The Praeger Handbook of American High Schools

From the private academies of Colonial America to the comprehensive public high schools and alternative schools of today, The Praeger Handbook of American High Schools offers a thorough compendium for parents, educators, and students. In its accessible and well-organized volumes, it includes charts and tables representing such things as enrollment trends, drop out rates, and academic achievement, as well as original entries on everything from assessment to No Child Left Behind to vouchers.

Written by an interdisciplinary group of experts in education, psychology, sociology, and other fields, this landmark handbook provides a thorough examination of U.S. secondary education from the private academies of Colonial America to the comprehensive high schools and alternative schools of today. This accessible compendium is a treasure trove of reliable and authoritative information for educators, parents, and students.

It includes original entries on assessment, architecture, bullying, campus life, censorship, college preparation, desegregation, disabilities, ethnic identity, family and community involvement, finance inequality, gangs, home schooling, homework, immigrants, intelligence, learning styles, magnet schools, mentoring, peer groups and peer culture, prom, reunions, rural schools, school boards, school to work programs, sex education, sports, standardized tests, student rights, teacher certification, teacher shortage, test preparation, violence, vouchers, and yearbooks, just to name a few. The text includes primary documents, each with scene and context-setting introductions, such as reports, legislation, and US Supreme Court cases will be found as well. Thorough cross-referencing enables the user to follow a topic from an entry to a primary document or another related entry. This wide-ranging, accessible and user-friendly source is an authoritative reference for anyone concerned with high schools and high school students in the United States.

Kathryn M. Borman is Professor of Anthropology at the University of South Florida and is the principal investigator of research projects housed at the Alliance for Applied Research in Education and Anthropology (AAREA) in the Department of Anthropology. Dr. Borman has extensive experience in educational reform and policy as well as evaluation studies. Currently she is studying the efficacy of an elementary science professional developmental program in a randomized control trial and looking at the effects of college program culture on female and minority student science, technology, engineering, and effects of college program culture on female and minority student science, technology, engineering, and mathematics participation. Additionally, she has been involved in training graduate students for research and taught a variety of courses including anthropology and education, and methods in qualitative analysis.

Spencer E. Cahill is Professor, Department of Sociology, University of South Florida. He is the immediate past editor of Social Psychology Quarterly, former co-editor of Journal of Contemporary Ethnography, Past-President of the Society for the Study of Symbolic Interaction, and Past-Chair of the American Sociological Association's sections on Children and Youth and on Emotions. He has published articles on a variety of topics in such journals as Social Problems, Social Psychology Quarterly, and Sociological Theory. His current research uses notes authored by and exchanged among adolescents to examine adolescent relationships, identity, and peer cultures.

Bridget A. Cotner is Research Associate, at the Alliance for Applied Research in Education and Anthropology, Department of Anthropology, University of South Florida. She is involved in mixed method research in large scale evaluations of reform programs. Current projects focus on all levels of education, from elementary to post-secondary. Her focus is on education reform, policy, and research methods.