mathematics and reading tests. It concludes that students enrolled in choice schools for 3 or more years, on average, did better on standardized tests than a comparable group of students attending Milwaukee public schools. The results indicate that the reading scores of choice students in their 3rd and 4th years were, on average, from 3 and 5 percentile points higher, respectively, than those of comparable public school students. Math scores, on average, were 5 and 12 percentile points higher for the 3rd and 4th years, respectively. The CPP/PEPG study also argues that the earlier researchers failed to use analytic techniques appropriate to experimental data; the bulk of their research focused on comparisons between choice students and a much less disadvantaged cross-section of public school students. Nine tables are included. (Contains 30 end notes.) (LMI) *********************************************************************** * Reproductions supplied by EDRS are the best that can be made * * from the original document. * *********************************************************************** The Effectiveness of School Choice in Milwaukee: A Secondary Analysis of Data from the Program's Evaluation Jay P. Greene University of Houston

Abstract: Those who favor expansion of consumer choice in education claim that competition would force schools to improve. Critics claim that it would sort students by race and class. A competitive market will provide what consumers demand, yet neither side has empirical evidence on such consumer preferences to back up their claims. This paper offers such evidence. This paper estimates a conditional logit model using data from a public school choice program in Minneapolis, Minnesota, in order to infer how families trade off the convenience of a shorter commute with school quality and peer group characteristics. The evidence suggests that consumer choice alone would not raise schools' academic performance. Parents in Minneapolis were not more likely to choose schools with high test scores or greater value added. Rather they preferred schools relatively close to home and ones where they were better represented ethnically and racially. The only discernable test score effect was one where families sought a match between their own child's ability and the mean ability level of similar students at the prospective school. Simulations suggest that expanding choice could ultimately lead to severe, but not total segregation by race and ethnicity. Unrestricted choice could present a tradeoff between consumer satisfaction today and increased racial segregation in the future. (Author/RJM) ******************************************************************************** Reproductions supplied by EDRS are the best that can be made from the original document. ******************************************************************************** School Quality and Social Stratification: The Determinants and Consequences of Parental School Choice U.S. DEPARTMENT OF EDUCATION Office of Educational Research and Irnprosenlent EDyc.TIONAL RESOURCES INFORMATION CENTER (ERIC) This document has been reproduced as received from the person or organization originating it. 0 Minor changes have been made to improve reproduction quality. Points of view or opinions stated in this document do not necessarily represent official OERI position or policy. Paper presented at the American Educational Research Association Annual Meeting, San Diego, CA. April 13, 1998 Steven Glazerman University of Chicago PERMISSION TO REPRODUCE AND DISSEMINATE THIS MATERIAL HAS BEEN GRANTED BY

Abstract: More and more students are being labeled at-risk in our educational system. These students are often behind academically, have dropped out of school, or have been expelled or suspended from conventional high schools. Some states have implemented school choice options that address the needs of these students giving them a choice of an alternative high school setting. These programs, commonly referred to as "second chance" programs, are designed to address the specific needs of at-risk students. The second chance option combines the pedagogy of alternative programs with the philosophical orientation of school choice offering a second chance to those who are failing in the traditional system. Alternative programs and schools are an integral part of the second chance option. Yet little is known about the characteristics of these programs and how they relate to school choice. While other types of school choice options have received the majority of attention over the past few years, second chance programs have been quietly addressing the needs of students most disenfranchised from the system. An evaluation of these programs and their effectiveness is important to consider as we contemplate the large numbers of at-risk youth and how to address their needs. "Alternative" has meant different things to different people over the past several years. As early as 1978 the controversy over the definition of alternative was acknowledged. Arnove and Strout (1978) noted that "the definition of `alternative' has been a matter of controversy since the early seventies, and much of the literature on the movement has been concerned with that issue alone" (p. 79). Nearly 20 years later there is still discussion about what alternative means. Raywid (1994) notes the variety of definitions surrounding alternative schools. She provides a summary of the alternatives that now appear to be available. These fall into three different categories: Type I alternatives are schools of choice and are usually popular. They sometimes resemble magnet schools and in some locales constitute some or all of the choice systems. They are likely to reflect programmatic themes or emphases pertaining to content or instructional strategy, or both. Type II alternatives are programs to which students are sentenced--usually as one last chance prior to expulsion. Typically, Type II programs focus on behavior modification, and little attention is paid to modifying curriculum or pedagogy. Type III alternatives are for students who are presumed to need remediation or rehabilitation--academic, social/emotional, or both. The assumption is that after successful treatment students can return to mainstream programs. Further, Raywid contends that," alternative schools are usually identifiable as one of these three types, but particular programs can be a mix" (p. 27). Sometimes this "mix" of definitions results in a school choice option such as second chance programs. In these programs school choice, remediation, and innovation combine to address the needs of at-risk students. Rather than these being "last chance" programs, these programs provide another chance at success within the educational system. Yet, several questions arise about these hybrid programs. What are the characteristics of these schools? Do these schools maintain the characteristics of alternative schools in their organization and structure? What are the characteristics of the students they serve? Can alternative schools be more than a holding tank for students but an actual first choice for those students who do not desire the conventional high school? Minnesota has been a leader in the implementation of school choice options including second chance options. In 1987 Minnesota established the High School Graduation Incentives (HSGI) Program that allows students who are at-risk of not completing school, two or more years behind academically, pregnant or a custodial parent, or expelled from school an opportunity to choose to attend any traditional high school in the state, any alternative school, or any Area Learning Center. …

Abstract: The School Choice Scholarships Foundation (SCSF) announced in February 1997 that it would provide 1,300 scholarships so that children from low-income families currently attending public schools could transfer to private schools.

Abstract: This study investigated the factors influencing parents of students with disabilities in choosing either an integrated setting or a special school for the education of their children. A questionnaire mailed to members of a parent support group in Victoria, Australia, sought responses to questions about current school setting, changes of school, parent preferences for school setting, and parent satisfaction with the current setting. Parents also rated 30 factors, including specialist resources, curriculum, socialisation, normalisation aspects, school environment, and professional consultation and advice, for their importance in selecting a school. Responses were received from 193 parents. Some differences were identified between parents of students in different settings, with mainstream parents giving high ratings to normalisation and academic aspects, and special school parents emphasising special programs, teacher‐student ratios, and the child's self‐esteem. All parents rated school climate vari...

Abstract: The authors provide background information on the "Charter Schools in Action" project, take a close look at the innovative ways in which some actual charter schools organize and support themselves, and present five lessons that charter schools offer American education We have recently concluded a two-year study known as "Charter Schools in Action," a project of the Hudson Institute s Educational Excellence Network, supported by the Pew Charitable Trusts In this article, we summarize the research and fieldwork undertaken for the project and discuss the implications of the charter school movement as we have observed it Our purpose is to suggest lessons that can be drawn from the country's brief charter experience that are relevant to US public (and private) schools We begin by providing some background information on the project and by recapping what is different about the charter idea itself We then discuss the origins of some actual charter schools and present some of the often creative and innovative ways in which these schools organize and support themselves We conclude with five lessons that charter schools have to offer American education Background Begun in July 1995, the "Charter Schools in Action" project had several goals: to illuminate the practical and policy issues surrounding the creation and successful operation of charter schools (including finances, governance, regulations, facilities, enrollment, and personnel); to begin to gauge the educational impact of these schools; and to inform people involved in creating and operating charter schools - both practitioners and policy makers - of strategies devised elsewhere During the first project year (1995-96), site visits were made to 43 charter schools in seven states: Arizona, California, Colorado, Massachusetts, Michigan, Minnesota, and Wisconsin Detailed information was collected on 35 of these schools, representing a cross section of the approximately 225 charter schools then operating nationwide More than 700 interviews were conducted with individuals in these schools and communities During the second year (1996-97), site visits were made to 45 charter schools in 13 states; 17 schools were visited for the second time Moreover, 18 schools that had been visited in 1995-96 participated in follow-up telephone interviews The research team obtained direct information from a total of 50 charter schools in 10 states, a reasonable cross section of the nearly 500 charter schools then operating nationwide (The three states with operating charter schools that were added in the project's second year are Florida, Texas, and the District of Columbia In addition, visits were made to New Jersey, North Carolina, and Hawaii to study the implementation of the new charter laws in those states) More than 600 interviews were conducted in the second year, bringing the two-year total to well over 1,300 During the second project year, parents, students, and teachers were surveyed in charter schools that agreed to participate (provided the response rates met the project's minimum participation levels) The project team developed three questionnaires in consultation with charter school experts nationwide and with the Information Technology Services unit of the Brookings Institution, which also provided data processing and analysis The results were tabulated from 4,954 students (fifth grade and older) attending 39 schools; from 2,978 parents of students attending 30 schools; and from 521 teachers in 36 schools Creating the New American Public School Whatever else the movement to develop "New American Schools" has accomplished since its beginning in 1991, it has certainly spurred the imagination of individuals and organizations that have made these schools genuine centers of innovation Policy makers, professionals, taxpayers, parents, and others committed to revitalizing public education should welcome charter schools as a giant step toward the reinvention of public education in America …

Abstract: The early results of a recent, as yet unfunded, study of the impact of markets on schools suggest that schools in Wales have become less stratified since 1988 in terms of indicators of poverty and educational need (Gorard & Fitz, 1998). The Smithfield study in New Zealand, on the other hand, concluded that market-like systems of choice had made segregation worse by advantaging the already advantaged (Waslander & Thrupp, 1997). Commentators in England, impressed by the range of existing secondary evidence from England, as well as from the Smithfield project, showing a relationship between school choice and class, have suggested that the picture for Wales is entirely a Welsh phenomenon. This article shows that this is not so, and that early results from a similar analysis in England confirm that between-school segregation has declined since 1998. It goes on to suggest that a fuller consideration of the interaction of poverty, markets and public monopoly schooling can help to resolve the dispute. The finding...

Abstract: Part One: Classroom Mismanagement. 1. The Limits of Teaching Skills. 2. The Trouble with School Uniforms. 3. Beyond Discipline. 4. How Not to Teach Values: A Critical Look at Character Education. Part Two: American Ideology Goes to School. 5. Resistance to Cooperative Learning: Making Sense of Its Deletion and Dilution. 6. "A Lot of Fat Kids Who Don't Like to Read": The Effects of Pizza Hut's Book It! Program and Other Reading Incentives. 7. Grading: The Issue is Not How But Why. 8. Grade Inflation and Other Red Herrings. 9. Only for My Kid: How Privileged Parents Undermine School Reform. Part Three: Unquestioned Assumptions About Children. 10. Suffer the Restless Children: Unsettling Questions About the ADHD Label. 11. The Truth About Self-Esteem. 12. Television and Children: ReViewing the Evidence. Part Four: Business as Usual. 13. The Five-Hundred-Pound Gorilla. 14. The False Premises of School Choice Plans. 15. Students Don't "Work"--They Learn. 16. The Littlest Customers: TQM Goes to School. Part Five: Lessons Learned. 17. Caring Kids: The Role of the Schools. 18. Choices for Children: Why and How to Let Students Decide. 19. What to Look for in a Classroom.

Abstract: The majority of U.S. states are currently considering or have recently passed reforms that increase the ease with which parents can choose a school for their children (Tucker and Lauber 1995). At first view, these reforms seem to take elementary and secondary education into wholly unknown territory. Yet this view neglects the fact that choices made by American parents have traditionally been an important force in determining the education their children receive. Parents' ability to choose among fiscally independent public school districts (through residential decisions) and to choose private schools (by paying tuition) is such an established feature of American education that it is almost taken for granted. Yet, through these choices, American parents exercise more control over their children's schooling than do many of their European counterparts. Of course, American parents are not all equally able to exercise choice. High-income parents routinely exercise more choice because they have more school districts and private schools within their choice sets. In addition, there is significant variation in the degree of choice across different areas of the country. Some metropolitan areas, for instance, contain many independent school districts and/or a number of private schools. Other metropolitan areas are completely monopolized by one school district or have almost no private schooling. The purpose of this paper is to answer three related questions. First, what general facts can we learn by examining the traditional forms of school choice in the United States? In particular, we need to understand the general relationship between school choice and five factors: (1) student achievement, (2) student segregation (along lines of ability, income, and taste for education, as well as race and ethnicity),(1) (3) school efficiency, (4) teachers' salaries and teacher unionism, and (5) the degree to which parents are involved in and influence their children's schools. Second, how do the general facts that we garner from traditional school choice carry over to analyses of reforms such as charter schools, vouchers for private schools, and open enrollment programs? Third, what information do we still need if we are to predict accurately the effects of reforms? And, what empirical strategies might we pursue to get such information? For evidence, I draw upon previous empirical work contained in several studies.(2) Although I briefly sketch the empirical strategy of these studies, this paper does not attempt to present the results in detail. Rather, the goal is to summarize the results and discuss their implications for school choice reforms. TRADITIONAL CHOICE AND THE ISSUES There are two basic forms of school choice in the United States. The first is choice among public school districts that have a substantial degree of fiscal and administrative autonomy. The second is choice between public and private schools. In this section, I take each in turn. Later, I briefly discuss intradistrict choice--a scheme that contains some characteristics of the two basic forms of choice. TRADITIONAL CHOICE AMONG PUBLIC SCHOOL DISTRICTS Households choose among public school districts by selecting a residence. The degree to which households can exercise this form of choice depends heavily on the number, size, and residence patterns of the school districts in the area centered around their jobs. Some metropolitan areas in the United States have many small school districts with reasonably comparable characteristics. Boston, for instance, has seventy school districts within a thirty-minute commute of the downtown area and many more within a forty-five-minute commute. Miami, on the other hand, has only one school district (Dade County) that covers the entire metropolitan area. People with jobs in rural areas typically have only one or a few alternative school districts to choose from. This form of choice (among public school districts) has several important properties. …

Abstract: Locating the debate within a policy framework of school choice and special educational needs (SEN) in England and Wales, the article investigates the ways in which schools competing within the educational marketplace perceive and respond to the needs of parents of SEN students, and considers the perspectives, experiences and values of these parents relating to school choice. In focusing in-depth on one case study area the article draws on the qualitative findings of the Parental and School Choice Interaction (PASCI) study, a 3-year longitudinal investigation into the interaction between parental choice of school and school decision making. The findings reveal the pressures on senior school managers and the difficulties encountered by parents of SEN students and suggest that as schools working in a public-market increasingly 'privilege the academic' so the needs and preferences of parents, and SEN students are increasingly marginalised and devalued.

Abstract: The 1988 Education Reform Act introduced a schools’ quasi‐market intended to reward schools financially for recruiting pupils and to give them a financial incentive for ‘good’ educational performance. The paper examines this linkage by analysing data on financial performance for over 300 English Local Education Authority (LEA) and Grant Maintained (GM) secondary schools from 1990/91 to 1995/96, correcting for inflation and changes in LEA delegation ratios. On average over 6 LEA areas, real school budgets per pupil declined by 0.6% a year while examination performance at GCSE improved. Statistical analysis shows that while change in pupil numbers is the most important variable explaining school budget change, half as much is explained by variations in LEA and government financial policy, thus weakening market incentives. It was also found that the proportion of socially disadvantaged pupils, as measured by free school meals, is associated with a loss of pupils over time and hence a decline in budg...

Abstract: Recently, several groups in the United States and Canada--for example, American Indian/First Nations people, African-American males, and the deaf--have claimed the right to receive state support for cultural identity schools--that is, separate schools whose educational aims and practices are designed to reinforce a particular cultural identity. It is widely assumed that liberalism must be committed to a principle of cultural neutrality that prevents a liberal state from assigning legitimacy to such demands. This article provides a close examination of the ethical principles a liberal state may adduce in making political judgments about such matters. First, two dominant perspectives that have emerged recently within liberal political and educational theory are developed and critically evaluated and their educational implications examined. Specifically, a distinction between "strong" and "moderate" cultural identity schools is identified, and it is argued that a liberal state may legitimately support the la...

Abstract: The system of financing special education currently in use in the Netherlands is regarded as inhibiting the inclusion of pupils with special needs within mainstream education. In line with many other countries, the government is considering the implementation of a more demand-oriented system. A descriptive study has been conducted in order to be able to use the experiences gained in Germany, England and Austria with a particular financing system, the 'pupil-bound budget'. The results show that pupil-bound budgets strengthen the position of parents and generally support the integration of pupils with special needs into mainstream education. On the other hand, the introduction of a pupil-bound budget can easily lead to growing numbers of pupils applying for a budget and to 'strategic behaviour' amongst schools. The shift from a supply-oriented to a demand-oriented financing system is thus at best an uncertain means of promoting inclusion.

Abstract: One-of-a-kind schools flicker brightly. A few manage to survive by avoiding the public's attention or by serving powerful constituents; the rest gradually burn out. Ms. Meier wonders whether we can change that and make the exceptions the norm. There are numerous stories of schools that have been successful with students who would otherwise count among society s failures. However, such school successes rarely set the stage for Big Reform agendas. These one-of-a-kind schools flicker brightly. A few manage to survive by avoiding the public's attention or by serving powerful constituents; the rest gradually bum out. Can we change that? Can we make the exceptions the norm? The Search for Silver Bullets To the vast majority of serious policy makers, the existing exemplary schools offer no important lessons. Most policy makers define systemic so that it applies only to the kinds of solutions that can be more or less simultaneously prescribed for all schools, irrespective of particulars. Solutions, in short, that seek to improve schooling by taking away the already too limited formal powers of those closest to the students. Examples range from more prescriptive curricula to new, more centralized testing systems; fiscal rewards and penalties; or changed school governance bodies. School-level folks are as skeptical about the capacity of any of these top-down recipes to make a significant impact on the minds of teachers or children as policy-level folks are about the idiosyncratic bottom-up ones. Practitioners - in classrooms and central offices - know at heart that "this too shall pass" or can be gotten around or overcome. They wait out the innovators. Policy makers work overtime to come up with ways to circumvent such resistance. The more things change, the more they stay the same. This is a climate that encourages impatience: enough's enough! If we can't do a better job of marrying top-down and bottom-up reform, we're probably in for big trouble. Giving up on the new thought that all children can learn to use their minds well is hard, especially for those of us who know firsthand that schools as designed are hardly suited to the job and that vastly more children could be well-educated if we came up with a better design. We've "tasted" it. It seems both so near and so far. Perhaps if we posed the problem differently, the oddball schools might offer us systemic answers. The Annenberg Challenge gave a substantial boost to a wave of projects around the country that were, on the one hand, fueled by the growing interest in vouchers and charters but that sought on the other hand a response more compatible with public education and equity concerns. By seeking a solution to the systemic through looking at the particular, different possibilities became thinkable. Good schools are filled with particulars - including particular human beings. And it is these human beings that lie at their heart, that explain their surprising successes. In fact, it is these particulars that inspire the passions of those involved and draw upon the best in each. Rather than ignore such schools because their solutions lie in unreplicable individuals or circumstances, it's precisely such unreplicability that should be celebrated. Maybe what these "special" schools demonstrate is that every school must have the power and the responsibility to select and design its own particulars and thus to surround all young people with powerful adults who are in a position to act on their behalf in open and publicly responsible ways. That may be the "silver bullet." Will grown-ups all jump at the chance to be such responsible adults? Of course not. Most have never been asked to have their own wonderful ideas, much less to take responsibility for them. Many will be leery because along with the freedom to design their own particulars must come new responsibilities for defending the outcomes. But the resultant practice, responsible citizenship, is not only a good means for running a good school but also the central aim of public schooling. …