Based on research conducted by RAND and experiential evidence that a comprehensive approach to school improvement held great promise, in 1997 Congress created the Comprehensive School Reform Demonstration program (CSRD), which encouraged schools to develop comprehensive plans by addressing nine specified components. The nine components stressed that schools incorporate measurable goals; support from staff members; research-based methods; external assistance; parental and community involvement; staff development; coordination of resources; evaluation; and a comprehensive approach into a schoolwide reform plan. For the years that followed, schools interested in schoolwide improvement found support through the CSRD program.
The 2001 Elementary and Secondary Education Act (ESEA), also known as the No Child Left Behind Act, signaled important changes for the CSRD program. Under NCLB, the CSRD program is no longer designated as a “demonstration,” nor is it governed by language in the appropriations legislation and accompanying conference reports. Instead, the federal program is now known as the Comprehensive School Reform (CSR) program and is regulated by the new CSR authority in ESEA’s Title I, Part F and the Fund for the Improvement of Education.
The new legislation specifies that federally funded educational programs must employ strategies and methods — based upon scientific research and effective practices — to improve the achievement of all students. To advance this objective two new components emphasizing results were added to the CSR program bringing the total number of CSR components to eleven. Together, these components guide schools in activities that promise to bring about significant gains in student learning, and directly support the No Child Left Behind act's purpose.
Through state grants, the federal CSR program awards a minimum of $50,000 per year for three years to qualifying schools. To be eligible for CSR funding, schools must demonstrate in their applications that they have planned a “comprehensive” program, as defined by the eleven components listed below:
- Goals and benchmarks: has measurable goals for student performance and benchmarks for meeting those goals. The Department encourages districts to link these goals to their state's definition of adequate yearly progress (AYP) in Section 1111(b)(2) of the ESEA.
- Supportive staff members: ensures that programs are selected and supported by school faculty, administrators and staff before implementation.
- Proven methods & strategies based on scientifically based research: employs strategies that are based on scientifically based research and effective practices and have been replicated successfully in schools.
- Strategies that improve academic achievement: has been found to significantly improve the academic achievement of students or demonstrates strong evidence that it will improve the academic achievement of students.
- External assistance: uses high-quality external technical support from a CSR entity with experience or expertise in schoolwide reform and improvement.
- Parental and community involvement: provides for the meaningful involvement of parents and the local community in planning and implementing school improvement activities.
- Professional development: provides high-quality and continuous teacher and staff professional development and training.
- Support of change agents: provides support for teachers, administrators, and other staff.
- Coordination of resources: identifies how all resources available to the school will support and sustain the school reform effort. In particular, it should make efficient use of federal, state, local and private financial and other resources to foster the school’s improvement plan.
- Annual evaluation: includes a plan for evaluating, annually, the implementation of the schoolwide reform and its impact on students' academic achievement.
- Comprehensive approach: has a comprehensive design for effective school functioning that includes instruction, assessment, classroom management, professional development, parental involvement, and school management, and that aligns the school’s curriculum, technology and professional development into a schoolwide reform plan.
These summaries were drawn from the CSR Program office’s “Guidance on the Comprehensive School Reform Program” available at
http://www.ed.gov/programs/compreform/guidance/index.html.
Many educators have argued that there should also be two additional components on governance and leadership. However, whether CSR is approached with eleven or thirteen components, the success of CSR depends not on any one of these components, but on their alignment and interaction in a comprehensive plan. In the sections that follow, each of the eleven components is discussed and resources are provided. Although schools can consider the components in any order, this guide suggests a logical progression for schoolwide improvement planning — beginning with establishing shared goals, taking time to gather and align various resources and ending the process by reviewing the plan to ensure that it is coherent, proven and comprehensive.
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