Unfinished Business: A Regional Education Laboratory Retrospective on School Improvement is authored by education professionals formerly employed at SERVE, one of the ten US federally funded education research and development laboratories. SERVE’S region included the following southeastern states: Alabama, Florida, Georgia, Mississippi, North Carolina, and South Carolina. The school improvement recollections found in this book are supported by contemporaneous data collected for research and evaluation as well as literature, interviews and evidence from former clients and collaborators. Each of the chapter authors wrote about a school improvement initiative in which they led or participated in developing.

Compared to the other nine labs, SERVE was heavily field based. SERVE’s projects and publications focused on school improvement, research, policy, and professional development. The work was typically launched in a spirit best described as emergent design. Building on extant research and best practice, potential clients across the six-state region were approached with ideas for educational interventions and evidence to support theories of action.

It is underscored that improving America’s public schools, teachers and school administrators is a continuous process involving difficult work. It is hoped that this book will offer suggestions to educators about how to implement school improvement, including what works and what doesn’t, and how initiatives can evolve positively over time.