The second edition of this comprehensive text once again encourages future educational leaders to be proactive rather than reactive, and equips them with an understanding of educational policy and the important political theories upon which it is based. Coverage not only addresses theory, analysis, development, and implementation of educational policy, but also explores the reasons for change in educational policy, ways to track its evolution, and techniques for influencing its ultimate destination. Finally, it wraps up with a look at the history of educational policy that helps put everything that has come before into an understandable context.