Publications

March 11, 2020
Editorial

A Bolder Vision for Business Schools

By: P. Tufano

Business schools teach to a model that dates back to the 1950s. Given the growing demands on business to take a lead in confronting societal challenges, business schools need to update how they train business leaders and how they compete, argues Oxford’s Saïd School... View Details

Keywords: Business Schools; Business And Society; Business Education; Leadership Development; Business and Stakeholder Relations

Register to Read

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

November 2013
Case

Canyon-Agassi Investing in Charter Schools

By: Nicolas P. Retsinas, Nicole Shomair, Vernon Beckford and Lisa Strope

After an unusual round of doubles in May 2011, real estate investor Bobby Turner, Managing Partner, Canyon-Agassi Charter School Facilities Fund (CACSFF) and Chairman, CEO, and Co-Founder of Canyon Capital Realty Advisors, found himself at a loss for words. Turner was... View Details

Keywords: Charter Schools; Real Estate; Fund Raising; Social Entrepreneurship; Education; Real Estate Industry; United States

February 2015 (Revised June 2016)
Case

AltSchool: School Reimagined

By: John J-H Kim, Kyla Wilkes and Christine S. An

Max Ventilla and his team launches in 2013 AltSchool, a new network of tech-savvy independent K-8 "micro-schools." AltSchool is born out of Ventilla's frustration with the education options available for his young daughter. During his search, Ventilla comes to the... View Details

Keywords: Education Technology; School Models; Product Development; Entrepreneurship; Talent Development And Retention; Social Impact Investment; Information Technology; Business Model; Education; Business Startups; Customization and Personalization; Growth and Development Strategy; Education Industry; United States

Fall 1997
Article

Little Machines in Their Gardens: A History of School Gardens in America, 1891 to 1920

By: Brian Trelstad

“Little Machines in their Gardens: A History of School Gardens in America, 1891 to 1920” explores the rise and decline of the school garden movement in the United States. The paper first documents the early history of the gardens and establishes them as a national... View Details

Keywords: School Garden Movement; United States

2017
Case

Uncommon Schools (A): A Network of Networks

By: John J-H Kim and Sarah McAra

In 2013, Brett Peiser, CEO of the charter school management organization (CMO) Uncommon Schools, is reassessing the nonprofit’s strategy. For nearly 10 years, Uncommon had fulfilled its mission to bring high-quality education to students in low-income, urban areas... View Details

Keywords: Charter Schools; Nonprofit Organizations; Teaching; Talent Management; Innovation; Organization Structure; Education; Early Childhood Education; Middle School Education; Organizational Structure; Performance Consistency; Strategy; Collaborative Innovation and Invention; Education Industry

2021
Working Paper

Pandemic Schooling Mode and Student Test Scores: Evidence from U.S. States

By: Clare Halloran, Rebecca Jack, James C. Okun and Emily Oster

We estimate the impact of district-level schooling mode (in-person versus hybrid or distance learning) on test scores. We combine Spring 2021 state standardized test score data with comprehensive data on schooling in the 2020-21 school year across 12 states. We find... View Details

Keywords: COVID-19 Pandemic; In-person Schooling; Distance Learning; Outcomes Measurement; Health Pandemics; Education; Performance Evaluation

2017
Supplement

Uncommon Schools (B): Seeking Excellence at Scale through Standardized Practice

By: John J-H Kim and Sarah McAra

The (B) case provides an update to the (A) case by illustrating how charter school management organization Uncommon Schools responded to the disparity in its students’ 2013 standardized test results. In 2015, CEO Brett Peiser and his management team decided to align... View Details

Keywords: Charter Schools; Nonprofit Organizations; Strategy; Teaching; Talent And Talent Management; Innovation; Education; Early Childhood Education; Middle School Education; Organizational Structure; Performance Consistency; Growth and Development Strategy; Innovation and Invention; Education Industry

Article

Health Equity, Schooling Hesitancy, and the Social Determinants of Learning

By: Meira Levinson, Alan C. Geller, Joseph G. Allen and John D. Macomber

At least 62 million K-12 students in North America—disproportionately low-income children of color— have been physically out of school for over a year due to the COVID-19 pandemic. These children are at risk of significant academic, social, mental, and physical harm... View Details

Keywords: COVID-19; Public Health; Air Quality; Social Determinants Of Health; Schooling Hesitancy; Vaccine Hesitancy; Racial Injustice; Inequity; Inequality; Health Pandemics; Education; Health Care and Treatment; Policy; Race; Equality and Inequality

February 2008 (Revised March 2008)
Case

Harvard Business School

By: Srikant M. Datar, David A. Garvin and Carin-Isabel Knoop

In 2008 the Boston-based Harvard Business School would turn 100. As the centennial year began, the HBS community and leadership were reflecting on how the School might fulfill its mission to "develop business leaders who make a difference in the world" in the next... View Details

Keywords: Business Education; Cases; Leadership Development; Management; Management Skills; Organizational Change and Adaptation; Planning; Problems and Challenges; Segmentation; Education Industry

February 2023
Case

Success Academy Charter Schools

By: Robin Greenwood, Joshua D. Coval, Denise Han, Ruth Page and Dave Habeeb

This stand-alone multimedia case follows the story of Eva Moskowitz and Success Academy, a network of high-performing charter schools in New York City. As a New York City councilor between 1999 and 2006, Moskowitz became frustrated over the inertia and dysfunction in... View Details

Keywords: Business and Government Relations; Performance Effectiveness; Equality and Inequality; Private Sector; Education Industry; New York (city, NY)

August 2010
Article

Sell-Side School Ties

By: Lauren H. Cohen, Christopher J. Malloy and Andrea Frazzini

We study the impact of social networks on agents' ability to gather superior information about firms. Exploiting novel data on the educational backgrounds of sell-side equity analysts and senior officers of firms, we test the hypothesis that analysts' school ties to... View Details

Keywords: Investment Return; Investment Portfolio; Corporate Disclosure; Governing Rules, Regulations, and Reforms; Knowledge Acquisition; Social and Collaborative Networks

February 2020
Case

Bill Riddick and the Durham S.O.S. Charrette

By: Francesca Gino and Jeffrey Huizinga

Bill Riddick employs the charrette process to help black and white community leaders overcome differences and desegregate local schools in Durham, North Carolina. View Details

Keywords: Charrette; Schools; Desegregation; Education; Social Issues; Race; Leading Change; History; Durham; North Carolina

February 2004
Case

Aspire Public Schools

Set in the fall of 2003, covers managerial challenges facing the CEO and COO of Aspire Public Schools, a nonprofit charter school management company. In operation since 1999 and funded by prominent national foundations and venture philanthropies, Aspire operates 10... View Details

Keywords: Business Model; Business or Company Management; Expansion; Social Entrepreneurship; Education; Education Industry; California

June 2003
Case

Memphis City Schools

By: Rosabeth M. Kanter and Kevin Morris

Associate Superintendent Marieta Harris needs a plan for continuing the momentum of systemic change in this urban school district while facing shifts of leadership and curriculum philosophy, uneven progress on reforms, new tests that put a high proportion of schools on... View Details

Keywords: Curriculum and Courses; Leading Change; Transition; Education Industry

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

Register to Read

June 2003 (Revised September 2003)
Case

Peabody Elementary School (B)

By: Rosabeth M. Kanter and Kevin Morris

After six months as principal of the school, Marty Pettigrew has commenced a series of reform initiatives to improve its academic performance and culture. As the school year ends, he must assess his progress and decide on his strategies for the following year. He... View Details

Keywords: Governing Rules, Regulations, and Reforms; Performance Improvement; Middle School Education; Personal Development and Career; Strategy; Education Industry

March 2018
Case

Summit Public Schools (A)

By: John J-H Kim and Aldo Sesia

Summit Public Schools was a very successful charter management organization with schools in California and Washington State. The students came from a variety of socioeconomic backgrounds, many from economically disadvantaged households. While nearly all of its students... View Details

Keywords: K-12; Online Learning; Virtual Learning; Blended Learning; Secondary Education; Middle School Education; Early Childhood Education; Learning; Business Model; Performance Improvement; Technology

January 2017
Case

Flatiron School

By: Thomas Eisenmann and Halah AlQahtani

In late 2016, the founders of Flatiron School, a startup offering 12-week coding bootcamps, are formulating their growth strategy. Their new online-only program has matched the excellent job placement results for their in-person bootcamps. Should Flatiron shift... View Details

Keywords: Scaling Start-ups; Growth Strategy; Entrepreneurship; Distribution Channels; Growth and Development Strategy; Internet and the Web; Business Startups; Diversification; Expansion; Education Industry; United States