Changing Schools for Good : A Study of School Culture and Systems

This article explores the unevenness of change between! culture and organizational structures. When school leaders and teachers embrace new systems without enough attention paid to the nature of the conver­ sation, and to the way knowledge is learned among the sk:hool's staff, then the sustaining of sound reforms diminishes drastically. By looking at the reforms Mission Middle School leadership and fa;culty imple­ mented aroWld assessment systems (e.g., portfolios), this ¥tide shows the pitfalls of reform efforts fixed on the implementatio:q. of systems that do not engage the very heart of a human organization how things are done.