Redesign by Design

Academic Benefits to Students: Large Scale Research Findings and Sources for Student Achievement Benefits of Small Schools
Evidence is provided to support the creation of smaller, more personal learner-centered school environments. Small schools can result in improved academic achievement for students.

Restructuring Big Schools: Leading and Staffing New or Redesigned Schools
Linda Darling-Hammond reports on a systematic approach for implementing school reform. The model, if accepted, provides new perspectives on teaching, learning, and schooling. The goal would be to infiltrate the core of the system in hopes of encouraging states to adopt and create incentives for the use of new standards in licensing, hiring, supporting, and certifying teachers.

Restructuring Big Schools: Urban Dream Catchers
Dream catchers across the country are coming together in a broad effort to create new, small schools, which they hope will create a humane environment that is hard to find in the urban public schools. They hope that the small-sized schools will enable them to really get to know their students.

Social Benefits to Students
What are the social benefits to students within small schools? How does a smaller school environment affect the rates of dropout, participation in school activities, and overall behavior? This page provides a short compendium of findings and sources for studies that have explored this important issue.