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Students, Teachers and High Standards Reforms: Negotiating Education Policy, Classroom Practice and Student Outcomes in Philadelphia Middle Schools

In this analytic essay, we argue for research on school reform that positions students at the center of policy and propose directions for future investigation. To date, research on high standards reforms has focused on adults, not students, and has offered insights about the myriad instructional changes teachers must make and the complex decisions with which they must contend to translate policy into on the ground practice, but it has not offered policy makers analyses of how students perceive and engage with these policies.