This volume argues that districts are important as a lever for change given the limited success of school-by-school efforts. Policies that focus on skill development, recognize and support performance, create opportunities for collaboration, build leader capacity, and create networks of knowledge sharing hold great potential for improving districts but it will require a paradigm shift in the way we view our public school system and those who work within it - away from blame and toward complext systems change.

• Cover
• Title Page
• Copyright
• Acknowledgments
• Contents
• Introduction: Why We Need to Think Systemically in Educational Policy and Reform
• Section 1: School Districts as Leverage Points for Systems Change
  • Chapter 1: Learning From the Past to Chart New Directions in the Study of School District Effectiveness
  • Chapter 2: Expanding School Indicator Systems in a Post-NCLB Era
• Section 2: Systems Learning at the School and Classroom Levels
  • Chapter 3: Formative Experimentation: The Role of Experimental Research in Program Development
  • Chapter 4: A Research-Practice Partnership to Improve Formative Classroom Assessment in Science
• Section 3: How Politics, Underlying Theories, and Leadership Capacity Support System-Wide Change
  • Chapter 5: Portfolio Reform in Los Angeles: Successes and Challenges in School District Implementation
  • Chapter 6: Common Core, Uncommon Theory of Action: CEOs in New York City Schools
  • Chapter 7: How Leadership Churn Undermines Learning and Improvement in Low-Performing School Districts
• Section 4: Systemic Lessons for Policy and Practice: Improving School Districts Under Pressure
  • Chapter 8: Commentary: Three Organizational Lessons for School District Improvement
  • Chapter 9: Commentary: Toward Systemic Reform in Urban School Districts
• Conclusions: The Challenge of School and District Improvement: Promising Directions in District Reform
• Conference Participants
• About the Contributors