March 2016

Solving the puzzle of school district turnaround to bring about system-wide—rather than school-by-school—improvement has the potential to dramatically raise educational outcomes. A timely and significant new book published by AERA examines systemic approaches targeting the school district as the unit of reform.

Thinking and Acting Systemically: Improving School Districts Under Pressure, edited by Alan J. Daly and Kara S. Finnigan, is the result of an intensive workshop funded by the AERA Education Research Conferences Program, focusing on the links between organizational learning, district-wide learning communities, and underlying social networks. The book spotlights empirical, theoretical, and methodological innovations and provides much-needed practical information for bringing about change in struggling districts.

Alan Daly (University of California, San Diego) studies leadership, policy, and organizational structures in education and the relationship between those elements and the educational attainment of traditionally marginalized student populations. Kara Finnigan (University of Rochester) studies low-performing schools and high-stakes accountability, with a focus on urban school districts, blending perspectives in education, sociology, and political science.

Thinking and Acting Systemically will be featured in a symposium at this year’s AERA Annual Meeting, in Washington, D.C. The symposium will be held on Sunday, April 10, from 10:35 am to 12:05 pm (Convention Center, Level Two, Room 204 B). It will include introductions from the editors and commentary from James Spillane (Northwestern University), Tonya Wolford, (Office of Research Evaluation, The School District of Philadelphia), and Sean P. “Jack” Buckley (The College Board).

The book will be available for purchase at the Annual Meeting (please visit the AERA exhibit booth). An e-book edition will be published this summer.

Books published under the aegis of AERA meet the quality standards of the Association based on peer review. These publications reflect the views of the authors and editors, and not necessarily those of AERA or its governing Council. AERA publishes works to advance knowledge, to expand access to significant research and research analyses and syntheses, and to promote knowledge utilization.