David L. Kirp

Professionalization as a Policy Choice: British Special Education in Comparative Perspective

Policies may be characterized in several distinct and competing ways: as best resolved by professional expertise, as fit for political determination, as properly treated in terms of legal rights, as appropriately subject to bureaucratic norms, or as sensibly left to market determination. The consequences of the choice among these frameworks is apparent in contrasting the British and American approaches to a particular policy issue, the education of handicapped children. That analysis reveals the utility of maintaining a policy scheme which builds in a tension among the competing frameworks.

State Efforts to Reform Schools: Treading Between a Regulatory Swamp and an English Garden

Since 1983, education has risen to the top of many states’ policy agendas. The level of state policy activity is unprecedented in the history of American education. While states have assumed responsibility for educational policymaking, little is known about the effects of various reform policies or strategies associated with their implementation. The authors argue that the current reform effort which aims at educational excellence will fail unless the policy culture shifts the strategic focus from regulation and compliance monitoring to mobilization of institutional capacity. This article examines reform strategies of three states—Texas, California, and South Carolina—and how those strategies relate to reform outcomes.

The Allure of Legalization Reconsidered: The Case of Special Education.

Legalization has been called a major trend in American public life. Yet it is a phenomenon that is conceptually unclear and little understood in the way it affects the institutions on which it comes to operate. This paper concerns special education, the subject of the Education for All Handicapped Children Act (EAHCA),1 which was passed in 1975. It will proceed in three steps. Initially, the legislation and the process leading to its passage and implementation will be examined as a case study in legalization. Next, the concept of legalization and its motivations will be outlined and ana-

The Legalization of the School Psychologists' World.

Abstract Discusses the increasing tendency of legal rules to shape school psychologists conduct. Court cases, legislation, and empirical studies treating with this issue are analyzed. The article suggests that “the legalization of the school psychologists world” may afford an opportunity to reshape, in more “non-formal” and collegial ways, relationships with other school professions, students, and parents.

Look Back in Anger: Hemophilia and AIDS Activism in the International Tainted-Blood Crisis

During the 1980s, the AIDS epidemic devastated the hemophiliac population. It also fostered the emergence of hemophilia activists, who have had a profound effect on policy and politics in scores of nations. Drawing on case studies of 11 countries, this article examines the impact of this emerging interest group on politics and policy outcomes. In addition, it compares the strategies adopted by hemophilia activists and gay activists, specifically the reliance on victimization or rights as the premise of demands for public support. Although the article focuses on community mobilization around AIDS, it speaks more generally to the growing international impact of interest group (or identity) politics on policy.

Invisible Students Bridging the Widest Achievement Gap

African-American boys have long fared worse in school. This paper documents this achievement gap, then assesses a number of evidence-based strategies that hold promise of bridging that gap. Those strategies range from high-quality early education and skill-building reading programs to mentoring initiatives and interventions that address stereotype vulnerability. Much of the existing research has not isolated the effects on black males, and the paper offers new data that demonstrates those impacts. A sequence of interventions, which begin before kindergarten and continue during college, is recommended.

Race, Schooling, and Interest Politics: The Oakland Story

This case study traces the evolution of race and schooling issues in Oakland, California. It assesses why that school district did not opt to desegregate, as seemed likely in the 1960s. The transformation of school politics and the emergence of black leadership, in the context of a rapidly shifting population, emerge as critical factors. Oakland has defined racial justice in terms of political power and educational resources, rather than integration. The consequences of that decision--for Oakland as for other predominantly black cities--are also addressed.

Mindshare and The Life of The Mind: A Liberal Arts College Finds Its Market Niche

(2003). Mindshare and The Life of The Mind: A Liberal Arts College Finds Its Market Niche. Change: The Magazine of Higher Learning: Vol. 35, No. 5, pp. 34-39.

Management 101 at the "New Oxford"

private, social, and economic benefits—from improved health to lower rates of welfare dependency and greater contributions to the tax base. Unfortunately, public pronouncements about why higher education matters, including those from university presidents, tend to focus on the fact that going to college enhances one’s personal economic status. The rich combination of societal and individual benefits of higher education is largely overwhelmed by the reality that university degree holders make an average of U.S.

AIDS: Rights, Risk, and Reason.@@@AIDS in the Industrialized Democracies: Passions, Politics and Policies.

1 million more over their lifetimes than non–degree holders. This obsession with private economic benefits has been a factor in the rapid rise in tuition rates, with a growing share of the financing burden shifted to students. As a result, concerns over student access have grown. While overall enrollments have increased substantially over the last 30 years, the gap between the lowest and highest income groups, and between minorities and others, has remained virtually unchanged. Those enrolled are now required to pay an ever-increasing share of the total cost of a university degree, especially through student loans. American students are indebted at levels unthinkable on an international level: more than U.S.