This thesis presents a case study of how curriculum differentiation operates at Lincoln High School, an urban public school in the Midwestern United States with a highly regarded International Baccalaureate (IB) program. I use a mix of qualitative and quantitative methods to investigate the systems of beliefs and practices that structure Lincoln's tracking system. Like many American high schools, Lincoln has rejected the traditional practice of assigning all students to overarching curriculum 'tracks' on the basis of their measured aptitude, instead allowing students to choose between courses covering different content at different levels of difficulty in most academic subjects. The school thus offers an excellent opportunity to examine within-school stratification in light of the declining popularity of traditional tracking and the increasing degree to which students control their own coursetaking. Within-school stratification is particularly worthy of continued attention because it qualifies the mythology of the American dream, which holds that schools give students from all backgrounds an opportunity to achieve upward social mobility. I use interviews, observations, and document analysis to explore how curriculum differentiation structures academic and social hierarchies at Lincoln, what teachers and students believe about how to achieve school success and upward mobility, and how Lincoln reconciles its egalitarian ideals with the continued existence of de facto tracking. I argue that Lincoln's approach to curriculum differentiation strikes a tenuous balance between academic excellence and equity for all students. Although student choice dominates the course scheduling process, Lincoln's curriculum still bears many of the hallmarks of tracking: the IB structures a clear academic and social hierarchy of courses, and students tend to follow predictable patterns of coursetaking within each subject, with few opportunities for upward mobility. Nonetheless, teachers and students almost unanimously subscribe to the local achievement ideology, which holds that any student, regardless of prior academic achievement, can and should participate in the IB as long as he or she is willing to work hard. This radical promise of equal opportunity allows participants to characterize Lincoln as a force for equality and social justice. However, the school's continued reliance on sorting its students, even in the face of evidence that tracking reproduces racial and class inequalities, suggests that the achievement ideology serves primarily to legitimate stratification, not to undo it. These findings have important ramifications for research in tracking, detracking, and stratification, and for practice in all schools seeking to negotiate the tension between excellence and equity.

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South African learners’ poor performance in general, and in the national matriculation examinations, has necessitated the introduction of various curriculum implementation improvement programmes in the country. The Jika iMfundo Programme (JiP) is a campaign of the Programme to Improve Learning Outcomes (PILO) that was piloted, on scale, in two districts of KwaZulu-Natal (KZN), South Africa, in 2014, to improve the learning outcomes in the province by supporting educators and school managers to improve curriculum coverage and implementation. This study employs a constructivist worldview to explore the experiences of educators and school managers in the King Cetshwayo District of KZN with the implementation of the JiP. The study addresses the issues of the preparation of stakeholders for curriculum change, the challenges experienced in implementing the programme and the adequacy of resources and support that are required to implement the JiP. A qualitative approach, and a multi-case study design involving nine educators, three department heads and three principals, to investigate the key research questions within three primary schools in the King Cetshwayo District were adopted. The educators were all teachers of mathematics from grades 1-7 and were purposively selected as respondents. Data were elicited through semistructured, one-on-one interviews, document analysis and observations. Since the data represented the perspective of individuals, data analysis was descriptive and interpretive in nature and was reported under pre-set and emergent themes. The main finding from the study is that, although the majority of educators and managers have a positive attitude towards the programme and are utilising the knowledge and skills attained through the training, the resources and support provided to implement the programme, the following factors inhibit efficacious implementation: lack of consultation, inadequate training, lack of sufficient learner resources, inadequate support from schools and the district and the fast pace and organisation of the mathematics curriculum. School contextual factors also affect the implementation of revised curriculum. Other factors like inadequate or non-reflection by educators on their curriculum coverage and insufficient opportunities for conversation around curriculum coverage at schools were also identified by the researcher as areas needing attention. Consultation with educators on future educational changes, more frequent training sessions, the provision of adequate learner resources, reduction in class sizes, a review of the mathematics curriculum for the Foundation Phase are some of the recommendations made in the study. / Curriculum and Instructional Studies / D. Ed. (Curriculum Studies)