Models and Methods for Examining Standards-Based Reforms and Accountability Initiatives: Have the Tools of Inquiry Answered Pressing Questions on Improving Schools?

This article synthesizes research on standards-based reforms and accountability, with specific attention to purposes, models, and methods of inquiry. Starting with the premise that the reforms were meant to be systemic, the article examines the extent to which studies were guided by designs that explicitly or implicitly acknowledge a system, and evaluates the utility of the designs in generating information to support large-scale systemic changes in education. The article concludes that research efforts on reforms have been largely non-systemic in design and have thereby failed to adequately help individual schools, school systems, and statewide systems to develop in directions that are consistent with the mission of the reform movement.