INTRODUCTION

"Will you accept us?" the shop teacher asked. The question stung. The teachers in the academic departments knew what he meant but cared not to address it.

The mathematics teacher: "You'll have to knock some of the rust off your math. But you can teach us a lot about how to teach. We talk too much. You give the kids the tasks. . . . You know about Exhibitions. We have much to learn from each other. . . . We have some rust to knock off too, and learn some new ways of teaching . . . from you." No one followed; the subject was painful. The committee's drift toward a program focusing on the traditional intellectual areas of the curriculum--for all students--obviously threatened some of the teachers of vocational courses.

--from T. R. Sizer (1992), Horace's School, pp. 137-138

Perhaps nowhere can the rift between academic and vocational secondary education be viewed in starker relief than in the reform movements associated with each. Within traditional, comprehensive high schools engaged in such multiple reform efforts, work around these initiatives can create an arena for clashing ideologies and interests that end up emphasizing differences rather than looking for commonalties; competing for the limited time and energies of participants; and, as illustrated in the above quote, assigning (even if only implicitly) centrality, value, and worth to some while marginalizing others.

Fairly or unfairly, and for a number of reasons, some of which are explored in this paper, the Coalition of Essential Schools (and later the national Re: Learning Project co-sponsored by the Coalition and The Education Commission of the States in 1989) has largely been associated with the academic side of secondary education reform. The changes advocated for schools were to be systemic, schoolwide, and predicated upon the nine common principles which encapsulate the philosophic imperatives and beliefs of the Coalition. The principles were then to be interpreted at the individual school level in accordance with the school's particular context and understanding to guide the school's change effort.

Briefly, the nine common principles pertain to the following:

1. The school should focus on helping students learn to use their minds well. It should not attempt to be comprehensive at the expense of its central intellectual purpose.
   
2. The school's goals should be simple: that each student master a limited number of essential skills and areas of knowledge.
   
3. The school's goals should apply to all students although the means to the goals will vary as those students themselves vary.
   
4. Teaching and learning should be personalized to the maximum extent feasible. To that end, a goal of no more than 80 students per teacher should be vigorously pursued, and decisions about curriculum, allocation of time, and choice of teaching materials and their presentation must rest unreservedly with the school's principal and staff.
   
5. The governing metaphor of the school should be student-as-worker, teacher-as-coach, rather than the more traditional teacher-as-deliverer-of-instructional services.
   
6. The diploma should be awarded upon a successful final demonstration of mastery--an exhibition--of the central skills and knowledge of the school's program.
   
7. The tone of the school should explicitly and self-consciously stress values of unanxious expectation ("I won't threaten you, but I expect much of you."), of trust (until abused), and of decency (fairness, generosity, and tolerance).
   
8. The principal and teachers should see themselves as generalists first (teachers and scholars in general education) and specialists second (experts in one particular discipline).
   
9. Ultimate administrative and budget target should be a per-pupil cost of no more than 10% above that of traditional schools. Inevitably, this will require the phased reduction of some services provided in many comprehensive secondary schools.

Within basically the same time frame and in some of the same schools, a second initiative aimed at changing the conceptualization and organization of vocational education entered the scene. Funded by the federal Carl D. Perkins Vocational and Applied Technology Act of 1990 and referred to as Tech Prep or school-to-work programs, these reform initiatives were broadly conceptualized to guide high school students to courses which would prepare them with the necessary academic and technological skills to pursue postsecondary education at least to an associate degree level. More specifically, these reforms addressed four imperatives: (1) bring a career focus to secondary school curriculum; (2) achieve an integrated secondary school curriculum, especially vocational and academic skills; (3) provide services to special needs students; and (4) build from collaborative planning processes that involve students, parents, community and business representatives, as well as school staff. Like the essential school initiative, these vocational education reforms also called for a serious reconsideration of the work of secondary schools and for fundamental and schoolwide changes, especially in the areas of pedagogy (curriculum/instruction) and school organization (governance/structure).

While there has been a good deal of research that has focused on essential school initiatives and changes in vocational education, there is little evidence of any attempts to examine these two important initiatives in tandem. Vocational education and Tech Prep have largely remained the province of those most interested in one set of issues; essential schools are the property of an entirely different group of researchers. Because of this schism, there is a paucity of field-based, empirical research that examines both reforms as embedded in the context of traditional, comprehensive high schools. Specifically, little is yet known about how one reform coming on the heels of another reform and both aimed at substantive, whole-school change interact within these institutions and the consequences one may hold for the other. Consequently, the "thick descriptions" necessary for understanding the complex and interactive nature of school change processes and the hard data needed for informed decisionmaking in policy areas affecting schools are notably lacking.

This study examines two traditional, comprehensive high schools, both of which have been involved with the school restructuring efforts advocated by the Coalition and the state Re: Learning Project's organization, the Illinois Alliance of Essential Schools (referred to in this report as the Alliance), since 1989. Shortly after this commitment to essential school activities, the schools also became involved in the series of vocational education reforms loosely referred to as Tech Prep. Both schools continued to participate in both essential school and vocational education/Tech Prep initiatives for the duration of this study.