Agenda for Change / Update!

Agencies seize opportunity to pitch new plans

For the first time in 10 years, United Way is opening up the funding process and encouraging area agencies to consider ways to better partner with the organization to make a stronger long-term impact on lives across the tri-county area.

The newly established process for 2008-2011 agency applications will allow unaffiliated organizations the opportunity to become United Way partners. This is part of United Way's overall effort to direct community resources in areas of the greatest need.

The new multi-year funding process will focus on programs, services, strategies and collaborations that will address short and long-term goals in three specific areas - educational preparedness, financial stability and basic needs, as outlined in the organization's Agenda for Change.

Current member agencies and those looking to form United Way partnerships based on programs that align with one or more of the priority areas were invited to complete a letter of intent in September. The review of those LOIs will conclude Oct. 5. Applicants will be notified during the week of Oct. 8 if their submissions made it to the next phase, during which they are asked to respond to a request for proposal.

Those current partners not selected for the RFP phase will be directed to the transitional funding process.

While United Way will continue to significantly invest in a wide array of agency programs and services, funding will primarily be focused on achieving Agenda outcomes. The funding system further supports the Agenda for Change, which serves as the United Way blueprint for creating sustained community change that measurably improves people's lives.

"The decision to realign our funding process was driven by our region's growing socioeconomic and human service needs," said Michael J. Brennan, President and CEO of United Way for Southeastern Michigan. "We know that today's issues are far too complex for any individual, group, or institution to tackle alone. We must work together and bring new groups into the fold. It is only through community building and regional collaboration that we will effect lasting change."

For more information about the LOI/Agenda for Change process (including guidelines, technical assistance sessions, and application deadlines), visit www.uwsem.org/partnertools.

Alignment ot OUR Purpose!

Ford likes the look of proposed contract


Chairman says automaker interested in health care fund


October 4, 2007

BY SARAH A. WEBSTER

FREE PRESS BUSINESS WRITER

Ford Motor Co. Executive Chairman Bill Ford indicated on Wednesday that leaders at the company founded by his great-grandfather are generally satisfied with the tentative contract rival General Motors Corp. reached with the UAW.

It is expected to serve as a pattern for the Ford deal.

"The broad framework is certainly something we can work with," Ford told journalists during an appearance in Chicago. He was there for a ceremony to start a national network of community-based high schools, which is being supported by the automaker.

Ford spokesman Mark Truby confirmed the comments, which were first reported by Dow Jones, although he emphasized that the company still is studying the deal.

Ford and crosstown rival Chrysler LLC agreed to an indefinite extension of the current contract after GM was named a strike target Sept. 13.

GM and the UAW reached a deal Sept. 26 after a two-day strike, and the union's 73,000 members at GM continue voting on the proposed contract.

The UAW is expected to resume talks with Ford and Chrysler when the GM-UAW tentative contract is ratified.

Bill Ford, who learned labor relations early in his career from former Vice Chairman Peter Pestillo, seems to have good relations with UAW President Ron Gettelfinger, who started his career at a Ford factory in Louisville, Ky., and was head of the UAW's Ford division prior to leading the entire union.

During his Chicago trip, Ford said the company is "very prepared to get going" in talks.

He also said that the automaker is interested in talking to the union about a voluntary employee beneficiary association, or VEBA. That form of union-supervised trust to manage health care for UAW retirees is set to save GM about $20 billion from its $50 billion in related liabilities.

J.P. Morgan Chase estimates Ford's UAW retiree health care liability at $22 billion, indicating possible savings for Ford of $9 billion from a GM-style VEBA.

Bill Ford's comments were notable in that they contrasted with industry experts' recent comments that Ford may need more -- or significantly different -- concessions than those GM won from the UAW.

For Ford, the specifics of the GM agreement could force it to provide greater clarity about its turnaround plan, which aims to make the North American division profitable by 2009, Arthur Wheaton, a labor expert from Cornell University, said last week. Ford lost $12.6 billion last year and is undergoing a restructuring.

David Cole, chairman of the Center for Automotive Research in Ann Arbor, said he expects that Ford, when it reaches a deal with the UAW, will disclose the six remaining of 16 plants it plans to close as part of its restructuring. Another large benefit of the proposed contract for GM is the savings related to replacing current workers in noncore jobs with lower-paid union members.

But Ford is ahead of GM in outsourcing noncore jobs, said John Casesa, a veteran auto analyst and managing partner of Casesa Shapiro Group LLC.

Over the past two years, the UAW approved what are known as competitive operating agreements at Ford plants that allowed noncore jobs to be subcontracted out at lower pay. UAW Vice President Bob King said that saved $750 million.

Casesa said the UAW will have to give a different deal to Ford and to Chrysler LLC if it wants to help the companies survive.

"Ford's financial situation remains fragile," Casesa said last week. "Because the main feature of the agreement is relief on health care for retirees and GM has the highest active-to-retiree ratio, it's disproportionately better for GM," he said.

GM provides health benefits to more than four retirees and surviving spouses for every active worker it employs. Ford's ratio is two retirees for each active worker, and Chrysler's ratio is about one-to-one.

Contact SARAH A. WEBSTER at swebster@freepress.com.

INDEED! (THE BIGGER PICTURE!)

Our Schools Must Do Better

By BOB HERBERT

Published: October 2, 2007

Boston

Share Your Comments About This Column

I asked a high school kid walking along Commonwealth Avenue if he knew who the vice president of the United States was.

He thought for a moment and then said, “No.”

I told him to take a guess.

He thought for another moment, looked at me skeptically, and finally gave up. “I’m sorry,” he said. “I don’t know.”

The latest federal test results showed some improvement in public school math and reading scores, but there is no reason to celebrate these minuscule gains. We need so much more. A four-year college degree is now all but mandatory for building and sustaining a middle-class standard of living in the U.S.

Over the next 20 or 30 years, when today’s children are raising children of their own in an ever more technologically advanced and globalized society, the educational requirements will only grow more rigorous and unforgiving.

A one- or two-point gain in fourth grade test scores here or there is not meaningful in the face of that overarching 21st-century challenge.

What’s needed is a wholesale transformation of the public school system from the broken-down postwar model of the past 50 or 60 years. The U.S. has not yet faced up to the fact that it needs a school system capable of fulfilling the educational needs of children growing up in an era that will be at least as different from the 20th century as the 20th was from the 19th.

“We’re not good at thinking about magnitudes,” said Thomas Kane, a professor of education and economics at the Harvard Graduate School of Education. “We’ve got a bunch of little things that we think are moving in the right direction, but we haven’t stepped back and thought, ‘O.K., how big an improvement are we really talking about?’ ” Professor Kane and I were discussing what he believes are the two areas that have the greatest potential for radically improving the way children are taught in the U.S. Both are being neglected by the education establishment.

The first is teacher quality, a topic that gets talked about incessantly. It has been known for decades that some teachers have huge positive effects on student achievement, and that others do poorly. The positive effect of the highest performing teachers on underachieving students is startling.

What is counterintuitive, but well documented, is that paper qualifications, such as teacher certification, have very little to do with whatever it is that makes good teachers effective.

“Regrettably,” said Professor Kane, who has studied this issue extensively, “we’ve never taken that research fact seriously in our teacher policy. We’ve done just the opposite.”

Concerned about raising the quality of teachers, states and local school districts have consistently focused on the credentials, rather than the demonstrated effectiveness — or ineffectiveness — of teachers in the classroom.

New forms of identifying good teachers and weeding out poor ones — by carefully assessing their on-the-job performance — have to be established before any transformation of American schools can occur.

This can be done without turning the traditional system of teacher tenure on its head. Studies have clearly shown that the good teachers and the not-so-good ones can usually be identified, if they are carefully observed in their first two or three years on the job — in other words, before tenure is granted.

Developing such a system would be difficult. But it’s both doable and essential. Getting serious about teacher quality as opposed to harping on tiny variations in test scores would be like moving from a jalopy to a jet.

The second area to be mined for potentially transformative effects is the wide and varied field of alternative school models. We should be rigorously studying those schools that appear to be having the biggest positive effects on student achievement. Are the effects real? If so, what accounts for them?

The Knowledge Is Power Program (KIPP), to cite one example, is a charter school network that has consistently gotten extraordinary academic results from low-income students. It has worked in cities big and small, and in rural areas. Like other successful models, it has adopted a longer school day and places great demands on its teachers and students.

Said Professor Kane: “These alternative models that involve the longer school day and a much more dramatic intervention for kids are promising. If that’s what it takes, then we need to know that, and sooner rather than later.”

If American kids — all American kids, not just the children of the elite — are to have a fair chance at a rewarding life over the next several decades, we’ve got to give them a school system adequate to the times. They need something better than a post-World War II system in a post-9/11 world.

HOLD ON TIGHT!

Get Ready, Get Set, GO!

AIM reaches the STARS! CONGRATULATONS!

Detroit HS tech stars get backers

Principal Patricia Pickett, Superintendant Connie Calloway, Rev. Jesse Jackson. PHOTO BY JACKIE BARBER

By Eric T. Campbell

The Michigan Citizen

DETROIT - Leaders from the education, faith-based and labor communities came together in front of the Northwestern High School student body Thurs., Sept. 14, to announce the creation of the Northwestern High School Success Project.

The assembly, held in Northwestern�s auditorium was part of the Rainbow/PUSH Third Annual Community Symposium.

Rev. Jesse Jackson, Deputy Mayor Anthony Adams, Detroit Schools Superintendent Connie Calloway and U.S. Representative John Conyers addressed the students.

The "Success Project" was initiated by a partnership of Northwestern Alumni with the Michigan Labor Constituency Council, the UAW, International Union, New Detroit Incorporated and the Rainbow/PUSH coalition.

Honorary Chairs and committee members include a long list of Detroit community leaders and activists. The five-year pilot program seeks to identify specific educational and structural needs at Northwestern and to raise a $500,000 fiduciary fund for the school to "augment their academic program over a five-year period", according to the symposium guide booklet.

The program also stresses the need for "community wide mobilization" to support student's scholastic needs and improve Detroit high school graduation rates.

"They've raised over $90,000 for us to augment our programs, organizations and clubs, to have a holistic approach, a community approach to transforming," Northwestern Principal Patricia Pickett told the Michigan Citizen. "We're going to try and develop a clean, safe learning environment with rigorous instruction. We're all stakeholders, continuously learning."

Northwestern High School was chosen to pilot the program in part because of its potential to incorporate an extended academic structure. The curriculum at Northwestern already includes nine advanced placement classes, four computer laboratories, two libraries and one of the only Planetariums located in a Michigan public school.

Dr. Shedrick Ward is the facilitator of the AIM program at Northwestern, which identifies and nurtures students from the ninth grade on and offers scholastic options based in technological fields.

"To bring the teachers together across areas to perform a unified approach" that's the American transformation of the high schools so that the kids are connected to places like Ford Motor Company, Chrysler, General Motors, who have their challenges in this global network," Dr. Ward told the Michigan Citizen in his office. "But young people still have some responsibility in understanding what that challenge is going to be when they leave high school."

In addition to the morning assembly, the Community Day Symposium also included a luncheon and town hall meeting, at which participants discussed and reviewed elements of the "Success Program".

The day ended with a black tie gala and fundraising dinner at the Charles H. Wright Museum of African American History. Keynote speaker Judge Greg Mathis has strong ties to the "Success Program" through his National Youth and Education Crusade, which focuses on issues of crime and education.

But the day was best exemplified by the gathering of the student body in the high school auditorium on Grand Boulevard, during which wisdom was passed from generation to generation in the spirit of community uplift and educational advancement.

"We are now the conscience of this country," congressman and Northwestern High graduate, John Conyers told the listeners. "We are now holding hands with the 6.6 billion people in the world and we can all make a difference."

Keynote speaker Rev. Jesse Jackson paid tribute to Northwestern High and its role, even beyond the neighborhood.

"You have such a sterling history and heritage of impacting our world by lessons taught and learned from this school," Jackson began.

He focused directly on the students in the building and their responsibility to uphold the advancements made by those in the Black community.

"We're going another way, against the odds, we at Northwestern, are going to higher ground," the audience repeated with Jackson. "We shall lift ourselves, and our community, our city, our state, by the power of our minds. We change our minds, and the whole world changes. We must first change our minds to change the world."

Meeting: YAPO Computer Learning Center / Board of Directors

Wednesday, October 3, 2007 4:00PM

Post "Comments" for Agenda Items

The Milford Powerhouse Project

The Milford Powerhouse
http:www.milfordhistory.org (click-on "powerhouse" on left-side)

Powerhouse (Virtual Tour)
http://www.visualtour.com/shownp.asp?SK=13&T=843903

The Pettibone Creek Powerhouse blog-site
http://pcpowerhouse.blogspot.com

Milford Powerhouse Renovation Committee
NEXT Meeting: Wednesday, October 10, 2007 7:00PM (Informal Presentation)

SWEET! (UWSEM Agenda for Change Initaitive)

September 7, 2007

United Way for Southeastern Michigan

1212 Griswold Street

Detroit, MI 48226

Ref: UWSEM Agenda for Change “Educational Preparedness” Collaborative LOI

Agenda for Change Committee:

Communities to Schools Regional Digital Collaboratory

SKETCH of INTENTION “Pilot Project”: Create and develop a youth-based digitally networked community (networked two-way telecommunications) of inclusive entities to include schools, neighborhood and city community centers, human service organizations, various community capacity building organizations, public service organizations, arts and cultural organizations, business, industry and government.

Attributes of Aspirations (Limited Only by Our Combined Imaginations, Creativity and Innovation)

• Community Interaction and Engagement

*Build deeper and richer community alliances. Build organizational leadership and capacity, service-learning and engagement vehicles for change from merely synergistic to systemic imperatives.

• Educational Enhancement and Distribution Channels

*Utilize existing K-12 educational assets; teachers, pedagogy, curriculum, underutilized digital infrastructure, etc. Develop digital media and learning curriculum, pedagogy, distribution methodologies and modalities aligned with new 21^st Century economic realities with a particular focus on Science, Technology, Engineering and Math (STEM) disciplines. Create connections to relevant real-world experts and working environments.

• Youth Development and Leadership

*Create student-led, student-taught, project-based explorations emphasizing creativity, innovation and entrepreneurial endeavors that resonate with their world as they encounter it while also learning how to think instead of what to think.

• 21^st Century Skills for New Creative Economy Career Development

*Utilize digital technological innovations as a foundational element to further our youth’s interest in connecting socially to the world around them while coaching and facilitating conventional understandings (problem solving, critical thinking, cognitive discipline, creativity, innovation, collaboration, social responsibility) of how our great society works thereby enhancing our local, regional, state, national and global competitiveness in the urgent “brute-force to brain-force” transformation.

Something from which to "Frame" our Intentions

Some recent additions to OUR Portfolio

The Creation of Consious Culture through Educational Innovation
http://changethis.com/38.03.EdInnovation


The Mind of The Innovator
http://changethis.com/37.01.MindInnovator

United Way "Agenda for Change" Meeting 9-6-2007

BEGIN With the END in MIND!

Leadership by Visualization

Science hasn't fully explained how or why visualization works.

But the fact that it does is enough for most major air forces in the world to invest hundreds of millions of dollars in flight simulators.

Frankly, if you're aiming to achieve a major goal, who cares if you know how or why visualization works - just that it does!

And there's no doubt that visualization is a proven success technique used by achievers in every field, from athletes to actors to astronauts. None other than golfing legend Jack Nicklaus is said to have always played a course in his mind before actually beginning a game. John Goddard, the number one goal achiever in the world, told me several months ago that visualization was one of the main techniques he used to accomplish more that 550 major goals!

Brian Tracy says that, "All improvement in your life begins with an improvement in your mental pictures. Your mental pictures act as a guidance mechanism that causes you to act in ways that make your mental pictures come true in your life."

Last December we introduced a brand new tool as part of our Champions Club program. The Goal Tiger Vision Board is a very powerful application for your computer that enables you to take the teachings of the Law of Attraction and apply them in your daily life. It helps you to visualize your goals and dreams in a unique and dynamic way on your computer screen, using your personal dream images. You can combine these images with self chosen affirmations and power words. This way, the Goal Tiger Vision Board assists you in adjusting your belief system to break through any self limiting barriers you might have to reach your goals and create the life you desire.

Until now, the Goal Tiger Vision Board has only been available with membership in the Champions Club. But we've heard from a lot of our subscribers that they'd like to put the Vision Board to work to magnetically attract their goals and dreams.

So, with special permission from our software developers, for a limited time we are making the Goal Tiger Vision Board available as a stand-alone tool.

For a lot more details and all the benefits of the Goal Tiger Vision Board go here: http://www.goals-2-go.com/visualize/

21st Century Digital Learning Environments!

Pennsylvania's "Classrooms for the Future" Program Increases

Aug 31, 2007, News Report

Two hundred-twenty-five more high schools will benefit from Pennsylvania's innovative Classrooms for the Future technology initiative this school year, bringing the total number of participating high schools to 358.

The expansion of the program means high school students in 303 of the state's 501 school districts will be able to begin using laptop computers and other high-tech tools to improve their learning and better prepare for future success.

"Classrooms for the Future is helping our high school students engage in learning on a new level," Governor Edward G. Rendell said. "The new technology will nurture students' minds and feed their appetite for learning and it will prepare them to use equipment and machines that are commonplace in colleges and universities, corporate offices, production plants and just about anywhere they will go after graduating.

"By using technology as a learning tool, we are ensuring Pennsylvania's workforce will remain relevant and competitive in the global economy."

Classrooms for the Future is a three-year investment to provide laptop computers, high-speed Internet access and state-of-the-art software to high school classrooms across the state. Under Rendell's plan, every high school would be part of Classrooms for the Future by 2009.

The 2007-08 budget signed by Rendell in July allocates $90 million to provide the 255 high schools with 83,000 laptop computers and related equipment. It also invests $11 million in high-quality professional development for 12,100 teachers in new Classrooms for the Future high schools. That money, coupled with $2 million in federal funds, will enable each Classrooms for the Future high school to receive $30,000 for staff development.

Education Secretary Gerald L. Zahorchak said professional development is crucial to the success of Classrooms for the Future. As teachers learn how to integrate the technology into classroom instruction, they can move beyond being a mere lecturer and facilitate student-driven work.

The technology is being used in math, science, English and social studies classes to broaden the learning possibilities for Pennsylvania students and provide an unprecedented "gateway" to information and knowledge, the secretary added.

"After only one year, Classrooms for the Future already has proven to be a success for students and educators," Zahorchak said. "Teachers tell us students are more excited and engaged because of these new learning tools. In some cases, truancy and absenteeism are declining."

Greater student engagement is not the only benefit, he noted. Classrooms for the Future helps students connect their academic coursework to the real world, giving deeper meaning to what goes on both inside and outside the classroom.

As examples, the secretary cited a current events teacher who used Classrooms for the Future equipment to help her students stage a videoconference with a soldier serving in Iraq. In another classroom, a group of students studying bridge design used computer software to not only design structures but also to test them to determine whether they would work in a real-life application.

Such activities move students beyond being passive listeners and make them into active learners, Zahorchak said, while the professional development component of Classrooms for the Future ensures teachers are prepared to integrate high-technology into classroom instruction and activities.

Something for OUR Consideration

Michigan State PIRC Holland, MI

11172 Adams Street Holland MI, 49423

Ms. Deanna Depree 616-396-7566 ext. 116 ddepree@lifeservicessystem.org

Innovations in Education series report: Engaging Parents in Education: Lessons from Five Parental Information and Resource Centers

A generation ago, “parent involvement” in schools usually meant “not very involved at all.” Parents seldom visited the classroom unless they received a call from their children’s teachers or principals. Often, the closest that mothers and fathers came to the school building was when they dropped off their children in the morning. Actual visits to the school were confined to big events such as plays and science fairs. Unfortunately, some parents still do not feel welcome in the classroom, nor do they feel they can ask substantive questions about the quality of their children’s teachers and schools.

However, in a growing number of communities, the picture is very different. Gone are the days when moms just organized bake sales. On any given day, students see parents in the school building helping to organize kindergarten registration, identifying ways to raise money that will buy materials teachers need to enhance a math lesson, tutoring kids that need more time to master skills and lessons, starting after-school programs where students can learn to play a new sport or understand the stock market, serving on a school site council, or coordinating resources and services from the community for families, students, and the school. It’s not just the moms participating who are participating either. Dads, grandparents, and other caregivers are getting involved. Families of economically disadvantaged or limited English proficient students are becoming more involved in their local schools too—because schools are providing more information about the range of programs and services available to them.

Helping Parents Share Responsibility for School Improvement

Helping to make this happen are Parental Information and Resource Centers (PIRCs). A new U.S. Department of Education Innovations in Education series report, Engaging Parents in Education: Lessons from Five Parental Information and Resource Centers, highlights the practices of five centers, with successful strategies for parent and educator engagement. Assistant Deputy Secretary for Innovation and Improvement Morgan Brown announced the release of the new guide at the annual meeting of the directors of the 2007 PIRC grantees in Baltimore, Maryland on August 1st.

Drawing on lessons learned, the guide shares promising strategies for increasing effective parent involvement. The five PIRCs highlighted in the guide were selected through a rigorous peer review process that relied on both benchmarking and case study methodologies, in which researchers and practitioners helped screen the programs. From an initial list of 45 programs that support parent involvement, five highlighted PIRCs were chosen based on the range and quality of their practices, the organizations’ locations and demographics of their target populations, and the quality of their collaborations with other parent involvement organizations or education agencies.

Funded through a discretionary grant program administered by the U.S. Department of Education’s Office of Innovation and Improvement (OII), PIRCs have operated since 1995 to support parent involvement in Title I schools. The centers must be of sufficient size and scope to ensure that they can serve parents throughout a state, and each are required to focus on services to parents of low-income, minority, and limited English proficient students, using at least 50 percent of the federal funds they receive annually to serve areas of their states with high concentrations of low-income families. Special attention is directed to parents of children in Title I schools that are not making adequate yearly progress under NCLB. This effort to increase parent involvement is critical to student achievement. According to leading researchers on this topic, “students with involved parents, no matter what their income or background, were more likely to earn higher grades and test scores and enroll in higher-level programs; be promoted, pass their classes, and earn credits; show improved behavior, and adapt well to school; and graduate and go on to postsecondary education.” ¹

At present, more than 60 PIRCs across the United States as well as in each of the special jurisdictions including the District of Columbia, Puerto Rico, the Virgin Islands, Guam, the Northern Mariana Islands, American Samoa, and the Federated States of Micronesia, work to strengthen partnerships that support children in reaching high academic standards, closing the achievement gap, and providing parents and educators with information and resources to help their children succeed.

To ensure that PIRCs maintain high-quality standards and implement research-based parental-involvement strategies and practices, the Department also supports the National PIRC Coordination Center, which was created in 2006 by the Southwest Educational Development Laboratory (SEDL) in collaboration with the Harvard Family Research Project (HFRP). SEDL’s three decades of experience with issues of family involvement in schools, combined with HFRP’s knowledge of helping education stakeholders develop and evaluate strategies that promote the well being of children, youth, families, and communities, equips the Center to assist the PIRCs with their numerous program management needs.

Leadership Training for Parents

Three of the PIRCs highlighted in the new guide -- the Indiana Partnerships Center, based in Indianapolis; the Family Works, a program of the nonprofit Gaithersburg-based (Md.) Family Service Agency; and the Intercultural Development Research Association (IDRA), based in San Antonio, Tex.-- have not only created strategies for increased parent involvement (described in the book), but they also offer parent leadership training institutes. The institutes have a common goal: empower parents to lead other parents and educators in efforts to raise student achievement.

After deciding to incorporate parent leadership training into their services, these PIRCs looked for a model from which to develop their own programs. Each offers training that was adopted—and adapted—from aspects of the Commonwealth Institute for Parent Leadership (CIPL), which has been training over 200 Kentucky parent leaders a year since 1997. They have individualized the parent leadership training, but all have preserved the mandatory “CIPL-model culminating project” that aspires to raise parents to a new level of parent engagement by requiring them to create an individualized project.

The culminating projects at each of the sites have ranged from efforts focused on getting more fathers involved in school, such as a mentoring program for boys that seeks to involve positive male role models, to curriculum-oriented efforts, such as creating a children’s book club and or staging Family Monopoly Night to increase math skills.

Executive Director Jackie Garvey of the Indiana Partnerships Centers explained that their projects often aim to empower parents to link parent activities to student achievement. She recalled a memorable project that started as a small literacy effort known as “Donuts with Dad and Muffins with Mom,” and reflected on how the effort evolved. “The project grew tremendously. A member created a train from a golf cart and it went around the school promoting books and reading. The organizers obtained community partners, the whole community rallied around them. It became project ‘All Aboard.’ It went so far as to take all the kids and families on a real train to Chicago to visit a museum. Everyone read on the train. Then we saw that the reading scores in that school really improved.”

Different Ways to Engage Diverse Parents and Educators

The Indiana Partnerships Center recruits leadership trainees by reaching out to other community-based organizations and education agencies to ask for nominations. It looks for a diverse pool of participants that reflects their communities. Unlike trainings offered by the other highlighted PIRCs, at the Indiana Partnerships Center, if an organization submits candidates for consideration, the candidates are sent in teams. According to Garvey, “using teams (where parents are the majority, but there is always a school staff member) has helped in several ways: it creates buy-in for the leadership projects; it helps make it easier to integrate the project into the school improvement plan; and it makes recruitment easier. The team approach lets quality projects go deeper,” she said.

The Family Works leadership training program aggressively recruits parents through targeted mailings, using lists generated by the Maryland State Department of Education, State Title I schools, the Maryland PTA, district family involvement offices, and other family support organizations. E-mail distribution lists and a network of program graduates serving as "ambassadors” also have been used. They seek candidates who are "traditionally not-involved or untapped parents who have capabilities.” Applicants have to receive a sign-off from the principal of the school they represent to ensure that the parent and school are establishing a productive partnership. A committee of stakeholders charged with developing a group that is balanced, both geographically and racially, and that spans K–12 education, selects the candidates.

In addition to training parent leaders, San Antonio’s IDRA targets educators, too. For example, they see the staff of a district’s Title I office as a natural audience for the training. Their model is the “train-the-trainer” approach, resulting in parents and educators developing even more parents to become leaders, which builds capacity. The San Antonio PIRC broadened the Commonwealth Institute for Parent Leadership model to cover four different types of parent involvement: parents as teachers of their own children, parents as resources to the school, parents as decision makers, and parents as leaders and trainers. The goal is to help parents see the variety of ways they can participate in the classroom and elsewhere at school. IDRA is also one of the only PIRCs that currently offers bilingual leadership training, but does not offer programs in Spanish and English separately in an attempt to bring people together.

Schools are no longer the only stakeholders in our children’s education. The efforts of PIRCs and other parent involvement organizations are helping to increase student achievement as they all work together to ensure success for every child.

Resources:

BuildingChoice.org

Harvard Family Research Project

Prichard Committee for Academic Excellence

Southwest Educational Development Laboratory

Note: Readers should judge for themselves the merits of the practices implemented in the schools or programs profiled in the Education Innovator. The descriptions of schools or programs and their methodologies do not constitute an endorsement of specific practices or products by the U.S. Department of Education.

1 Henderson, A. and Mapp, K. 2002. A New Wave of Evidence: The Impact of School, Parent and Community Connections on Student Achievement , p. 7. Austin, Tex.: Southwest Educational Development Laboratory.

Something to Consider

Writing on Chalkboards Fading?

Officials Push for SMART Devices in All Classes by 2010


By Delphine Schrank
Washington Post Staff Write
Thursday, August 30, 2007; LZ01


With the continuing rollout of interactive electronic whiteboards in schools across Loudoun County, the digital age is spreading its wings and the ancient world of the chalkboard is crumbling like, well, a stick of chalk.

The SMART Boards look much like their unplugged whiteboard counterparts, but they have a touch-sensitive display connected to a computer and a projector.

Loudoun school officials have set a goal of putting a SMART Board in every classroom by 2010, and each Loudoun school already has at least a handful of them -- one of the reasons the school system was honored by the National School Boards Association last year for its efforts to use new technology to enhance student achievement.

For Elizabeth "Betty" Korte, head of mathematics at Stone Bridge High School in Ashburn, the boards are nothing less than the dawn of the future. Korte's department was one of the first in the county to use them. Two years ago, she purchased several with a stipend she earned from a teaching award and matching funds from her husband's employer. The boards were $1,400 apiece at the time, Korte said.

In the past two years, the technology has improved and prices have dropped by about half, said Michael Williams, principal of Sterling Middle School, which also started using the boards two years ago and now has them in 13 classrooms. "It's a very valuable thing," Williams said.

Korte said the possibilities for instruction are endless. "In my mind, the boards let me turn the math classroom into a lab. I can introduce things like color, detailed diagrams, animated Java applets that change before the kids' eyes."

Other teachers agreed that one of the board's chief benefits is providing visual tools to illustrate the abstract, making concepts seem more real.

Probability can be demonstrated with a throw of dice. Graph lines can tantalize with a line of stars instead of points. And with different software, "you can be a million different colors," Korte said. "All kinds of crazy things."

Because the boards digitally record notes scrawled across them with a finger, they can be recalled a day later if lessons end too soon, Williams added.

Korte said she typically posts notes onto her Web site so that struggling students can relive a class in full, and students with heavy loads from other classes can catch up later.

After Korte purchased the first set of SMART Boards, the other math teachers in her department -- as well as three special education teachers -- soon caught on, she said, and their use "just mushroomed."

But Williams cautions that the extent of a student's engagement depends somewhat on the teacher's versatility with the board, which can vary based on experience with the technology. Teachers typically get a day and a half of training, Williams said.

In short, not everyone is quite the "virtuoso," a word used by Loudoun schools spokesman Wayde B. Byard to describe Korte.

"I pretty much use the SMART Board and its associated software as the center of my lesson," Korte said. "It's not just a pretty show-and-tell. The more of that we do, the better off we'll be."

Moreover, for the students, she said, "they are so used to technology and all the bells and whistles that this just fits into their world." The software gizmos "absolutely" grab their attention, and every day, she said, is a new adventure.

And what of the time-tested technique of grabbing the attention of unruly students with the screeching of nail on chalkboard? Has Korte any nostalgia for the chalkboard?

"Me?" she said. "Nooooo."

Oakland Wireless and Wireless Washtenaw! SIGN-ON to PROJECT!

Oakland, Washtenaw wireless systems coming soon

Posted on 8/30/2007 8:45:39 AM Municipal wireless projects in Oakland and Washtenaw counties should be complete in 2008 and will offer considerable economic development benefits, officials of the two counties told a Great Lakes IT Report - WWJ Newsradio 950 breakfast Thursday. The systems, Wireless Oakland and Wireless Washtenaw, will offer particular advantages for rural areas in western Washtenaw and northern Oakland counties, which are currently limited to broadband. "West of Zeeb Road, we don't have access" to broadband, Washtenaw County deputy county executive and CIO David Beehan said during the event. He said business owners in western Washtenaw are telling the county, "We only have dial-up, and it's killing us." Beehan and Phil Bertolini, Oakland County deputy executive and CIO, outlined their respective counties' progress toward free wireless Web access to a crowd of about 100 at Lawrence Technological University in Southfield. Bertolini said the inspiration for the project came from a 2004 visit by Oakland County Executive L. Brooks Patterson to Dubai, which has universal Web access. "Brooks said there's four square miles of Dubai, there's 910 square miles of Oakland County -- make it so," Bertolini said. Both counties' projects involve no government investment or ownership. Instead, the counties are making government assets such as power poles and radio towers available for free to a private sector partner that provides the actual service. A basic level of service -- 128 kilobits per second, about twice as fast as dial-up -- is provided free, with higher speeds available at a price. The provider also gets advertising revenue from a portal start page that all users begin at. In Oakland County, those upsell rates and prices range from $19.95 a month for 512 kilobits per second download speed to $39.95 a month for 1.5 megabits per second. Berolini said Wireless Oakland's Phase I has covered 18.5 square miles, an area comprised of 35,000 households and businesses. So far, 11,000 of them have signed up -- far exceeding the county's initial projection of a 5 percent signup rate. Of the 11,000, about 200 are paying for higher speeds, Bertolini added. Bertolini said Wireless Oakland is currently developing its rollout schedule for the rest of the county, which should be complete by the end of 2008. Roughly the same schedule is in effect for Washtenaw County, which has a 15-square-mile pilot system operating in Saline, Manchester and downtown Ann Arbor. In Washtenaw, though, only 300 have signed up. Both counties said government is one of the "anchor tenants" of the system and will use it extensively. And Bertolini said the system is already paying off in terms of economic development. "We already have companies contacting Oakland County and saying that part of the reason we are looking to locate in Oakland County is that the county is building a wireless network across 910 square miles," Bertolini said. Behen said Washtenaw County got its inspiration not from Dubai, but from the fact that the private sector simply doesn't seem interested in providing broadband to rural areas. "I'm not going to argue with the private sector," Behen said. "But in my position as deputy county administrator and CIO, I have to think a little bigger, and think about the quality of life for those areas." Both plans also include programs to bridge the digital divide, once the wireless network is up and running. The counties will be providing free or low-cost computers and training for low-income residents. Both speakers also said they're watching the development of WiMax technology carefully, but that it's still years away from widespread use. Oakland County is already using WiMax for backhaul, Bertolini said.

Something to Emulate!

Harlem Program Finds Ways to Help Kids, Revive a Community

By DAVID HO
Cox News Service
Sunday, August 26, 2007

NEW YORK — In a worn building in the heart of Harlem, up two flights of well-used stairs and down halls dotted with proud plaques and bright murals, 14-year-old Alec Strong sits before a shiny white computer learning Web site design and pondering a future full of possibilities.

One floor up, beside a small gym favored by baby-faced basketball players, 6-year-old Bria Jordon yells and knocks down two men more than twice her size. She bows to her martial arts sensei, who smiles as another lesson in discipline and fitness is completed.

A few blocks away is the public school where Aisha Tomlinson attended "Baby College" classes and learned there was a lot she didn't know about being a parent.

At nearby Promise Academy elementary, 8-year-old Noah Brown begins each school day reciting a pledge that ends with the words: "We will go to college. We will succeed. This is the promise. This is our creed."

All these faces belong to the Harlem Children's Zone, an ambitious project spanning nearly 100 blocks in one of New York's poorest neighborhoods.

As many cities struggle with pockets of crime and poverty, the zone has become a rare national beacon, widely admired and studied by local governments and charities because of its success in bringing education, social services, medical help and a sense of community to thousands of children and families.

The program has lately become part of presidential politics, touted by Democratic candidate Barack Obama as the basis for his poverty strategy. He called the zone "an all-encompassing, all-hands-on-deck anti-poverty effort that is literally saving a generation of children in a neighborhood where they were never supposed to have a chance."

Obama said in July that, if elected, he would spend billions of dollars to apply the zone's approach in 20 U.S. cities, spurring debate on whether the government can effectively replicate the program.

Many dedicated and generous people work to make the zone a reality, but it exists largely because of the vision and sweat of Geoffrey Canada, who overcame a poor and violent childhood in the South Bronx and dedicated himself to giving back.

"In communities like Central Harlem it's not just one thing that's really going badly for children, it's everything," said Canada, the zone's president and CEO. He said individual programs that address issues such as early childhood education or teen pregnancy are not enough to ensure that kids succeed.

The response, he said, is not to fight one battle, but to fight them all.

"That's how you reach the tipping point, really creating a conveyor belt that starts from birth with programs like Baby College and Harlem Gems for 4-year-olds," he said. "It supports young people straight through college."

Getting kids all the way through college is key, Canada said, noting that a high school diploma is not enough to ensure success in today's world. Helping new graduates stay connected to their community creates a positive cycle, he said.

"That's how you really begin to grow a young adult population which is prepared to take responsibility, by making sure young people feel that they have a place that they are responsible for and they have the tools to make a difference," Canada said.

The children's zone is part of a broader economic revival in Harlem that includes new construction and an influx of business after years of decline.

The zone grew out of a program called the Rheedlen Centers for Children and Families and began providing services to a 24-block area of Harlem in 2001. That area included about 3,000 children, most of them black and nearly two-thirds living in poverty.

It now encompasses 97 blocks and serves more than 9,000 kids and their families.

Children in zone schools have longer days, shorter summer vacations and many after-school options. Teachers are held to very high performance standards.

The zone's approximately 20 programs range from a family crisis storefront facility to Harlem Peacemakers, which trains young people to keep neighborhoods safe and puts them in classrooms to work with elementary school kids.

The scope of the effort is clear at the program's recently built $42 million headquarters on 125th Street, which houses a community center, sports and medical facilities, a cafeteria serving healthy meals and upper grades of the Promise Academy.

A conference area here resembles a war room, with a map of the zone's blocks dotted with program sites. Another map shows the high levels of obesity in Harlem compared to the rest of New York. Still another pinpoints the schools where hundreds of children from the zone have made it to college.

Leaders from cities from San Francisco to Miami have come here to learn what makes the zone tick.

The zone's annual budget is $50 million, with one-third coming from federal, state and city funds and the rest from private donations. Much of the private money stems from hedge fund wealth and Wall Street donors among the program's trustees.

The zone's results can be found woven through the lives of people like Harlem mom Flo Brown and her three sons.

Noah, who soon starts Promise Academy's 3rd grade, passed 3rd grade state reading and math tests a year early. Jeremiah, soon to be 4, will begin at the Harlem Gems pre-kindergarten in the fall, and 1-year-old Caleb also has the zone in his future.

The two older boys already talk about going to college, Brown said.

"I'm fully aware of the epidemic of our black men going to jail, dropping out of high school, or on drugs or being killed," she said. "Having three black men that I'm raising is very frightening for me."

"Trying to raise a family in Harlem in this day and age — we really couldn't afford a private school," Brown said. "I don't know that I could have done this in this environment without the Harlem Children's Zone. It's also created a village of sorts for me."

That village provided help beyond schooling. Brown said a zone asthma program, needed in a neighborhood with some of the worst asthma rates in the nation, helped Noah get through a time of frequent emergency room visits.

Brown also attended the Baby College, which teaches moms and dads about parenting. One often eye-opening class concerns discipline and how to punish children without hitting.

"All that stuff is embedded in you, so you think because this is the way you were raised this is the way we are supposed to raise your children," Brown said. "My husband and I are talking to our son, we're explaining things to our son."

Aisha Tomlinson, 42, said Baby College classes about seven years ago also taught her the importance of reading to her kids.

"The things that you didn't have, you definitely want your children to have," she said.

Older kids in the zone have programs like TRUCE, The Renaissance University for Community Education. The program provides after-school and summer activities for kids 12-19, focusing on academics, arts, technology and nutrition and fitness. Students here produce a cable TV show, a newspaper and have a Web site in the works.

Alec Strong has been part of TRUCE since he was 10. He said he wants to be a video game designer and the program provides an early step.

"Some students really have nothing and this program gives students something to look forward to," he said. "I'm looking forward to going to college."

On the Web:

Harlem Children's Zone: www.hcz.org

Importance: URGENT!

The Preschool Question: Who Gets to Go?

Va. Expansion Efforts Highlight Debate

By Maria Glod
Washington Post Staff Writer
Wednesday, August 22, 2007; A01

The children in Carrie Hamilton's preschool class yesterday drew wobbly hearts with wobbly letters underneath. They tapped the buttons on a toy cash register and raced cars over roads built of wooden tracks. Hidden in the games and giggles were lessons on the building blocks of reading and math.

These Fairfax County 4- and 5-year-olds are part of a national push to devote more public resources to the youngest learners. They are also at the center of a debate, underscored last week in a Virginia policy shift, over whether the government should offer preschool to all children or concentrate on those from poor families.

Nationwide, about 950,000 children are enrolled in state-funded preschool, a 36 percent increase from five years ago, said experts who track the programs. As advocates promote quality pre-kindergarten as a way to prepare children for school, strengthen the workforce and reduce crime, states have increased funding since 2005 for such programs by 75 percent, to $4.2 billion, according to the District-based organization Pre-K Now. Some in Congress have also proposed more federal money to help build state preschool initiatives.

The questions about which children will benefit most from government-funded preschool and how great the investment should be are at the core of Virginia's effort to expand pre-kindergarten but have also arisen in Maryland. Next week, in its first foray into all-day preschool, Montgomery County plans to introduce full-day, federally funded Head Start classes for 260 students at 10 elementary schools that serve low-income neighborhoods. This week, Prince George's County expanded its full-day state-funded preschool program by half, to 261 classes, also targeting students from poor families.

After campaigning in 2005 to offer free preschool to every 4-year-old in Virginia regardless of family income, Gov. Timothy M. Kaine (D) scaled back his plan last week and said he would focus resources on the neediest children.

In an interview yesterday, Kaine said his pledge to launch universal preschool was prompted by research showing that a tremendous amount of learning takes place before the first day of kindergarten. But education experts persuaded Kaine to build on the work of existing public and private preschools.

"Instead of just creating a system from scratch, why not take the existing network and focus on the goals of increasing access and increasing quality?" Kaine said. "We can change the financial criteria to help kids who can't afford it and have an impact on the quality of all parts of the system."

Virginia 4-year-olds who qualify for free school lunches -- those in households with incomes of less than $27,000 for a family of four -- are eligible for free preschool, and about 12,500 children take part at an annual state cost of about $50 million. Kaine's plan would extend benefits to children in families with incomes up to $38,000. The new proposal, which envisions enrolling about 17,000 more underprivileged children by 2012, would cost an additional $75 million a year.

Kaine also is calling for a state-led rating system to help parents gauge how providers measure up. Preschools, much like restaurants or hotels, would be rated on a five-star scale based on such factors as the educational level and training of teachers, class sizes and an expert's classroom observation.

Kaine's plan to offer universal preschool for all 100,000 4-year-olds in the state would have cost about $300 million annually.

Bruce Fuller, an education and public policy professor at the University of California at Berkeley who is a leading proponent of income-targeted funding, said research has shown that children from poor families get the biggest boost from high-quality preschool. He said universal preschool provides unneeded benefits to wealthy families and said the emphasis should be on helping children in lower-income homes, who tend to start school knowing fewer letters and numbers than their peers.

"We need to focus scarce dollars where the benefit is the greatest, and that's to children from low-income and blue-collar households," Fuller said. "If dollars are sprinkled across all families rich and poor, it's illogical to think early learning gaps will be narrowed."

But other education experts said the country should shift to preschool for all children. They say every dollar spent on public preschool will improve school performance, lessen the need for remedial education and have other long-term benefits.

A recent study of New Mexico's preschoolers showed that students in the state program learned many more words and scored higher on a test of early math skills than peers who didn't attend.

"Even though it costs more, the public is better off if they make sure it gets to all kids," said W. Steven Barnett, director of the National Institute for Early Education Research at Rutgers University. "Even middle-income kids, the middle 60 percent, have a 1 in 10 chance of failing a grade, a 1 in 10 chance of dropping out of high school. A lot of that can be traced to how far behind they were when they started kindergarten."

Libby Doggett, executive director of Pre-K Now, which backs universal access, applauded Kaine's proposal. "Given the political realities of the state, he's starting where he should," Doggett said, alluding to Virginia's budget constraints.

The federal Head Start program provides preschool for about 900,000 children from low-income homes across the country, and many states fund classes targeted largely to disadvantaged children. Georgia and Oklahoma offer universal preschool that reaches large percentages of children. Other states, including West Virginia and New York, are working toward such programs.

In Florida, voters approved a constitutional amendment in 2002 that mandates pre-kindergarten for all children, but critics contend the quality of the program has suffered because of a lack of funding. Last year, California voters rejected a ballot measure that would have taxed the wealthy to pay for universal preschool.

In the District, more than 5,000 children are enrolled in full-day preschool programs in public schools.

The nonprofit preschool of Annandale Christian Community for Action, where Hamilton's students played yesterday, is one of several private centers in a pilot program started by Kaine to help Virginia reach more children from disadvantaged homes. This summer, the center has new state funding for 26 additional children.

Camilla Torejo, 4, showed off her artwork as classmates flipped through books, played computer games and zoomed around with toy cars. "I made this heart and this heart and this heart," Camilla said. Next to them, she wrote her name.

Staff writer Daniel de Vise contributed to this report.

Batter UP!

Published Online: August 14, 2007

Commentary


Why Education Reform Is Like Baseball


Thoughts for the Days of Summer

By Jeanne Century

If you are looking for an entertaining summer read, what could be more promising than a David-and-Goliath baseball story? That’s what I expected as I opened Michael Lewis’ 2003 best-seller Moneyball: The Art of Winning an Unfair Game. But before I had finished the first chapter, I realized this was more than a sports story, and that my hopes of being distracted from the work of improving education were not going to be realized.

Moneyball tells many stories, one of which is how General Manager Billy Beane of the Oakland A’s used an otherwise disregarded statistic—on-base percentage—as a strategy for selecting players. His scouts were accustomed to the more traditional approach to finding baseball stars: traveling across the country and recruiting those who looked “right.” Beane’s analytic approach was decidedly unpopular, and the story of its implementation before the 2002 season is yet another illustration of the fact that, whether in baseball or education, systems are stubborn.

Moneyball tells about a system that did not want to change; of practices held steadfast in tradition; and of how a leader, with the right motivation and insight, innovated for success. So, as this season winds down and you sit watching nine innings, consider these nine lessons for educators drawn from an unlikely place: America’s simple favorite pastime—baseball.

1. Don’t go for the home runs … just get on base and the rest will come. Beane didn’t win baseball games by hoping for home runs. Home runs are rare, and hope doesn’t win games. He understood that individual players don’t win games; teams do—when they work together in a process of creating runs. In education, we identify isolated strategies that we hope will be our home runs. But experience tells us that a better approach is to get solidly and clearly “on base.” Then, the system can work, each piece supporting the other, stepping up when necessary and stepping back to “sacrifice” if that is what will win the game. The only way the system can work is if everyone buys in and does his or her part.

In a quickly changing world, practices that once worked can become ineffective artifacts, and those most familiar to us may be the very ones that are in fact standing in the way of improvement.

2. Money is important, but it is not the answer. Beane had to spend his team’s meager $40 million wisely; other clubs had several times that amount. So he set out to identify ways he could use his money more efficiently. As Lewis writes, “[I]n professional baseball it still matters less how much money you have than how well you spend it.” Instead of investing in one big star, Beane sought out those players who were regularly and consistently getting on base (see lesson one). We in education need to find ways to get on base. Small steps are enough if they are consistent and well informed. The smartest strategies don’t necessarily cost the most money. Indeed, some of them don’t cost anything at all.

3. Be willing to change the things that are the most familiar. When it came time to make changes, Beane identified a part of his organization that looked most like the others—his scouting department—and that is where he made changes that were key for his success. Educators can take a lesson from this. In a quickly changing world, practices that once worked can become ineffective artifacts, and those most familiar to us may be the very ones that are in fact standing in the way of improvement.

4. Decisions should be made with personal investment, but not overpersonalized. In baseball, the people who make the decisions generally have played the game at one time or another and, as Lewis puts it, they “generalize wildly from their own experience.” This sounds familiar? We all have personal experience with education, and it is easy to think that what worked for us will work for others. We need to make good decisions grounded in personal experience and beliefs. But we need to recognize that beliefs built on the experience of one person, or even a few people, may not hold the answers for the country as a whole.

5. Make decisions based on experience and evidence, not on impressions. Lewis tells us that baseball scouts had a dislike of short, right-handed pitchers and a “distaste” for fat catchers. But Beane looked past appearances and turned to performance. While scouts chose players without looking very far below the surface, Beane looked at past performance and made informed decisions based on what was most likely to happen next. In other words, he paid attention to history to inform his shaping of the future. In education, we need to hold our goals clearly in our sights while remembering to look below the surface and consider all that we know. Informed by our history, we can look optimistically forward.

6. The changing environment makes old rules obsolete. Lewis notes that some practices of baseball are vestiges of a time long gone when players wore no gloves and fields were rough expanses of dirt. Likewise, the education system was invented at a time when the world looked quite different, and yet, the instruction and function of our schools often looks very much the same. Even as ball fields have built lights and digital scoreboards, the object of the game has stayed the same. Likewise, the object of our “game” stays the same, but the setting is very different. We need to discard the obsolete practices and find those that will keep us apace in our growing world.

7. There is resistance to new knowledge and ideas. The book explains that as baseball statistics became more sophisticated and available, those inside the sport relegated them to a “cult” of users. Lewis notes that “there was a profusion of new knowledge and it was ignored. … [Y]ou didn’t have to look at big-league baseball very closely to see its fierce unwillingness to rethink anything.” This sounds painfully familiar. In education, we say we want to innovate and improve. But saying it and acting on it are two different things. Few are willing to let go of the familiar to take the risk of embracing the promising, but still unknown.

8. People do things even when there is evidence that they don’t work. Oddly, in baseball and education alike, people do things even though it’s clear that they don’t work. In baseball, for example, players might steal bases even when it seems to be statistically pointless or even self-defeating. In education, we know that an incremental, evidence-based approach will get us where we want to go. And yet, we continue to implement popular (albeit unproven) strategies on unrealistic timelines because that is what the constituents want, even if, in the end, it won’t help win the game.

9. A system is a system is a system. Lewis quotes the innovative baseball statistician Voros McCracken, who once wrote: “The problem with major-league baseball … is that it’s a self-populating institution. … [T]hey aren’t equipped to evaluate their own systems. They don’t have the mechanisms to let in the good and get rid of the bad. They either keep everything or get rid of everything, and they rarely do the latter.”

As I sat in the warm summer sun, I had to check the cover of the book, just to make sure I hadn’t accidentally picked up a book about education.

Jeanne Century is the director of science education and research and evaluation at the University of Chicago’s Center for Elementary Mathematics and Science Education.

Thank You for PARTICIPATING in this Virtual Community!

August 15, 2007

Building Virtual Communities

Sheryl Nussbaum-Beach

from Technology & Learning

Online communities of practice are central to 21^st century professional development. In this excerpt from techlearning.com, an expert shares her views—and we invite yours.

Author, consultant, and social learning theorist Etienne Wenger describes virtual learning communities as electronic communities of practice where you find groups of people who share a concern, a set of problems, or a passion for a topic. These communities deepen their knowledge and expertise by interacting on an ongoing basis. According to Wikipedia, traditional communities of practice are "based around situated learning in a colocated setting." In the blogosphere however, we see community developed not by common location, but through pockets of common interest.

Capacity Building

I spend a lot of time participating in communities online. I have had the opportunity to see some of the best and some of the worst in action. I am thankful for the new electronic models of professional growth that inspire me daily to think and collaborate differently. The diversity of ideas and thoughts represented in my community 21^st Century Collaborative push the boundaries of my thinking as I share knowledge and do my part to advocate for educational reform.

The way I see it, social networking tools have the potential to bring enormous leverage to teachers at relatively little cost. The burning question: How can we accelerate the adoption and full integration of 21^st century teaching and learning strategies in schools today?

What Makes a Community Successful?

A burgeoning body of opinion suggests virtual learning communities are becoming the venue through which agents for change operate. The potential is enormous, as knowledge capital is collected and the community becomes a sort of online brain trust, representing a highly varied accumulation of expertise. However, successful virtual learning communities are hard to come by, and many seem to fade away almost as soon as they get started. This past June at the EduBloggerCon at NECC several online community leaders tried to think about components and attributes of successful learning communities. The following are tips and tricks garnered from my lessons learned as I have created and led virtual learning communities for various purposes over the last seven years.

The Community Organizer

Typically, community organizers foster member interaction, provide stimulating material for conversations, keep the space organized, and help hold members accountable to the stated community guidelines, rules, or norms. They also build a shared culture by passing on community history and rituals. Perhaps most important, community organizers are keenly aware of how to empower participants to do these things for themselves. Organizers use their group facilitation skills to help all members of the community to become active participants in the process. They work hard behind the scenes to support socializing and relationship-and trust-building.

Points to Consider

Besides finding the right organizer, other key attributes of successful online communities include:

• a shared vision of what constitutes the mission or niche of the community


• a core group willing to chime in on a variety of topics, self-monitor, and keep the conversation rolling


• opportunities for content creation such as book reviews, book chats, lesson sharing, and other professional development input


• regular posting of relevant, provocative issues.

Here are some questions you need to ask when designing your learning community:

• Will communications be asynchronous, synchronous, or both?


• Will we need file-storage and file-sharing capabilities?


• How will we share and store links to Web-based resources?


• How will we support collaboration on projects?


• Will we need archiving capability for Webcasts, chats, and threaded discussions?


• Will we need polling or surveying tools as part of our work?


• Is voice capability important for our synchronous events?


• Is a member profiling tool an important feature?


• What recruitment and rollout strategy will we have?


• Is the community open or closed?

Measuring Impact

Evaluation needs to be built in to this work from the beginning. In addition to any evaluation done in connection with scholarly research, it is critically important for organizers to use "just-in-time" assessments that allow for continuous improvement of the virtual community experience. Since this is a relatively new field, many research questions remain to be answered.

Sheryl Nussbaum-Beach is a regular speaker on teacher leadership and virtual community building. Her Web portal is 21st Century Collaborative.

21st Century Digital Learning Environments would like to hear your comments on and experiences with virtual learning communities:

• What role does Web 2.0 play in the development of teacher leadership and implementation of school reform through the communities in which we learn and play?


• What are the components of successful, thriving virtual communities?


• Do intentional roles and norms lead to building the trust that is necessary for a community to grow?


• Does part of the answer to meaningful change and implementation of 21^st century skills and dispositions in schools lie in the collaboration that occurs in virtual learning environments?

To participate in the conversation, visit http://www.digitallearningenvironments.blogspot.com