Teachers are some of the kindest, most altruistic and smartest people on the planet yet despite the best of intentions, fearful atmospheres can arise organically within schools, leaving people feeling disempowered, anxious, isolated and frustrated. Why is this? What are the impacts? And, crucially, how do we resolve it? Ofsted, accountability, funding, workload and societal difficulties have led to a response in many schools that is fear based, generating staff cultures that affect teacher wellbeing and are leading to large numbers leaving the profession. This impacts not only staff morale and wellbeing but also has a highly detrimental effect on teacher performance and the outcomes for pupils and students. This book examines what underpins these patterns and sets out a practical model for embedding a trust-based culture in all schools. Drawing together four key psychological concepts, the book explores what a trust-based culture looks like and the conditions that are needed for this to develop. It looks at the paradoxes that lie in how staff create harmonious and collaborative cultures and the practical steps that are needed to create a culture where staff that crave and give open, robust feedback are pro-active, learn from failure and have the ability to thrive through challenging questions. Providing a comprehensive blueprint for schools to follow, this is essential reading for school leaders and thinkers who want to create a rich, healthy environment where collaboration, creativity and excellence in teaching and learning can flourish.

Most Americans agree on the necessity of education reform, but there is little consensus about how this goal might be achieved. The rhetoric of standards and vouchers has occupied center stage, polarizing public opinion and affording little room for reflection on the intangible conditions that make for good schools. Trust in Schools engages this debate with a compelling examination of the importance of social relationships in the successful implementation of school reform. Over the course of three years, Bryk and Schneider, together with a diverse team of other researchers and school practitioners, studied reform in twelve Chicago elementary schools. Each school was undergoing extensive reorganization in response to the Chicago School Reform Act of 1988, which called for greater involvement of parents and local community leaders in their neighborhood schools. Drawing on years longitudinal survey and achievement data, as well as in-depth interviews with principals, teachers, parents, and local community leaders, the authors develop a thorough account of how effective social relationships—which they term relational trust—can serve as a prime resource for school improvement. Using case studies of the network of relationships that make up the school community, Bryk and Schneider examine how the myriad social exchanges that make up daily life in a school community generate, or fail to generate, a successful educational environment. The personal dynamics among teachers, students, and their parents, for example, influence whether students regularly attend school and sustain their efforts in the difficult task of learning. In schools characterized by high relational trust, educators were more likely to experiment with new practices and work together with parents to advance improvements. As a result, these schools were also more likely to demonstrate marked gains in student learning. In contrast, schools with weak trust relations saw virtually no improvement in their reading or mathematics scores. Trust in Schools demonstrates convincingly that the quality of social relationships operating in and around schools is central to their functioning, and strongly predicts positive student outcomes. This book offer insights into how trust can be built and sustained in school communities, and identifies some features of public school systems that can impede such development. Bryk and Schneider show how a broad base of trust across a school community can provide a critical resource as education professional and parents embark on major school reforms. A Volume in the American Sociological Association's Rose Series in Sociology

Twelve-term Texas Congressman, Presidential candidate, and #1 New York Times bestselling author Ron Paul returns with a highly provocative treatise about how we need to fundamentally change the way we think about America's broken education system in order to fix it. Whether or not you have children, you know that education is vital to the prosperity and future of our society. Yet our current system simply doesn't work. Parents feel increasingly powerless, and nearly half of Americans give our schools a grade of "C". Now, in his new book, Ron Paul attacks the problem head-on and provides a focused solution that centers on strong support for home schooling and the application of free market principles to the American education system. Examining the history of education in this country, Dr. Paul identifies where we've gone wrong, what we can do about it, and how we can change the way we think about education in order to provide a brighter future for Americans.

The culmination of nearly three decades of research, Collective Trust offers new insight and practical knowledge on the social construction of trust for school improvement. The authors argue that collective trust is not merely an average trust score for a group, but rather an independent concept with distinctive origins and consequences. The book demonstrates that schools are organizations that require environments characterized by high levels of collective trust to be effective. Including an historical overview, an exhaustive review of the empirical research, and implications for school reform policy and leadership, this is the most comprehensive resource to date on the issue of collective trust.

Seven key principles from Finland for building a culture of trust in schools around the world. In the spring of 2018, thousands of teachers across the United States—in states like Oklahoma, Kentucky, and Arizona—walked off their jobs while calling for higher wages and better working conditions. Ultimately, these American educators trumpeted a simple request: treat us like professionals. Teachers in many other countries feel the same way as their US counterparts. In Teachers We Trust presents a compelling vision, offering practical ideas for educators and school leaders wishing to develop teacher-powered education systems. It reveals why teachers in Finland hold high status, and shows what the country’s trust- based school system looks like in action. Pasi Sahlberg and Timothy D. Walker suggest seven key principles for building a culture of trust in schools, from offering clinical training for future teachers to encouraging student agency to fostering a collaborative professionalism among educators. In Teachers We Trust is essential reading for all teachers, administrators, and parents who entrust their children to American schools.

From David Osborne, the author of Reinventing Government--a biting analysis of the failure of America's public schools and a comprehensive plan for revitalizing American education. In Reinventing America's Schools, David Osborne, one of the world's foremost experts on public sector reform, offers a comprehensive analysis of the charter school movements and presents a theory that will do for American schools what his New York Times bestseller Reinventing Government did for public governance in 1992. In 2005, when Hurricane Katrina devastated New Orleans, the city got an unexpected opportunity to recreate their school system from scratch. The state's Recovery School District (RSD), created to turn around failing schools, gradually transformed all of its New Orleans schools into charter schools, and the results are shaking the very foundations of American education. Test scores, school performance scores, graduation and dropout rates, ACT scores, college-going rates, and independent studies all tell the same story: the city's RSD schools have tripled their effectiveness in eight years. Now other cities are following suit, with state governments reinventing failing schools in Newark, Camden, Memphis, Denver, Indianapolis, Cleveland, and Oakland. In this book, Osborne uses compelling stories from cities like New Orleans and lays out the history and possible future of public education. Ultimately, he uses his extensive research to argue that in today's world, we should treat every public school like a charter school and grant them autonomy, accountability, diversity of school designs, and parental choice.

Maximizing student capacity and restoring motivation—the key to school success Brain research has the power to revolutionize education, but it can be difficult for educators to implement innovative strategies without the proper knowledge or resources. The Education Revolution bridges the gap between neuroscience, psychology, and educational practice. It delivers what educators need: current and relevant concrete applications to use in classrooms and schools. Readers will find Teaching strategies and model lessons designed to advance academic performance Solution-focused practices to address the root of negative behaviors Approaches to counteract the negative impact of technology on the brain Concrete methods to improve school climate