school environment

Identifies the goals of the SMART way of thinking about education, including strategic and specific, measurable, attainable, results-based, and time-bound, and describes a framework for creating a SMART school through focus, reflection, collaboration, and leadership.

Offers advice to administrators on how to encourage the teachers in their schools or districts and create a climate that allows them to take risks and act as coaches to their students.

"A resource guide designed to help teachers, administrators, students and parents incorporate the practice of Circles into the everyday life of the school community... offers comprehensive step-by-step instructions for how to plan, facilitate, and implement the Circle for a variety of purposes within the school environment. It describes the basic process, essential elements and a step-by-step guide for how to organize, plan, and lead Circles. It also provides over one hundred specific lesson plans and ideas for the application of Circles in the following areas of school life: learning and establishing a Circle practice; establishing and affirming community norms; teaching and learning in Circle; building connection and community; promoting social-emotional skills; facilitating important but difficult conversations; Working together as adults; engaging parents and the wider community; developing students as leaders in peer Circles; [and] using Circles for restorative discipline"--Amazon.com.

Offers teachers practical, budget-friendly advice for redesigning classrooms to make them more effective learning spaces.

The landmark college guide that introduces 40 of the best colleges never heard of. Evaluations of each school's program and "personality" Candid assessments by students, professors, and deans Information on the progress of graduates This new edition not only revisits schools listed in previous volumes to give readers a comprehensive assessment, it also addresses such issues as homeschooling, learning disabilities, and single-sex education.

Presents profiles of more than 2,500 colleges and universities; includes a list showing which schools offer which majors; and provides information on the college admissions process.

A guide to defining, assessing, and transforming school culture to be positive and actively working to enrich the lives of students. Includes tips for hiring and training teachers who will support the culture, and instructions for implementing a successful school culture rewiring team.

Provides strategies to help teachers and principals work together to identify and solve staff problems, prevent conflict, and enrich school climates.

Journalist Robbins explores the ways group identity theories play out among cliques--and the students they exclude. She reveals the new labels students stick onto each other today, the long-term effects of this marginalization, and the reasons students in these categories are often shunned. Then she celebrates them. The homogenization of the US education system has made outcasts more important than ever. In this conformist, creativity-stifling society, the innovation, courage, and differences of outcasts--nerds, weirdos, punks, etc.--are crucial to progress. Robbins intertwines psychology with science, addressing questions such as "Why are popular people mean?" and "Why do social labels stick?" As in Pledged and The Overachievers, Robbins follows students through the course of a year. In her other books, however, Robbins merely observed students. This time, she forces them to examine who they are and how other students perceive them, then dares them to step outside of their comfort zone to attempt social experiments at their schools--experiments that end up changing their lives.--From publisher description.