EDUCATIONAL POLICY / May 2001ANDREW GIT IN Bounding Teacher Decision Making: The Threat of Intensification

One common limitation in most reform efforts is an understanding of the rela-tion among teachers ’ work, decision making, and the construction of school knowledge. This study attempts to fill this gap by examining how critical theo-ries of teachers ’ work both inform and are informed by an analysis of two case study middle schools. Findings from this study suggest that many of the deci-sions that teachers make are based on their attempt to contain the threat of intensification. Such a self-regulatory process shaped decisions in the areas of planning, grading, and classroom management and fostered a defensive form of school knowledge that is fact oriented, routinized, and mundane. Particu-larly troubling is the finding that this defensive form of knowledge was most pronounced in classes with large numbers of students of color. REFORM EFFORTS in recent times have tried any number of strategies to improve schooling. New instructional techniques such as cooperative learn-ing or whole language have been introduced into schools (Finnan, St. John, McCarthy, & Slovacek, 1996; Slavin, 1995). Attempts have been made to shift relations of power toward the school or district site (Malen & Ogawa, 1988; Niemiec & Walbey, 1993). Federal programs have provided monies or set new standards. Partnerships within schools and between schools and uni-versities have been put in place in any number of educational communitie