Schools as developmental contexts during adolescence

Considerable strides have been made in the past decade in recognizing the centrality of the cultural context of schooling to adolescent development. In this review, adopting a developmental systems conceptualization of schooling, we focus on selected new research findings from the past decade regarding how (a) teachers, curricular tasks, and classroom environments; (b) aspects of the school as an organization; and (c) district policies and practices can play an instrumental role in adolescents' intellectual and social-emotional development.