At CRPE, we study how assessment, accountability, and oversight can strengthen public education while fostering equity, innovation, and continuous improvement. Our research examines how traditional accountability frameworks can narrow teaching and constrain schools’ ability to adapt, and we explore approaches that measure what truly matters for student success—academic growth, deeper learning, and readiness for life beyond school. We also investigate how oversight can balance school autonomy with strong protections for access and quality, ensuring that all students are well served. Across this work, our goal is to inform accountability systems that uphold public trust while enabling schools to innovate and respond to the diverse needs of their communities.
This study identifies key functions performed by state education agencies, estimates the relative level of resources devoted to each activity, and explores ways SEAs could free up resources to build school improvement capacity.
This working paper reports on a meeting in which representatives from several states gathered for a candid discussion of the lessons learned from Louisiana’s dramatic school turnaround efforts.
This report is the conclusion of an extensive six-year national study funded by the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation. The authors criticize school finance systems for being outmoded and not linked to student results and offer a four-part action plan for overhauling today’s school finance systems.
This edition of Hopes, Fears, & Reality explores some of the most controversial issues facing the charter school movement and the implications of continued growth for leading players in the charter school debates.
Too many charter school authorizers aren’t fulfilling their responsibilities in providing adequate oversight for charter schools. This white paper examines the causes and consequences of poor authorizing and proposes how the problem might be fixed.
This report summarizes the functions of school boards, identifies some of the problems with big city school boards, and suggests options for reorienting boards around the trusteeship of the children they serve.
Prepared for the Washington State Academic Achievement and Accountability Commission in 2002, this report attempts to take a fresh look at the data from the Washington Assessment of Student Learning (WASL) in order to provide practical information for both educators and policymakers.
This study examines the experiences of fifteen elementary schools in Washington State demonstrating relatively slow improvement on the reading and math sections of the WASL.
No results found.