Do students who attend restructured high schools learn more? Is learning in these schools equal for students of different social groups? This distinctive volume is the first to explore these questions using data from a large (over 800 private and public schools) national survey. Demonstrating empirical links to achievement, this book investigates how restructuring relates to such organizational and structural properties of schools as their size, the curriculum, instruction, their teachers' attitudes toward students, and how they press their students to work hard and succeed. Going beyond any existing work on this topic, Restructuring High Schools for Equity and Excellence demystifies the statistical analyses to draw implications and make recommendations for school reform and school policy.

The authors examine a broad range of Catholic high schools to determine whether or not students are better educated in these schools than they are in public schools. They find that the Catholic schools do have an independent effect on achievement, especially in reducing disparities between disadvantaged and privileged students. The Catholic school of today, they show, is informed by a vision, similar to that of John Dewey, of the school as a community committed to democratic education and the common good of all students.