About "Changing Schools" and
the Focused Reporting Project



MiddleWeb: Exploring Middle School Reform
is produced by the Focused Reporting Project with financial support from the Program for Student Achievement of the Edna McConnell Clark Foundation.


The "Changing Schools" newspapers

During the first four years of our EMCF grants, the Focused Reporting Project employed a team of education writers to produce newspapers about middle grades reform in two US school systems. These newspapers -- published twice each year and distributed widely throughout the target communities -- reported on the efforts of the Long Beach (CA) and Louisville (KY) school systems to implement standards-based reform and boost achievement for all middle school students. Each district received sizeable grants from the Clark Foundation to support this work.

The newspapers -- Changing Schools in Long Beach and Changing Schools in Louisville -- described the progress of each district's middle schools through the stories of teachers, students, administrators, parents, and community organizations who are working to meet high standards. The newspapers were published from 1996-2000. A selection of stories from these newspapers is available here at MiddleWeb. Several of the more recent issues of Changing Schools are also posted in their entirety as PDF files.



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