Education Law

Redesigning public education

We?re all struggling to do more with less these days. As budgets are cut and traditional resources are shrinking, we face the demand for new and innovative ideas. But innovation needs to be much more than an idea ? it needs to produce real results. The challenge in public education is to identify which new initiatives make the best use of limited resources ? time, money, and energy.

In the January issue of American School Board Journal, author and founder of the Leadership and Learning Center, Douglas Reeves, outlines his plan for how school boards can redesign public education. In his article, The Board?s Role in Innovation, Mr. Reeves calls for school districts to join the dialogue and share their success stories, and he outlines the steps needed to make real progress in these tough times. For starters, school boards need to deal with ?initiative fatigue? ? too many priorities, spread too thin. School leaders must also identify sound practices that don?t rely on budget-draining single programs or products. BoardBuzz would like to hear from you ? does your board have a success story to share with our readers?

Mr. Reeves will delve deeper into this topic at the 2010 NSBA Annual Conference in Chicago, where he will share more ideas on what works and what doesn?t and outline how school leaders can improve student achievement by sharpening their focus.

Full post as published by BoardBuzz: NSBA's Daily Weblog on December 17, 2009 (boomark / email).