ABSTRACT
This chapter looks at the theoretical and methodological basis of the school effectiveness research tradition. It considers how school effectiveness is measured and analyses the strengths and limitations of the field. Consequently, school effectiveness is very much on the political, research and teaching agendas. One common response to the problem or making schools more effective has been to mobilise change effort at the level of the whole organisation. One of the distinctive features of school effectiveness research is its preoccupation with judging and measuring performance. In school effectiveness studies usually test/exam results are used to gauge and compare pupil performance. Work on school effectiveness suggested that schools were equally effective across a range of outcomes. The differential impact of school effectiveness on sub-groups is a question which interests many in the school effectiveness field. D. Nuttall showed large differences for different types of pupil in the relative effectiveness of schools in London.
