Schools can and do affect student achievement, and this book recommends specific-and attainable-action steps to implement successful strategies culled from the wealth of research data.

What would a school look like if it was designed with mental health in mind? Too many public schools look and feel like prisons, designed out of fear of vandalism and truancy. But we know that nurturing environments are better for learning. Access to nature, big classroom windows, and open campuses consistently reduce stress, anxiety, disorderly conduct, and crime, and improve academic performance. Backed by decades of research, Schools That Heal showcases clear and compelling ways--from furniture to classroom improvements to whole campus renovations--to make supportive learning environments for our children and teenagers. With invaluable advice for school administrators, public health experts, teachers, and parents Schools That Heal is a call to action and a practical resource to create nurturing and inspiring schools for all children.

Families and schools share a desire for students to succeed but are often perplexed about how to collaborate and support this achievement, especially during the transition to middle and high school. This book will help educators and policymakers identify and implement the most effective strategies to help parents remain involved in their teens’ education. The research in this book looks at diverse families and adolescents from a wide range of backgrounds while considering cultural and socioeconomic contexts. Bringing together multidisciplinary perspectives—including prominent researchers from the fields of teacher education, psychology, and sociology —this authoritative book: Presents new research on family-school partnerships in the unique developmental period of adolescence. Outlines the challenges teachers experience in maintaining communication with families. Offers strategies that reflect academic socialization among African American, Asian American, Latino, and European American families as key factors that promote achievement. Describes how technology can bridge the gap between families and schools in a way that fits with the developmental needs of adolescents. Examines the roles of policymakers, communities, and school districts to highlight developmentally appropriate, culturally sensitive policy solutions.

This book is about a group of experienced K-12 teachers who took teacher research to another level. Their story is not only about teacher working together to improve their own teaching, but also about how their research reverberated throughout their school system and inflluenced how their schools were run.

Revised edition of: Solution-focused brief therapy in schools: a 360-degree view of research and practice / Michael S. Kelly, Johnny S. Kim, Cynthia Franklin.

The peer-reviewed report presented as a series of 11 briefs, addresses legislative, policy, and procedural matters with pragmatic and practical strategies for prevention of bullying.

Access issues are pivotal to almost all charter school tensions and debates. How well are these schools performing? Are they segregating and stratifying? Are they public and democratic? Are they fairly funded? Can apparent successes be scaled up? Answers to all these core questions hinge on how access to charter schools is shaped. This book describes the incentives and pressures on charter schools to restrict access and examines how charters navigate those pressures, explaining access-restricting practices in relation to the ecosystem within which charter schools are created. It also explains how charters have sometimes responded by resisting the pressures and sometimes by surrendering to them. The text presents analyses of 13 different types of practices around access, each of which shapes the school’s enrollment. The authors conclude by offering recommendations for how states and authorizers can address access-related inequities that arise in the charter sector. School’s Choice provides timely information on critical academic and policy issues that will come into play as charter school policy continues to evolve. Book Features: Examines how charter schools control who gains and retains access.Explores policies and practices that undermine equitable admission and encourage opportunity hoarding.Offers a set of policy recommendations at the state and federal level to address access-related issues.