The Coalition of Essential Schools (CES) is a California-based organization that was created to promote a kind of educational reform that is demonstrated by small and personalized learning environments. In creating and sustaining fair, intellectually stimulating, and personalized schools, the organization foresees making these schools the norm of public education in the United States.

The history of the Coalition dates back to 1984 when founder Ted Sizer published a book called Horace’s Compromise. It outlined the findings of a 5-year study conducted by Sizer and his colleagues, expressing that even with differences in location and demography, American high schools are generally dull, similar and inadequate. As a result, Sizer devised a clever design of how schools should be by defining a general set of common principles upon which a school can be guided. In favor of redesigning themselves based on the ideas laid down by Sizer, a group of 11 schools formed the Coalition of Essential Schools in 1984 which now has 600 formal members and over 2 dozen Affiliate Centers that work to serve students from pre-kindergarten through high school.

The Common Principles that form the foundation of the Coalition include:

• Learning to use one’s mind well;
• Less is more, depth over coverage;
• Personalization;
• Goals apply to all students;
• A tone of decency and trust;
• Student-as-worker, teacher-as-coach;
• Commitment to the entire school;
• Resources dedicated to teaching and learning;
• Demonstration of mastery; and
• Democracy and equity.

The Coalition currently runs the CES Small School Project that is supported by a grant from the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation. The project is a 5-year initiative aimed at creating a strong network of 23 CES Mentor High Schools to help support the creation of new small schools; converting 2 large high schools into 8 new CES small schools; developing CES ChangeLab, an online resource that provides a behind-the-scenes look at every school; and creating a “Mentor Schools Guide” that would document the school-to-school mentoring approach.

Moreover, CES provides other tools and resources such as its quarterly journal Horace and the website EssentialAnalysis.org.