Hugh G. Petrie - Böcker

The authors examine the major groups within the dropout population, the myriad of factors within schools that lead to dropping out, and the larger social and economic context within which dropping out occurs. The resulting synthesis of knowledge and perspectives provided here will enhance our understanding of an important topic that has, to this time, been given too little attention.

The authors examine the major groups within the dropout population, the myriad of factors within schools that lead to dropping out, and the larger social and economic context within which dropping out occurs. The resulting synthesis of knowledge and perspectives provided here will enhance our understanding of an important topic that has, to this time, been given too little attention.

In recent years, textbooks have been widely criticized for low standards, lack of imaginativeness, and insensitivity to racial and gender issues. Increasingly, they are cited as another "weak link" in American public education. This book goes beyond the headlines to examine how textbooks are produced, how they are selected, and what pressures are placed on textbook authors and publishers. The book focuses on the relationship of the textbook to the educational system and includes important issues such as the politics of textbook policy, the determinants of textbook content, the role of textbooks in educational reform, and the process of selection at the state level. The authors offer current research on textbook policy including perspectives from those directly involved with textbooks-from several thoughtful analyses by textbook editors and publishers to the views of California's Superintendent of Public Instruction.

This book explores key policy issues related to early childhood education. Through the contributions of various professionals in the field, the editors provide a vision, practical and possible, of early childhood education in the 1990s. Part I delves into the complex world, both personal and professional, of the classroom teacher. The essays in Part II look at issues of the school community, including the roles of class, race, gender, and exceptionality. Finally, Part III examines the relationship between schools and the community-at-large, and how complex issues find their way into social and economic policies that often stifle, rather than support, the democratic vision of American schools. Taken as a whole, the volume presents a stimulating discussion of the current state of early childhood education policy and practice.

Provides insights into and results of a wide variety of experiments with professional development schools in the field of education.The concept of professional development schools (PDS) has recently emerged as one of the most exciting possibilities for systematic educational reform. These "teaching hospitals" of the education profession typically are real schools in a district that take on, with a cooperating institution of higher education, special responsibilities for inquiry and professional preparation. Although still in their infancy, PDSs as places for professional preparation and of inquiry into teaching learning and teacher education have major policy potential.

There is a real need for a clear analysis and investigation of what the "crisis" in teaching actually is. By exploring the definition of the teaching crisis, investigating the evidence for its existence and reforms proposed to "solve" it, and studying the possible effects of proposed reforms, the authors of Crisis in Teaching address this need. Their work constitutes one of the first sustained and critical analyses of teachers and teaching in the contemporary situation. The authors, among the nation's leading critical thinkers in the field of education, reflect a variety of perspectives as they attempt to unravel the current rhetoric of crisis and question solutions that are, in effect, too often simplistic and superficial in their analyses and proposals.