Our Research

The first report of the Rennie Center's Condition of Education project, the 2013 Data Report identifies and measures state-level indicators to inform decision-making among Massachusetts education leaders.

This 2012 policy brief identifies promising practices and ongoing challenges of this program, and concludes by offering considerations—based on literature and research findings—for school and district leaders, community partners, and state policymakers. 

The Rennie Center's 2012 toolkit aims to assist district leaders in decision-making about school budgeting, and is intended to push school leaders to take a more deliberative approach to school budgeting.

This 2012 policy perspective presents a new three-year model for post-baccalaureate teacher preparation and development aimed at improving the quality of the educator workforce statewide. The proposed "New Partnership-based Model for Massachusetts Teacher Preparation" is research-based and focuses on partnerships at the district level to achieve joint accountability for the training of a majority of teachers working in the Commonwealth.

This 2012 case study highlights the work by union, district, and community leaders in Springfield Public Schools, offering a compelling picture of labor-management-community collaboration in practice. The goal of the case study is not for communities to simply replicate the systems and structures Springfield uses to collaborate, but to learn and apply the key lessons to their local contexts.

This 2011 report focuses on challenges associated with high rates of student mobility in Massachusetts public school districts, and identifies promising strategies for overcoming these challenges.

This 2011 policy brief provides policymakers in Massachusetts with an understanding of how student learning plans (also known as individualized learning plans) work, an overview of the research and effectiveness of this approach on improving a variety of student outcomes, and state trends in mandating SLPs for all students.

This 2011 report commissioned by the Rennie Center and Policy Analysis for California Education (PACE) offers a blueprint for strengthening assessment policy, pointing out how new technologies are opening up new possibilities for fairer, more accurate evaluations of what students know and are able to do.

In 2010, EdVestors issued a four-year retrospective report on the winners of the School on the Move Prize from 2006 to 2009. Researched and written by the Rennie Center, this report identified five principles of school improvement shared by winning schools.