The Edna McConnell Clark Foundation
2003
In 1995, the Edna McConnell Clark Foundation's Program for Student Achievement began an experiment in standards-based reform that - unlike most other such - focused solely on the middle grades. This report details the planning, implementation, and evaluation of that effort in six districts, including brief mention of an evaluation of student achievement (using student NAEP and standardized test scores as the litmus test). Unfortunately, because "the foundation did not consider raising test scores to be a major objective in the design of the program," there is little discussion of the findings from the district evaluations. There are, however, vignettes from school and district leaders about the implementation challenges they faced, which may be interesting to school and district leaders now trying to implement No Child Left Behind and other standards-based reforms in middle schools. You can see the report for yourself at http://www.emcf.org/pdf/student_comprehensivereport.pdf.
