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Reforming instruction is challenging. In this comparative case study of 12 school districts, we investigated the dilemmas that emerged for system leaders as they engaged in system building for elementary science and the approaches leaders took in managing them. We found that system leaders’ efforts to man- age their environments contributed to the preferential treatment of literacy and mathematics relative to science. Leaders managed this dilemma using three strategies: (a) integration of science with other subjects, (b) specialization of teachers, and (c) adopting curriculum materials. This study contrib- utes to literature on dilemma management by showing that dilemmas in education system building are school-subject sensitive, emerge in relation to system building for other subjects, and are embedded in school and education systems’ structural/organizational arrangements. 

Science in the elementary grades is often deprioritized in comparison to ELA and mathematics. We wondered, how comprehensively, frequently, and consistently is science in elementary schools’ schedules? In this study, we reviewed daily schedules for 14 schools in 9 districts across the U.S. to qualitatively examine how science is represented on the daily instructional schedule. These schools were selected as “best case scenarios” recommended by district or state science leaders as places where science is taken seriously. We complement these schedule data with data from 21 interviews with teachers, science specialists, and school leaders to better understand how science actually appears in children’s daily instructional experiences. Our findings suggest that, in these schools, science is taught comprehensively (though not as comprehensively as ELA or mathematics), has the potential for being taught frequently (even in the lower elementary grades), and is taught somewhat consistently (albeit usually in some kind of rotation with social studies). The paper closes with implications for how school schedules could be crafted to make science comprehensive, frequent, and consistent, as well as some pitfalls that could be avoided as schedules are developed.