New American Schools

Education in America is coming under close scrutiny as it is obvious that many students are not learning what they should, and are leaving school unprepared for the working world. This paper will look at how this situation can be remedied and make suggestions for the design of a New American School.

If a student is going to learn effectively in a school situation, there are many issues which need to be addressed. A non-profit, non-partisan organization known as New American Schools (NAS) is attempting to assist and support schools through the implementation of comprehensive school design (Hertling, 2000). Before reforms take place, it is necessary for schools to conduct a thorough self-study to carefully and realistically identify their strengths and weaknesses. Once this assessment has been made, the Education Research Service says, strong leadership is necessary to implement the reforms. Teacher commitment is essential, and school leaders must encourage students by communicating with students, parents and community members to enlist their cooperation in the effort.

The Graduation Really Achieves Dreams (GRAD) program is proving highly effective in Houston (Carter, 1999). GRAD has five components that address the academic and social problems affecting inner-city students: The Scholarship Program, funded by local businesses and the schools system; Communities in Schools, dealing with social factors affecting student performance; Consistency Management and Cooperative

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heir accounting employees. (Lee and Blaszczynski, 1999). Teaching the needed skills outlined above in the usual accounting classes will be more effective than teaching them separately. This will allow students to learn naturally how to communicate better and to use computers while they are studying accounting subjects. Combining these different skills will require a change in teaching methods to incorporate more cooperative learning, case studies, and hands-on experience with computers and the Internet to prepare students to work in the real business world. Business curriculums for new schools must be designed to prepare students for the work world they are about to enter by teaching them the skills the industry needs. Various new school design systems are in effect across the country in an attempt to identify ways to improve education. The old learning methods simply do not work any more. Comprehensive School Reform (CSR) involves programs that affect all aspects of school functioning, such as instruction, curriculum, governance, professional development, parental and community involvement, and support services. Strategies for restructuring include cooperative learning, math/reading groups, teacher feedback, student discu

Category: Psychology - N