Publications

June 2003
Case

Peabody Elementary School (A)

By: Rosabeth M. Kanter and Kevin Morris

A new principal, Marty Pettigrew, has just joined this inner-city optional school--which offers special programs in international studies to attract children from all over the city. Entering mid-way through the school year, he observes a number of areas of concern,... View Details

Keywords: Change Management; Leading Change; Early Childhood Education; Education Industry

December 2022 (Revised February 2023)
Case

Daniel Defense: Responding to the Shooting at the Robb Elementary School in Uvalde, TX

By: Benjamin C. Esty and Daniel Fisher

At 11:33am on May 24, 2022, an 18-year-old man from Uvalde, Texas walked into the Robb Elementary School carrying a semi-automatic "AR-15-style” rifle manufactured by Daniel Defense and killed 19 children and two adults. Three days later, Representative Carolyn Maloney... View Details

Keywords: Gun Violence; Gun Policy; Second Amendment; Legal Liability; Government Legislation; Marketing Strategy; Business or Company Management; Product Marketing; Ethics; Corporate Accountability; Corporate Social Responsibility and Impact; Moral Sensibility; Crime and Corruption; Governing Rules, Regulations, and Reforms; Manufacturing Industry; Advertising Industry; United States

February 2014 (Revised March 2022)
Case

School Specialty, Inc.

By: Stuart C. Gilson and Kristin Mugford

Set in 2013, School Specialty was a financially troubled supplier of educational products to primary and secondary schools in the United States. The company planned to file Chapter 11 in order to address its excessive debt load, but needed to arrange... View Details

Keywords: School Specialty; Bankruptcy; Section 363; Financing; Chapter 11; Capital Structure; Financing and Loans; Insolvency and Bankruptcy; Distribution Industry; Education Industry; United States

2012
Working Paper

Colonial Institutions, Trade Shocks, and the Diffusion of Elementary Education in Brazil, 1889–1930

By: Aldo Musacchio, Andre Martinez-Fritscher and Martina Viarengo

In this paper, we examine the role of trade shocks in promoting the diffusion of elementary education in subnational units in Brazil during a period (1889–1930) in which they had relative financial autonomy to collect export taxes and spend on public goods. The... View Details

Keywords: History; Literacy; Voting; Education; Spending; Performance Improvement; Government and Politics; Brazil

SSRN

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Research Links: Secondary Sources - Railroads and the Transformation of Capitalism | Harvard Business School

HBS Quick Links MBA Executive Education Doctoral Programs Faculty and Research Alumni HBS Publishing Site Index HBS Home Contact Us Map/Directions Railroads: The Transformation of Capitalism Introduction The Pre-Industrial Era The First... View Details

15 Sep 2010
News

A Model for Free Schools in Britain

Keywords: charter schools; Elementary and Secondary Schools; Elementary and Secondary Schools

September 2014
Article

Colonial Institutions, Trade Stocks, and the Diffusion of Elementary Education in Brazil, 1889–1930

By: Aldo Musacchio, Andre C. Martinez Fritscher and Martina Viarengo

We show how the decentralization of fiscal responsibility among Brazilian states between 1889 and 1930 promoted an unequal expansion of public schooling. We document how the variation in state export tax revenues, product of commodity booms, explains improvements in... View Details

Keywords: Institutions; Economic History; Education; Development Economics; Policy; Brazil

01 Jun 2013
News

Can Business Smarts Save the Charter School Revolution?

Recovery and Reinvestment Act, with a Race to the Top competition that promised more than $4 billion in stimulus money for states that—among other reforms—heeded the call to establish what the President referred to as "laboratories of... View Details

Keywords: David McKay Wilson; charter schools; Elementary and Secondary Schools; Elementary and Secondary Schools

2011
Working Paper

Big BRICs, Weak Foundations: The Beginning of Public Elementary Education in Brazil, Russia, India, and China

By: Latika Chaudhary, Aldo Musacchio, Steven Nafziger and Se Yan

Our paper provides a comparative perspective on the development of public primary education in four of the largest developing economies circa 1910: Brazil, Russia, India and China (BRIC). These four countries encompassed more than 50 percent of the world's population... View Details

Keywords: Developing Countries and Economies; Economic Growth; Early Childhood Education; Government and Politics; Wealth and Poverty; China; India; Russia; Brazil

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06 Mar 2012
Working Paper Summaries

Big BRICs, Weak Foundations: The Beginning of Public Elementary Education in Brazil, Russia, India, and China

Keywords: by Latika Chaudhary, Aldo Musacchio, Steven Nafziger & Se Yan; Education

April 2012
Article

Big BRICs, Weak Foundations: The Beginning of Public Elementary Education in Brazil, Russia, India, and China

By: Latika Chaudhary, Aldo Musacchio, Steven Nafziger and Se Yan

Our paper provides a comparative perspective on the development of public primary education in four of the largest developing economies circa 1910: Brazil, Russia, India, and China (BRIC). These four countries encompassed more than 50% of the world's population in... View Details

Keywords: Perspective; Growth and Development; Middle School Education; Developing Countries and Economies; Data and Data Sets; Geographic Location; Public Administration Industry; Brazil; Russia; India; China

2012
Working Paper

Big BRICs, Weak Foundations: The Beginning of Public Elementary Education in Brazil, Russia, India, and China

By: Latika Chaudhary, Aldo Musacchio, Steven Nafziger and Se Yan

Our paper provides a comparative perspective on the development of public primary education in four of the largest developing economies circa 1910: Brazil, Russia, India and China (BRIC). These four countries encompassed more than 50% of the world's population in 1910,... View Details

Keywords: History; Middle School Education; Data and Data Sets; Residency; Integration; Perspective; Surveys; Geographic Location; Welfare or Wellbeing; Government and Politics; Developing Countries and Economies; Growth and Development; China; India; Brazil; Russia

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Buy Now, Pay Later: Research Links - Secondary Resources

Manuscript Collections Printed Collections Visual Collections Secondary Resources Credits Bacheller, Irving. Keeping up with Lizzie; Charge It (New York: Harper & Brothers, 1911 and 1912). Full text... View Details

July 2001
Case

Bobbie D'Alessandro and the Redesign of the Cambridge Rindge and Latin School

By: Linda A. Hill, Kristin Doughty and Ellen Pruyne

Bobbi D'Alessandro, the superintendent of the school system in Cambridge, MA, has just hired a new principal to lead a major redesign effort in the city's only high school. The need for reform had been evident since the late 1980s when school statistics highlighted... View Details

Keywords: Problems and Challenges; Business and Stakeholder Relations; Performance Improvement; Change Management; Secondary Education; Selection and Staffing; Leading Change; Education Industry; Cambridge

2016
Case

Denver Public Schools 2015: Innovation and Performance?

By: Michael Tushman, Colin Maclay and Kerry Herman

Keywords: Innovation; Education Reform; Education; Secondary Education; Middle School Education; Early Childhood Education; Innovation Strategy; Education Industry; Colorado

01 Jun 2014
News

School Ties

largest school districts in the country, the survey found that business is involved in 95 percent of America's school districts, but mostly in a fragmented array of efforts that focus on short-term benefits... View Details

Keywords: Garry Emmons; Elementary and Secondary Schools; Elementary and Secondary Schools

School Specialty Inc. (HBS Case #214084)

(With Kristin Mugford) Set in 2013, School Specialty was a financially troubled supplier of educational products to primary and secondary schools in the United States. The company planned to file Chapter 11 in order to address its excessive debt load, but needed to... View Details

July 2001
Case

Paula Evans and the Redesign of the Cambridge Rindge and Latin School (A)

By: Linda A. Hill, Kristin Doughty and Ellen Pruyne

Paula Evans is in her second year as principal of the only high school in Cambridge, MA. Her mandate when she arrived was to redesign the high school so that long-standing inequities in academic achievement rates across race and socioeconomic class were removed. In her... View Details

Keywords: Problems and Challenges; Organizational Change and Adaptation; Change Management; Strategy; Secondary Education; Restructuring; Leadership; Conflict Management; Education Industry; Cambridge

March–April 2022
Article

School Choice in Chile

By: Jose Correa, Natalie Epstein, Rafael Epstein, Juan Escobar, Ignacio Rios, Nicolas Aramayo, Bastian Bahamondes, Carlos Bonet, Martin Castillo, Andres Cristi, Boris Epstein and Felipe Subiabre

Centralized school admission mechanisms are an attractive way of improving social welfare and fairness in large educational systems. In this paper, we report the design and implementation of the newly established school choice system in Chile, where over 274,000... View Details

Keywords: Early Childhood Education; Secondary Education; Middle School Education; Family and Family Relationships; Welfare; Chile