Schooling for the Real World: The Essential Guide to Rigorous and Relevant Learning

"The melding of reform approaches by the Coalition of EssentialSchools and of the 'school-to-work' movement has been inevitable aswell as sensible. In Schooling for the Real World, Adria Steinberg,Kathleen Cushman, and Robert Riordan outline how these reforminitiatives have effectively coiled together and put theircollective experience into an accessible and usable form. Given itscomplexity, the practical reshaping of America's high schools willsurely be a messy business. The authors bring some order from theirexperience and thereby provide all of us a big boostahead."--Theodore R. Sizer, chairman, Coalition of EssentialSchools

"Schooling for the Real World offers many practical ways forteachers and schools to provide young people a genuine educationthat gives them experience in the world. Such experience addsconsiderable value to what is studied in school and helps youngpeople see themselves as citizens of their places, persons who arehighly valued for their seriousness of purpose and hard work byadults in their communities."--Vito Perrone, director of Programsin Teaching, Harvard Graduate School of Education

In today's workplace, the "knowledge worker" has become key to highperformance. This person must have not only multiple talents andskills, but a sound understanding of what works in the real world.This incisive book argues for schooling that combines rigorousacademic instruction with learning in real-world settings. Itoffers practical strategies for designing effective learningprograms, developing a strong curriculum, setting standards andgoals, assessing student work, supporting rewarding internships,and much more.

In clear and straightforward language, the authors presentinspiring examples of successful schools from such organizations asthe Coalition of Essential Schools, Jobs for the Future, and NewUrban High Schools to show how work-based learning can become aschoolwide effort--and not simply a specialized program. Throughoutthe book, there are examples offering important lessons and toolsto administrators, teachers, policymakers, and community leaders.Schooling for the Real World heralds a future in which theknowledge worker is not the exception, but the rule.

ADRIA STEINBERG is a program director of Jobs for the Future, a national nonprofit organization working to strengthen the transitions and links between learning and work. She has worked in and written about high schools for over thirty years and is the author of several books, including Real Learning, Real Work (1997). For five years, she was a writer for and editor of The Harvard Education Letter. KATHLEEN CUSHMAN has written for more than a decade about education reform, describing the Coalition of Essential Schools in the journal Horace and the schools of the Annenberg Challenge in Challenge Journal. She is editor of The Collected Horace: Theory in Practice in Essential Schools, a five-volume work published in 1998. ROBERT RIORDAN is a longtime teacher, administrator, and teacher trainer. He was named National School-to-Work Practitioner of the Year in 1994. He is currently project director for Changing the Subject: The New Urban High School, a joint initiative of the Big Picture Company and the U.S. Department of Education.