Editors' Introduction
Sam Stringfield and John Hollifield

This issue simultaneously displays the focus and full range of topics covered by the Journal of Education for Students Placed At Risk. The focus throughout is the question, "How have we, and how can we, improve the achievements of students who have traditionally been at risk of academic failure?" The specific topics in Volume 3 Number 3 are delightfully varied.

The introductory policy-research article by Shelley Billig reports data from a follow-up survey of state and local Title I educators. The focus of the survey relates to educators’ continuing efforts to implement five aspects of the 1994 Title I reauthorization. These data indicate that state Title I offices, districts and schools continue moving toward implementation of the substantial changes mandated in that law. (For results from a similar survey administered one year earlier, see Billig, 1997.) The recommendations for stable-to-increased Title I funding and for more research on promising models and practices are particularly relevant.

The Starbase-Atlantis case study by Lee-Pearce, Plowman and Touchstone describes a successful implementation of a program built around a partnership between the U.S. Navy and local Title I elementary schools. The program included five full days of hands-on learning experiences. The authors document that the program improved students’ achievements in areas related to mathematics and science.

Anderson and Pellicer provide a very thoughtful model for explaining the levels at which schools and systems must work in order to provide effective programs to at risk students. This theoretical construct is used to explain the exemplary academic results for at risk students in four schools. The article describes interrelations among schools’ purposes and standards, shared leadership, level of community support, teachers’ will and skills, and opportunity to learn/curriculum integration, and a school-wide nonacceptance of failure. Their theoretical orientation and practical analyses help explain why few schools are currently exemplary, and what additional schools must do to become exemplary.

The Rojewski and Hill article reports on a study of at-risk factors and students’ career decision making. While the majority of JESPAR articles deal with elementary school reform, Rojewski and Hill point not just to high school, but to students career aspirations beyond high school. While several of the findings are quite sobering, the authors point toward practical steps that can be taken by schools.

Among the three book reviews, Jones-Wilson provides an excellent analysis of a historical description of the workings of an exemplary all-Black North Carolina school during the segregated years of this century. The reasons for the schools remarkable success are examined in detail by Jones-Wilson. Stevens and McNaughton review James Comer’s Rallying the Whole Village. This review compliments the JESPAR special issue (Vol. 3, No. 1) devoted exclusively to the School Development Program (Haynes, 1998). Finally, Huang reviews Out of sight, out of mind: Homeless children and families in small-town America. JESPAR 1(1) included a review of a school serving homeless children in a rural context (Golubich, 1996); in this volume Vissing has examined the challenges of small-town homelessness, with a particular eye toward children.

References

Billig, S. (1997). Title I of the Improving America’s Schools Act: What it looks like in practice. Journal of Education for Students Placed At Risk, 2(4), 329-343.

Haynes, N. M., Ed. (1998). Changing Schools for Changing Times: The Comer School Development Program. Special Issue. Journal of Education for Students Placed At Risk, 3(1).

Golubich, J. (1996). Book Review of Schooling Homeless Children by Sharon Quint. Journal of Education for Students Placed At Risk, 1(1), 95-98.