A wonderfully useful, hones and comprehensive book, one which does not oversimplify the condition and the opportunities of the public schools.


--Theodore R. Sizer, chairman, Coalition of Essential Schools

Based on an extensive, in-depth study of 150 students from across the country, Kids and School Reform offers a student perspective on schools that are transforming themselves. Using extended vignettes and the actual voices and stories of five students who differ in personality, economic and personal circumstances, and academic achievement, the authors show how reform efforts affect kids and what changes matter the most. The five high schools studied are part of the Coalition of Essential Schools.

PATRICIA A. WASLEY is the Dean of the Graduate School of Education at Bank Street College in New York City. She has worked as a researcher for the Puget Sound Educational Consortium at the University of Washington, at the Coalition of Essential Schools and at the Annenberg Institute for School Reform at Brown University. She is the author of Stirring the Chalkdust (1994) and Teachers Who Lead (1991) ROBERT L. HAMPEL is a professor of education at the University of Delaware. He is the author of The Last Little Citadel (1986). RICHARD W. CLARK is a senior associate with the Center for Educational Renewal, College of Education, University of Washington and a senior associate of the Institute for Educational Inquiry.