What\u27s Wrong with Reform?

The conservative educational reform movement, which still, after more than a decade, is the dominant force in school reform, has had little success in improving schools because it is based on invalid and self-defeating theoretical assumptions. Taken together, these assumptions have the effect of substituting nostalgia — a longing for the schools the reformers themselves attended —for policy and for increasing standardization at the expense of individual growth and development. The reformers (Bloom, Hirsch, Ravitch, Finn, Bennett, et al.) have particular difficulty, given their assumptions, in dealing both with individual differences among students and with ethnic and racial differences among groups of students, and hence have little useful to say about the most serious problems in American education. Their assumption that American schools are worse than they used to be is based on impressions and anecdotes, not research. Finally, their belief in the importance of tradition prevents them from seeing major changes in demography, in technology, and in the state of knowledge, which are affecting schools

Copycatting: Fiscal Policies of States and Their Neighbors

This paper formalizes and tests the notion that state governments' expenditures depend on the spending of similarly situated states. We find that even after allowing for fixed state effects, year effects, and common random effects between neighbors, as state government's level of per capita expenditure is positively and significantly affected by the expenditure levels of its neighbors. Ceteris paribus, a one dollar increase in a state's neighbors' expenditures increases its own expenditure by over 70 cents.

Interview with Jim Case by Andrea L’Hommedieu

Biographical NoteJames W. “Jim” Case was born on June 21, 1945, in Chicopee, Massachusetts. His father was a firefighter and his mother was a homemaker who raised seven children; Jim was the fourth of five boys. His family was Irish-German Catholic, and his parents were involved in local politics. He grew up in a blue-collar mill town with a good public educational system; he attended Clark University, where he majored in psychology. He was drafted in November 1968 at the height of the Vietnam War and served two years as an administrator in a physical therapy clinic at an Army hospital. Subsequently, he attended the University of Maine School of Law, became active in politics as co-chair of the local Kennedy campaign committee, and developed an interest in labor law. He also worked on George Mitchell’s gubernatorial campaign in 1974. After law school he went to Washington, DC to work in Senator Muskie’s office, first as assistant counsel to the Committee on Environment and Public Works, which involved economic development and environmental policy, and later as legislative director. He was Senator Mitchell’s first administrative assistant, a post he held until 1981. At the time of this interview he was a partner in the McTeague, Higbee, Case, Cohen, Whitney & Toker law firm. SummaryInterview includes discussions of: 1972 Muskie presidential primary race; 1974 Maine gubernatorial race; factors that contributed to the results of the 1974 election; Mitchell on the campaign trail; Mitchell’s role in Muskie’s 1976 reelection campaign; how Mitchell came to be appointed U.S. attorney and later a federal judge; the transition in the Senate office when Muskie moved over to the State Department; Mitchell getting committee assignments; issues he worked on in his first year of office; Finance Committee deregulation of the banking industry; Case’s predicting that Mitchell would be Democratic leader; Senate prayer breakfasts; Case’s bringing David Johnson in to replace himself when he left in 1981; Mitchell’s accessibility to Mainers and commitment to Maine; and the mutual loyalty between Senator Mitchell and his staff

Ariel - Volume 1 Number 1

Copyright 1969 Arie

Student Perceptions of Project Management: Comparing students’ start and end of course Perceptions of the importance of PM, PMBOK Categories, and Contributing Subject Areas

Institutions of higher education are receiving steady pressure to better prepare students for project management (PM) positions and therefore the value being placed on project management courses is increasing in higher education, especially in computing disciplines. IS curricula models specifically address PM courses and concepts. The need for appropriately skilled project managers has also motivated industries to take advantage of PM training and certification programs offered by the Project Management Institute (PMI, 2000). The Standish group indicates that CIOs believe that having an experienced project manager is a key factor in IT projects success. This investigation focuses on the perception of students on the overall importance of PM, the Project Management Body of Knowledge Areas (PMBOK), and knowledge of specific subject areas that contribute to the preparation of students for PM positions. Graduate and undergraduate PM students at a regional institution in the southeast were survey at both the start and end of their courses

Feature technology - an overview

Manufacture is an objective that has become more urgent within the wider context of a total Computer Integrated Manufacturing environment. In seeking this integration it is recognised that the diversity of activities and consequent needs for data can best be served by a single representation for design, design analysis and manufacturing planning, and that a strong candidate for this descriptive role is a Feature Representation. This paper briefly overviews the primary methods of the use of features through Feature Recognition and Design by Features, particularly in the process planning application area