| This qualitative study is an examination of collaborative business-school partnership programs targeted to students at risk of dropping out of school. The thesis of the study is that attention to change process is crucial. It is important to know, for example, why a particular innovation spreads rapidly or slowly, what causes of resistance to change in educational systems are, and why particular strategies of change chosen by innovators succeed or fail. Three factors appear to contribute to the perceived integration of the four partnerships reviewed for this study: designation of a director or coordinator charged with overseeing the program and coordinating the public and private sector partners; administrative assurance of the requisite conditions and resources necessary for implementation; and development of processes for feedback and input for planning and implementation.;A conceptual model developed from the literature of organizational change framed the study and focused interviews with key respondents from four business education partnerships. Programs from urban, suburban, and rural settings and at different stages of integration were studied. The study examines program characteristics, host organization characteristics, the adopting decision, the transformation process, and perceived outcomes, both anticipated and unanticipated.;Although the qualitative methods used in the study limited the sample, reliability was addressed by the use of multiple respondents from multiple program sites. Even with its limitations, the study is an important step in discovering the various attitudinal, situational, and environmental factors that impinge upon business-school partnerships and the complex processes that precipitate human interaction and organizational change. |
