From the Director Research findings to guide policy and practice Three major WCER projects recently concluded their assignments and now are reporting findings that should help guide education policy, curriculum, and instruction in important ways for years to come. School finance reform in Kentucky, New Jersey and Texas has led to varying degrees of improvement in the equity of these states' school finance structures. Studies by the Center for Policy Research in Education are the first analyses of equity effect to pinpoint the structural reasons for equity impacts and ways to improve the effects. Allan Odden of the CPRE Finance Center provides an overview of these statewide reforms and their results. Fred Newmann and Gary Wehlage explain that authentic pedagogy requires students to produce meaning instead of merely reproducing knowledge produced by others.
Authentic pedagogy leads students to an in-depth understanding of problems and issues.
It produces learning with aesthetic, utilitarian, or personal value beyond the classroom. The five-year CORS study found that authentic pedagogy helps boost achievement for all students. The Algebra Working Group, part of the National Center for Research in Mathematical Sciences Education, seeks to make algebra a more meaningful and engaging part of the curriculum. Researcher James Kaput and his team found that, rather than treating algebra as a course, educators should present algebra as a form of reasoning, taught across all grade levels, beginning in the elementary grades. But deep change in the curriculum will require major sustained support for teachers and a new curriculum embodying the innovations.