Preparing the Climate for Public Education in Coming Decades.

N

19

Change Strategies; Community Education; Declining Enrollment; Demography; Depleted Resources; Educational Change; Educational Trends; Elementary Secondary Education; Enrollment Projections; Futures (of Society); Institutional Cooperation; Postsecondary Education; Public Education

Problems in education have changed from those dealing with growth to the exigencies created by scarcity and retrenchment. The two major sources of scarcity, the long-range demographic changes in society and the changing energy situation, will permanently alter the style and standard of American life. Public education in the foreseeable future will be caught in a squeeze between increasing expenses and a declining clientele. A constructive answer to scarcity is a reconceptualization of the nature and function of schools to embrace community education as a life-long process. To make this adaptation, school management needs to change its organizational concentration from strategy, structure, and systems to that of staff, skills, style, and superordinate goals. Teachers can reconceptualize their traditional roles and be developers of curriculum and coordinators of the efforts of many people. Effective schools also have both public and parental involvement. In the wider political community, management should utilize the practices of networking, coalition building, cooperation, and collaboration. Finally, in stressing superordinate goals, managers must clearly define what it is that education does and develop priorities within that definition. (MLF)

1983

ED228710