James Comer's School Development Program (SDP) (1988) is rooted in the developers experiences in community psychiatry and child development at the Yale Child Study Center. Over several years, Dr. Comer and the staff of the School Development Program have developed a program that replaces traditional school organization and management with a collaborative school governance and management team, integrates the school's social service programs, and enhances parent participation in all aspects of school life. The purpose of the program is to improve academic achievement and to enhance the social, psychological, and emotional development of the students. The SDP does not provide separate curricula or instructional methods to schools.
Success for All (Slavin, Madden, Karweit, Dolan, & Wasik, 1992) is an extensively articulated, intensive school restructuring program designed to be implemented in schools serving large numbers of highly disadvantaged students. The goals of the program are to have all students reading on grade level by the end of third grade and to sustain those gains through the elementary years. Student reading skills are developed in small group and tutoring sessions, supported by a host of recommended teaching practices and materials.
Mortimer Adler's (1983) The Paideia Proposal: An Educational Manifesto served as a clarion call for improved quality of schooling for all children. Adler stated that all children are entitled to academic "cream," rather than some being given cream while others receive "skim milk." Through the reading of challenging material, didactic instruction, coaching, and weekly Socratic seminars," students in Paideia Schools are encouraged in the "development of [higher order] intellectual skills."
The Coalition of Essential Schools (CES) was developed by Brown University's Theodore Sizer (1984). CES is a school restructuring design that outlines broad directions and leaves the construction of specific curricula and instructional methods in the hands of local educators. Re:Learning is a support and dissemination mechanism for CES developed by the Education Commission of the States. The goal of Re:Learning is to provide support for the nine CES principles "from the statehouse to the schoolhouse."
