Enhancing accountability is a key aspect of current demands for school reform. Much externally driven accountability has not been effective, and internally motivated accountability requires specific organizational capacities. This article examines one poor, rural southeastern American school district to high-light the barriers to effective accountability in a low-achieving district. The study concludes that current accountability models are incapable of altering local practices where needs are probably beyond the scope of educational policy making. Five themes are identified as a set of interrelated micro (district only) and macro (local community) factors affecting efforts at reform. These include racial discord, the power of poverty, the leadership mess, missing ingredients, and unidentified urgency, which together create a dysfunctional local cultural capital that results in an inability to foment significant change. Affecting any of these issues in isolation will not dramatically transform the stifling culture, as change will require altering the micro and macro themes in tandem.
Get full access to this article
View all access options for this article.
References
1.
Berliner, D.C.
, & Biddle, J. B. (1995). The manufactured crisis: Myths, fraud and the attack on America's public schools. Reading, MA: Addison-Wesley.
2.
Berry, B.
(1996). Accountability, school reform, and equity: The troubling case of Sylvan School District. The Urban Review, 28, 233-256.
3.
Berry, B.
, & Norton, J. (1995, Fall). School reform in Long Beach. Aflanta, GA: The Focused Reporting Project.
4.
Bourdieu, P.
, & Passeron, J. (1977). Reproduction in education, society and culture. London: Sage.
5.
Clark, D.
, & Astuto, T. (1994). Redirecting reform: Challenges to popular assumptions about teachers and students. Phi Delta Kappan, 76, 513-520.
6.
Darling-Hammond, L.
(Ed.). (1993a). Professional development schools: Schools for developing a profession. New York: Teachers College Press.
7.
Darling-Hammond, L.
(1993b). Reframing the school reform agenda: Developing capacity for school transformation. Phi Delta Kappan, 75, 753-761.
8.
Darling-Hammond, L.
(1993c). Standards of practice for learner-centered schools. New York: National Center for Restructuring Education, Schools, and Teaching.
9.
Darling-Hammond, L.
, & Ascher, C. (1992). Creating accountability in big city schools. New York: National Center for Restructuring Education, Schools, and Teaching.
10.
Darling-Hammond, L.
, & Snyder, J. (1992). Curriculum inquiry. In P' Jackson (Ed.), Handbook of research on curriculum (pp. 41-78). New York: Macmillan.
11.
Doman, J.
, Jenkins, K., & Berry, B. (1995). Barriers to reform. Greensboro, NC: Southeastern Regional Vision for Education.
12.
Erickson, F.
(1987). Transformation and school success: The politics and culture of educational achievement. Anthropology and Education Quarterly, 18, 335-356.
13.
Ginsberg, R.
(1996). State-driven reforms and productivity: Lessons from South Carolina. In B. Levin, W. J. Fowler, & H. J. Walberg (Eds.), Organizational influences on educational productivity (pp. 51-77). Greenwich, CT: JAI.
14.
Ginsberg, R.
, Gerber, P. J., & Reiff, H. B. (1994). Employment success for adults with learning disabilities. In P. J. Gerber & H. B. Reiff (Eds.), Learning disabilities in adulthood (pp. 204-213). Boston: Andover.
15.
Green, T. F.
(1983). Excellence, equity, and equality. In L. S. Shulman & G. S. Sykes (Eds.), Handbook of teaching and policy (pp. 318-341). New York: Longman.
16.
Havighurst, R. J.
(1966). Education in metropolitan areas. Boston: Allyn & Bacon.
17.
Kirst, M.
(1990). Accountability: Implications for state and local policymakers. Washington, DC: U.S. Department of Education, Office of Educational Research and Improvement, Information Services.
18.
Kozol, J.
(1991). Savage inequalities. New York: Crown.
19.
National Commission on Excellence in Education.
(1983). A nation at risk. Washington, DC: U.S. Department of Education.
20.
Newmann, F. M.
, King, M. B., & Rigdon, M. (1997). Accountability and school performance: Implications from restructuring schools. Harvard Educational Review, 67, 41-74.
21.
Oakes, J.
(1989). What educational indicators? The case for assessing school context. Educational Evaluation and Policy Analysis, 11, 181-199.
22.
Odden, A.
(1990). Educational indicators in the United States: The need for analysis. Educational Researcher, 20, 25-29.
23.
Orfield, G.
(1996). Dismantling desegregation: The quiet reversal of Brown v. Board of Education. New York: New Press.
24.
Perkinson, H. J.
(1968). The imperfect panacea. New York: Random House.
25.
Piven, F. F.
, & Cloward, R. A. (1971). Regulating the urban poor: The functions of public welfare. New York: Vintage.
26.
Rothmann, R.
(1995). Measuring up: Standards, assessment and school reform. San Francisco: Jossey-Bass.
27.
Ryan, W.
(1976). Blaming the victim. New York: Random House.
28.
Salagnik, L.
(1994). Apples and apples: Comparing performance indicators for places with similar demographic characteristics. Educational Evaluation and Policy Analysis, 16, 125-141.
29.
Shepard, L.
(1991). Will national tests improve student learning. Phi Delta Kappan, 73,232-238.
30.
Talbeii J.
, & McLaughlin, M. (1993). Understanding teaching in context. In D. Cohen, J. Talbert & M. McLaughlin (Eds.), Teaching for understanding: Challenges for policy and practice (pp. 167-206). San Francisco: Jossey-Bass.
31.
Timar, T. B.
, & Kirp, D. L. (1989). Education reform in the 1980's: Lessons from the states. Phi Delta Kappan, 70, 509-510.
32.
Wheelock, A.
(1995). School rewards, school accountability, and school reform. Paper prepared for the Carnegie Task Force for Learning in the Primary Grades, New York.
33.
Wilson, J. Q.
(1965, January). Urban renewal does not always renew. Harvard Today, pp. 2-8.
34.
Wise, A. E.
(1967). Rich schools, poor schools: The promise of equal opportunity. Chicago: University of Chicago Press.
35.
Yukl, G.
(1994). Leadership in organizations. Englewood Cliffs, NJ: Prentice-Hall.
