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Although there has been receptivity to the notion of school-level resource reallocation, there has been a dearth of information on how resource reallocation can actually be implemented. The authors′ goal is to describe actual resource reallocation practices and the realities of the resource reallocation process using examples from the schools that they have studied, as well as schools that others have studied. Though it is helpful to know that resource reallocation is feasible, it is even more helpful to principals and teachers to understand the nitty-gritty details of it - which resources get reduced, which resources are added, what funding sources are tapped, what problems are encountered, and how the process unfolds in real school settings. All types of schools were included in the study: schools in urban, suburban and rural districts, large and small schools, and schools in large, medium, and small school districts. The schools studied also reflect a range of student demographics, from low to high percentages of minorities and students eligible for free or reduced-price lunches. Each school adopted a number of new educational strategies, each of which required various expensive educational ingredients - smaller classes, more planning time, expanded professional development, tutoring for students who were struggling to achieve high standards, etc. This book tells the story of how schools can finance expensive program needs by describing the vast array of decisions that must be made, including how to pay for the new strategies.

At a time when the United States is struggling with far-reaching educational reform, school leaders need a blueprint that can dramatically improve student success and then support that success by effectively reallocating and managing available resources. Doubling Student Performance combines the latest research with the authors' national study of diverse schools that were able to significantly boost student achievement. Strategies focus on reducing class size, promoting professional development, locating necessary funding, and providing academic support to struggling students. School leaders will find Examples and case studies that include high-minority and high-poverty schools 10 key strategies for dramatically increasing student achievement, such as setting ambitious goals and emphasizing a collaborative culture Clear steps and specific tools to successfully reallocate resources This book is a valuable tool for educators and policy makers who understand that reform is only possible when schools have the human and financial resources to do it. Book jacket.

A total of 33 sites, including states, school districts, charter school coalitions, and other education organizations make up Cohorts 1 and 2 of the Teacher Incentive Fund (TIF). These sites received funds beginning in the fall of 2006 and spring of 2007 to redesign compensation programs for teachers and principals. The U.S. Department of Education named a third cohort of TIF grantees on September 23, 2010. TIF grantees have confronted numerous challenges as they have worked to design and implement new performance-based compensation programs. These challenges include effectively engaging and communicating with stakeholders, developing a set of measures to assess teacher and principal effectiveness, and ensuring that data quality procedures are in place for such high-stakes decisions. As Cohort 1 and 2 grantees near the end of their five-year Federal funding period, fiscally and programmatically sustaining TIF programs has become a top priority. This paper describes the ways in which TIF grantees have approached fiscal and programmatic sustainability. The paper draws from multiple sources, including TIF program monitoring reports, Center for Educator Compensation Reform (CECR) technical assistance notes, grantees' internal and external evaluations, and interviews with selected grantees. The authors reviewed and analyzed these data with an eye toward shedding light on the following issues: (1) What fiscal and programmatic sustainability challenges have TIF grantees faced?; (2) What approaches to fiscal and programmatic sustainability have grantees taken?; and (3) What lessons can grantees learn about sustaining performance-based compensation systems in the current economic climate? This paper uses named grantees in describing examples of sustainability efforts. A few examples also use non-TIF sites that have developed innovative new compensation programs. Wherever the authors use examples, they are illustrative, not exhaustive, as the particular historic, economic, and political context of each district offers nuanced challenges and solutions. One goal of the brief is to share what has worked for some grantees as a means of helping Cohort 1 and 2 grantees sustain performance-based compensation after their grants end. Another aim is to help new TIF grantees develop their programs with an eye toward sustainability. Before beginning to answer the three focus questions that frame this paper, the authors first take up the issue of defining "fiscal" and "programmatic" sustainability. A list of data sources is provided. (Contains 4 tables and 5 footnotes.

The adoption and implementation of the death penalty varies greatly by state. This dissertation will attempt to explain these differences in terms of the characteristics identified as salient in the empirical and theoretical literature at the state level. Some of the questions addressed include: Are the differences among the states the result of Social Conditions, such as demographics and inequality? Do the political tendencies in political affiliations of the state legislatures explain why some states adopt capital punishment and execute and others do not? Do crime rates, in terms of homicide rates and hate crime rates, have an effect on the implementation of death penalty statutes? Using social control and social dominance theories, independent variables were selected to test these theories. Due to the fact that executions occur in only a few states, zero-inflated negative binomial regression models will be used to test bivariate and multivariate associations (Mwalili, Lesaffre, and Declerck 2007). Percentage of the population that African American, inequality rates, homicide rates, educational attainment, percentage of the population that is evangelical, hate crime rates, exonerations and percentage of the state legislature that is Republican are the independent variables analyzed and number of executions is the dependent variables analyzed. In addition, the percentage of the population that is African American was combined with the percentage of the population that is Hispanic was tested as well. All models controlled for region and year, while state population per million was used as an exposure variable, and the procedures were repeated in models lagged by 5 years. Results indicate that most of the independent variables are associated with the adoption of the death penalty in the bivariate modes (both non-lagged and lagged models). However, in the multivariate models, only hate crime rates and evangelicals were significant in explaining the differences in executions in the non-lagged models when region was removed. Evangelicals, hate crimes, and the combined race variable (% Black + % Hispanic) were significant in predicting states with the death penalty in the lagged models, while homicide rates were only significant in the first lagged model in predicting the adoption of capital punishment. These results support part of the framework used in this research, which includes features of sociological theories for understanding state level variation in the implementation of the death penalty. These results also bolster the argument that state policies are not merely reactions to murder rates, but are influenced by other social factors.

Archibald attempts to find variables that can explain the variation not only in the adoption of the death penalty, but also in the implementation of capital punishment. She combines Kingdon¿s Garbage Can model and Social Control Theory to explain the differences in the adoption and implementation of the death penalty. Given that there was only one model that showed a correlation between the adoption and implementation of the death penalty and homicide rates, while other variables, such as race and hate crimes, were correlated across multiple models, one could argue that the death penalty is used as a means of social control. Her results also bolster the argument that state policies are not merely reactions to murder rates, but are influenced by other sociological, political, and economic factors.

This text combines the latest research with a national study of diverse schools that dramatically increased student achievement by implementing key strategies and reallocating resources.

This Research & Policy Brief addresses the aspect of the teacher support system that is perhaps the most important and often the most weakly implemented: teacher learning and development. This brief includes the following to help state and district leaders select professional learning activities that are worth the allocation of scarce resources: (1) A summary of current research and policy related to high-quality professional development; (2) A discussion of factors that decision makers need to consider when making resource allocation decisions; (3) A description of evaluation methods for professional learning activities; and (4) Examples of promising approaches to professional development. High-Quality Professional Learning Activities Self-Assessment Tools are appended. (Contains 1 figure and 3 tables.).

As districts struggle to meet the demands of standards-based reform and requirements for "highly qualified" teachers in the face of increasing fiscal constraints, professional development has the potential to be a significant part of a district's improvement strategy. To use dollars effectively, districts need to think about how to best integrate professional development expenditures and activities with their overall strategies to improve student performance. To develop and implement a coherent professional development strategy that maximizes their return on investment and is aligned with district goals, districts need to understand how much they spend, what activities those funds support, how the activities align with district goals, and how flexible resources are. This article, originally published as an academic article in the "Journal of Education Finance" v30 n1 p1-26 Sum 2004, represents a collaboration of some of the most knowledgeable education finance researchers about professional development spending in the country. The article sets forth a concrete, powerful tool that helps districts quantify and analyze their professional development spending and discusses the results of its application in a number of districts. This tool not only illuminates where funds are being spent, but also systematically categorizes the purposes of the spending, prompting district leaders to think strategically about targeting resources purposefully to align with the districts' needs and goals. Going beyond broad and sometimes misleading budget categories and the limited sources most districts consider when tallying professional development investments, this tool looks broadly to capture spending on efforts to build instructional capacity and considers the range of resources under district control. With this kind of information in hand, policymakers and education leaders could organize their district support to make the investments matter for students. [Preface by The Finance Project.].