Over the last decade, reforms have incrementally shifted the primary focus of local education governance towards improving education outcomes through shared decision making and embedded accountability structures. What follows briefly examines some emerging trends, issues and challenges for school boards across the Canadian landscape. Communit...
It has become increasingly clear that sustained school improvement requires a system solution - one that is at the same time practical and effective on a large scale. That solution in my view is within our grasp; it is what I call the tri-level solution. The tri-level solution focuses on total system transformation through the conscious, deliber...
The Canadian principal shares many characteristics of counterparts in other English-speaking countries. School leaders everywhere are experiencing greater demands and increasing expectations due to multiple education reforms in the last decade. Preparation programs are struggling to provide relevant training experiences to adequately prepare leader...
A report on Alberta’s public charter schools will be released March 1st. Canadian Charter Schools at the Crossroads (207 pg.) provides the findings of a comprehensive two-year study conducted through the University of Calgary under principal researcher, Dr. Lynn Bosetti, Special Assistant to the Vice President, Academic. Bosetti offers a comprehe...
Thank you all for being willing to get engaged in a discussion about the role of the union in education reform. For a long time we felt like we were all alone in the "big hall" talking about the need for unions to change and to get engaged more deeply in education reform. But a growing number of people have shown interest in this, so these days...
Executive Summary This study tested two different approaches to teaching key phonological awareness skills and concepts to kindergarten students in SD #42. Based upon early the intervention was designed to expand the repertoire of instructional options available to kindergarten teachers. Two parallel but different series of lessons were...
New research clearly correlates what teachers know and do with student learning. The value-added studies of Sanders and other researchers have been able to isolate teacher effects, independent of external variables such as socioeconomic status of students. With this new knowledge, student achievement can no longer be explained simply as a result of...
Many a promising initiative is prevented or curtailed by the inflexibility of the school system. Bureaucratic responses often prove inadequate to deal with the complex and very site-specific challenges of school improvement. Innovators in education are now thinking Îoutside the boxâ of centralized district policies and contracts which stifle c...
A. Literacy Literacy Instruction in Aboriginal Settings SAEE Research Brief October 2004 Helen Raham Increasing success rates for is one of Canada's most pressing educational challenges. As the acquisition of literacy skills is fundamental to stud...
Considerable attention, during the 1980s and 1990s, has been directed to the issue of teacher union involvement in educational reform. Both Canada and the U.S. have experienced significant educational reform, including centralization, curriculum standards, accountability measures, state or province-wide student achievement measures, and school choi...