Here you will find my published research, essays and commentaries. All documents are for viewing only on this website. Viewers are responsible for obtaining appropriate copyright permission for any other use. Thank you for your cooperation.
Research:
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Redefining high performance in Northern Ireland: Deeper learning and twenty-first century skills meet high stakes accountability
Journal of Educational Change, 2015This study examined four secondary schools in Northern Ireland serving a significant percentage of low income families... 
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Strong agents and weak systems: University support for school level improvement
Journal of Educational Change, 2012This study examined individual and school level factors that advance and suppress the traits of high performing schools. Based on action plans and reflective journals of 28 school level practitioners...
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Are we taking the wrong path?
Phi Delta Kappan, 2011 School turnaround has become a national industry. Driven by the political necessity to show results in the short term, educators have responded with strategies that reliably raise standardized test scores, some-times dramatically, within one to two years.
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The professional learning community as subversive activity
Professional Development in Education, 2012 As the professional learning community (PLC) as a desired cultural norm gains popularity within K-12 state schools, greater knowledge of the PLC implementation process is warranted.
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The centrality of context
Journal of Thought, 2012 The Coalition of Essential Schools’ Common Principles (1984), which grew out of the findings of A Study of High Schools and followed the publication of Horace’s Compromise: The Dilemma of the American High School, were intended as a rallying point for school reform and a kind of constitution for exemplary school practice as Theodore R. Sizer imagined it. In the years since, the Common Principles have had a wide and varied impact on American K-12 education—deep in some places and much less clear in others.
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Leadership challenges converting a large high school to small schools: A followup study
NASSP Bulletin, 2011 This follow-up study presents findings from 11 structured interviews that were conducted with principals engaged in a conversion from a large comprehensive high school to six small schools. Key findings are (a) the greatest barrier to improvement was entrenched instructional patterns and (b) goals of college readiness and social/ emotional development, espoused by principals, only partially aligned with systemwide student assessments and school programs.
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Connecting reflective practice, dialogic protocols, and professional learning
Professional Development in Education, 2009 In recent years, elements of reflective practice have been popularized in state school professional development. As reflective practice has moved into the mainstream, dialogic protocols have been developed by numerous organizations to structure discourse for deep understanding, enhance professional practice and advance organizational learning. This case study reports on the use of a dialogic protocol as a tool to advance educator reflective practice. It finds that the protocol significantly alters prevailing discussion patterns to promote the construction of new knowledge.
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Conversion of a large, urban high school to small schools: Leadership challenges and opportunities
NASSP Bulletin, 2009 This article reports findings from a study of the experiences of 11 school principals who are leading the conversion of a large, comprehensive, urban high school into six thematic small schools.
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Conspiracy theory: Lessons for leaders from two centuries of school reform
Phi Delta Kappan, 2007 If school leaders are to bring about successful reform, they must thwart the forces that have conspired against it since the 19th century. Mr Nehring identifies six "conspirators"-- destructive tendencies so deeply embedded in our culture that they often operate unnoticed-- and offers practical suggestions for rooting them out.
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Essays and Commentaries
We Must Teach for 'Range' and 'Depth'
Education Week, 2015
There is a problem baked in to federal and state accountability policies when it comes to assessment of learning. The problem is so fundamental that any effort to develop assessment systems by way of the same accountability recipe will produce the same flat-as-a-pancake result.
The problem is this: Human judgment is poison to accountability, but it is the basic ingredient for assessment of learning.
Public accountability systems exist largely to ensure a meritocracy uncontaminated by nepotism, political favoritism, or anything that would threaten merit as the sole criterion for consequential decisions. This is the logic behind civil service exams, going back to ancient China and extending to modern public bureaucracies around the world. The system seeks to ensure that a person gets a job based on his or her qualifications, not who they know or how much money they have or which political party they favor. The idea is to so marginalize—or, better, eliminate—human judgment in the evaluation process so that no one can charge bias. Objective measures. A precise and scientific enterprise.
Education Week, 2015
There is a problem baked in to federal and state accountability policies when it comes to assessment of learning. The problem is so fundamental that any effort to develop assessment systems by way of the same accountability recipe will produce the same flat-as-a-pancake result.
The problem is this: Human judgment is poison to accountability, but it is the basic ingredient for assessment of learning.
Public accountability systems exist largely to ensure a meritocracy uncontaminated by nepotism, political favoritism, or anything that would threaten merit as the sole criterion for consequential decisions. This is the logic behind civil service exams, going back to ancient China and extending to modern public bureaucracies around the world. The system seeks to ensure that a person gets a job based on his or her qualifications, not who they know or how much money they have or which political party they favor. The idea is to so marginalize—or, better, eliminate—human judgment in the evaluation process so that no one can charge bias. Objective measures. A precise and scientific enterprise.
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Why Education Is Not Like Medicine
Education Week, 2013 There are three bad ideas popular among education writers in the United States right now. First is the idea that American public education should learn from the medical profession. Second is the idea that better skills are the route to higher income. And third is the instructional core, an idea that teaching consists of three elements—teacher, student, and content. For each of these ideas, there is a better way that will set us on a more constructive path.
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Doing No Harm
Is It Time for a Research Boycott of High-Stakes Testing? Education Week, 2008 It is now widely accepted across the scholarly community that the persistent use of high-stakes testing in public education is a potentially harmful practice. The large and growing body of evidence is synthesized nicely in recent publications by Audrey Amrein and David Berliner; Deborah Meier and colleagues; and Wayne Au.
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Progressive vs. Traditional: Reframing an Old Debate
Education Week, 2006 I’ve spent many years working in progressive schools, the chief characteristic of which is that they are not traditional. Or so we say. In fact, the schools I have worked in and admire are mislabeled. And so, too, are the “traditional” schools with which they are unceasingly compared. It’s time to set the record straight: So-called progressive schools are the legacy of a long and proud tradition of thoughtful school practice stretching back for centuries, while so-called traditional schools are the mostly unintended consequence of decades of politically driven and often misguided school reforms that have accumulated like layers of wallpaper on old plaster.
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Certifiably Strange
Education Week, 2001 He’s authored four books and helped launch two schools, but the National Board says that’s not enough. And it won’t say why. My eyes scanned the first paragraph of the letter for a telling phrase, or even a single word. And there it was, a few lines in: “regret.” I was shocked. At first, I denied it. Can’t be. Yet there it was: “regret.” Disappointment began to coalesce somewhere deep down. But then, almost as quickly, my brain kicked into emotional rebound. I can revise. This thought grew bigger in my consciousness until, by the end of the letter, I was philosophizing: Life is about revising. It was my mental defense against that other, unacceptable, conclusion: You failed! That was last November, when I received my National Board scores for certification in social studies/history.
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A Nation of Boutiques
Education Week, 2000 I teach in a small public charter school in central Massachusetts. In Boston circles, I hear our school referred to as a "boutique." I've seen the label applied to other smallish, unusual schools, along with "specialty shop." The word "fringe" sometimes comes out with the next breath. It's meant as a criticism. We're interesting but inconsequential. Elitist, maybe, and unconcerned about the wider world. Not easily replicated.
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Cure for Teacher Shortage: Let Teachers Teach
Education Week, 1999 "Get tough" measures such as penalizing teacher education programs for low test scores won't swell the ranks of candidates. Our public schools face a growing teacher shortage. Results from several rounds of teacher exams in my home state, Massachusetts, suggest that some who wish to enter teaching may lack basic skills, which means the teacher shortage is even deeper than we feared. What is the solution? "Get tough" measures such as penalizing teacher education programs for low test scores won't swell the ranks of candidates. And signing bonuses will lead only to short-term commitments. To find a real solution, we should ask why so few of our best and brightest college graduates pursue a teaching career in the first place.
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