Superintendent Joe A. Hairston's plan for improving Baltimore County schools, known as the "Blueprint for Progress," has been revised, largely eliminating education jargon while making strategies for improvement more explicit, said school board members, parents, principals and teachers.

Although the various constituencies suggested more improvements to the 24-page document, they praised recent revisions.

The changes follow sharp criticism from the school board, which in September attacked the booklet for technical language and some unrealistic goals. Members also complained that not all strategies and measures of progress lined up with the goals.

But board members sounded positive notes after reviewing the revisions at a meeting Monday night. "I'm just really delighted to see a fleshing out of this document," said Phyllis E. Ettinger, a board member.

James R. Sasiadek, the board's vice president, praised a change that emphasized the importance of involving families and communities in schooling a child. But he said the booklet should include provisions for measuring the achievement of elementary and middle school pupils.

"We have a number of indicators for high school students, but nothing for them," Sasiadek said.

Enacted more than two years ago after Hairston's arrival, the plan required revision this year to accommodate new federal and state laws that required more testing of students and toughened qualifications for teachers.

Hairston's blueprint is available to the public at schools and online at www.bcps.org.

In the case of teacher qualifications, the system's goal -- that every student will be taught by a "highly qualified" teacher by the 2005-2006 school year -- goes well beyond federal mandates. To reach that goal, the draft suggests middle school math teachers must be certified to teach math or score well on tests gauging their mastery of the field.

Currently, some middle school math teachers are certified to teach children through eighth grade, rather than certified to teach math.

Throughout the revised booklet, jargon has been pared down and a glossary has been added to define the few technical terms remaining.

Other changes -- addressing state standards for student achievement -- make explicit Hairston's efforts to make schooling more rigorous. One revision calls for using standardized test scores to make sure students are taking challenging classes.

"There's no question it's a much better document than the previous one," said Mark Beytin, president of the Teachers Association of Baltimore County.

He said it's now easier to see how the system wants to reach its goals, though he said the final draft should do a better job indicating whether the way to measure progress toward those goals is required by federal law, state standards or county standards.

Hairston has championed the "Blueprint for Progress" on his stops around the county, saying its prescriptions for lifting school achievement were ahead of its time.

A work group of 36 school officials, principals, teachers and parents have been meeting to amend the booklet, which will undergo further tweaking in the next few weeks. The public will be able to comment on the changes at the school board's meeting Dec. 3, and the board will vote on the revised version Dec. 17.

Maggie Kennedy, an official with the PTA Council of Baltimore County, applauded the emphasis throughout the revised booklet on involving parents in their children's education. One new measure would give parents and guardians training in helping their children do well in school.

But Kennedy said the "Blueprint for Progress" should focus more on students off the college preparatory track.

"We need to look at what goals we have for those students who do not participate in AP classes, who do not participate in the SATs," she said. "When we're talking about all children, we can't just talk about how we're doing with children going to college."

John Desmone, principal of Timonium Elementary School and president of the association of elementary school principals in the county, praised new provisions emphasizing the roles that support personnel play.

But he said the most positive outcome of the review process is that Hairston's overarching program was not touched.

"The big picture isn't changing," Desmone said.