Many factors complicate the education of urban students. Among them have been issues related to population density; racial, ethnic, cultural, and linguistic diversity; poverty; racism (individual and institutional); and funding levels. Although urban educators have been addressing these issues for decades, placing them under the umbrella of "urban education" and treating them as a specific area of practice and inquiry is relatively recent. Despite the wide adoption of the term a consensus about its meaning exists at only the broadest of levels. In short, urban education remains an ill-defined concept. This comprehensive volume addresses this definitional challenge and provides a 3-part conceptual model in which the achievement of equity for all -- regardless of race, gender, or ethnicity - is an ideal that is central to urban education. The model also posits that effective urban education requires attention to the three central issues that confronts all education systems (a) accountability of individuals and the institutions in which they work, (b) leadership, which occurs in multiple ways and at multiple levels, and (c) learning, which is the raison d'etre of education. Just as a three-legged stool would fall if any one leg were weak or missing, each of these areas is essential to effective urban education and affects the others.

Many factors complicate the education of urban students. Among them have been issues related to population density; racial, ethnic, cultural, and linguistic diversity; poverty; racism (individual and institutional); and funding levels. Although urban educators have been addressing these issues for decades, placing them under the umbrella of "urban education" and treating them as a specific area of practice and inquiry is relatively recent. Despite the wide adoption of the term a consensus about its meaning exists at only the broadest of levels. In short, urban education remains an ill-defined concept. This comprehensive volume addresses this definitional challenge and provides a 3-part conceptual model in which the achievement of equity for all -- regardless of race, gender, or ethnicity - is an ideal that is central to urban education. The model also posits that effective urban education requires attention to the three central issues that confronts all education systems (a) accountability of individuals and the institutions in which they work, (b) leadership, which occurs in multiple ways and at multiple levels, and (c) learning, which is the raison d'etre of education. Just as a three-legged stool would fall if any one leg were weak or missing, each of these areas is essential to effective urban education and affects the others.

This book discusses methods, outcomes and future directions in psychotherapy. Chapter One studies phenomenological hermeneutics psychotherapy. Chapter Two provides an essential understanding of sexual issues so therapists can confidently address problems with both knowledge and strategies that help individuals and/or couples overcome sexual difficulties. Chapter Three explores the emotional needs of people with intellectual disabilities, looking at methods for identifying the issues and ways of working to enable progress to be made. Chapter Four explores the experience of the future because without a sense of the future, patients cannot move forward psychologically. The remaining chapters are dedicated to the work of Habib Davanloo, MD, Professor Emeritus of Psychiatry at McGill University. The authors in this special section are all current or recent past members of Davanloos Closed-Circuit Experiential Training Workshops in Major Mobilization of the Unconscious and ISTDP, and have presented at one or more of the last several of Davanloos annual audio-visual symposia on the metapsychology of the unconscious. All four authors acknowledge a deep sense of gratitude to Dr. Davanloo for his generous sharing of his discoveries and insights, and his tireless teaching. The theoretical concepts presented in these chapters including the terminology such as Mobilization of the Unconscious, Transference Component of the Resistance, Complex Transference Feeling, Unconscious Therapeutic Alliance, Central Dynamic Sequence, Perpetrator of the Unconscious, Fusion of Primitive Murderous Rage with Guilt and Sexuality, Intergenerational Destructive Competitive Transference Neurosis, Uplifting the Transference Neurosis, Unlocking the Unconscious, and others, are not the authors own. They were developed by Dr. Davanloo by over 50 years of systematic clinical research. Each author, through their many years of involvement in Davanloos programs brings their own unique synthesis of his teaching. The chapters will review the historical development of Davanloos ideas and techniques and then will focus on his recent work in Transference Neurosis. The Experiential Training Workshops have provided a laboratory for Dr. Davanloo and the Trainees to get a unique perspective on the Metapsychology of the Unconscious, Unconscious Resistance, Fusion and the various forms of Transference Neurosis. These topics will be elucidated further. It is the hope of the authors, that by the end of this special section, the reader will have a broader understanding of Davanloos Metapsychology of the Unconscious and of the concept of Transference Neurosis. Further, they hope that their offerings will be useful to psychotherapist of any orientation, to short-term dynamic psychotherapists, and to Davanloos Intensive Short-Term Dynamic Psychotherapy (DISTDP) therapists specifically as it applies to their most challenging cases.

How can public schools be improved? One radical solution that has been proposed is to provide parents with a voucher for a specified dollar amount for use at any public or private school (both religious and non-religious). Proponents argue that those children using the voucher would be able to attend more effective and efficient private schools, and that the loss of students (and revenue) to public schools would force them to respond by improving their programmes. Everyone would then be better off. In what has become a fiercely contentious and highly political debate opponents claim that moving to such a voucher system on a large scale would destroy public schools and exacerbate inequities in student outcomes by class and race/ethnicity. Both sides use research evidence from a small number of voucher experiments, and other sources, to bolster their claims. In this RAND Education book, the authors take a hard look at the evidence on vouchers in education. They consider what we know and what we would like to know more about: how vouchers would affect the academic achievement of participating and non-participating students, which students might use vouchers, who would supply and regulate schooling under a voucher system, and how much a voucher system would cost. After an exhaustive and critical review, the authors conclude that the evidence for many of the positions taken by either side in the debate is remarkably weak. For example, there is little rigorous empirical analysis that suggests public schools do any better job than private schools in promoting civic values or racial/ethnic integration, and that moving to a voucher system would have disastrous consequences. However, the evidence on the positive effects of vouchers on participating students is modest at best, and there is almost no grounded analysis of the key policy questions that policymakers need to consider before moving to a large-scale voucher experiment. This book should be a useful, unbiased primer for all those interested in this controversial topic.