:
"This in-depth look at high school redesign makes a significant contribution toward understanding the real world complexities and challenges of implementing comprehensive high school reform. The lessons learned from Dr. Legters’ work make this a must read for anyone interested in high school reform."
–Sandra Feldman, President, American Federation of Teachers"Dr. Legters and her colleagues present a tough, honest, scars-and-all story of one of the most promising high school reform efforts in America. This is an important book and I certainly hope it is widely read."
–Sam Coburn Stringfield, Center for the Social Organization of Schools, The Johns Hopkins University
"In one Philadelphia high school, kids were trashing the school and throwing books and furniture out the windows. Two years later, achievement and attendance are up and dropouts are down. What was the one big difference? The Talent Development program."
–David W. Hornbeck, Child Advocate and former superintendent, School District of Philadelphia
Grounded in the authors’ real-world experiences of restructuring several urban high schools, this volume offers a powerful alternative to current reform efforts. The well-structured text details organizational, curricular, and instructional strategies providing practitioners with a workable blueprint for whole school reform. Since its inception, the Talent Development Approach has gained national recognition and is currently expanding to new areas. This book is the story of what happened in schools when this model was implemented–what worked and what didn’t. Clearly, this approach holds great promise for transforming large, nonselective high schools into personalized, relevant, and effective communities.
