The number of Hispanic students in the nation's public schools nearly doubled from 1990 to 2006, accounting for 60% of the total growth in public school enrollments over that period. Strong growth in Hispanic enrollment is expected to continue for decades, according to population projection by the U.S. Census Bureau. Using data from the 2006…

Regardless of geographical limitations, community partnerships can flourish through videoconference technology. This article presents iDance Arizona (iDA) research as a tool for supporting the teaching and learning of dance in rural settings. This research focuses on university/K-12 collaborations and examines the pedagogy of videoconferencing in…

Trilhos Alternativos (Alternative Paths) is a community-based program that aims to integrate African-Portuguese urban youth from low-income families into Portuguese society. This article describes the first year of the program and presents formative data about effectiveness of the program. The motivation system seems to be an indirect variable…

Any voucher program that is going to have a major impact on a public education system is likely to require an expansion of private schools in order to accommodate increased demand; however, little is known about where private schools open and therefore how a major voucher program might affect private school availability in various communities.…

This paper explores one school's implementation of a locally developed curriculum reform known as "Math-Science Investigations". At one level, it offers an account of a reform told from the perspective of a classroom teacher and her 3rd- and 4th-graders. At another level, it reconstructs their experience to explore the understandings of the…

In San Diego, California, 800 public school students from the inner city are attending a program called School in the Park (SITP), for approximately one-fourth of their 3rd-, 4th-, and 5th-grade education. This unique program blends rigorous academic standards (formal learning) with hands-on, experiential curricula (informal learning), using…

A partnership project was developed in which parents volunteered to support teachers in training years 1-3 children in computer skills at a primary school in a small, low socio-economic community. This article identifies the ways teachers and the "tutors" (as the volunteers were called) understood the value of the project. "Being a…

In Hilliard, OH, administrators, teachers, kids and parents make a school a "community." Visualize, if you will, a symphony orchestra. The violins play as one, led by the concertmaster in the first violin section, who is first among equals. As the music builds, the cellos add their glorious tone while the woodwinds may introduce the theme.…

In this article, the author examines the role the literacy coach at her school has played in supporting the kindergarten through second grade teachers. Using a theoretical framework for classroom communities (Pintaone-Hernandez, 2002), she reflects on how the literacy coach has helped teachers maintain a professional learning community in the wake…

This report is based on the discussions of the February 2008 "Teaching by Choice: Beyond 2 + 2" conference, convened by the American Association of Community Colleges to focus on the growing role of community colleges as providers of teacher education and source of professional development for elementary, middle and secondary teachers of science,…

University-community partnerships are widely recognized as critical to the success of community research and advocacy work but difficult to form and sustain. This article will describe a unique facet of that partnership, namely the collaboration between mental health clinicians and community consultants, a partnership that our data suggest was a…

A case study of school-community collaboration in an elementary community school in Israel follows up an environmental education (EE) school-based curriculum that involves the parents and community members in various indoors and outdoors activities. The collaboration was established in the framework of the Community School Approach. In these…

The achievement gap is clearly visible throughout the school years, from grade-school test scores through high school graduation and higher education. It divides American Indian, Asian, Black, Latino, and White students, and it divides the economically advantaged from the disadvantaged regardless of their race/ethnicity. Under the federal No Child…

The Seattle Public Schools serve one of the most diverse student bodies in the nation. The school system's enrollment represents many racial and ethnic groups and includes students from around the world who come to Seattle speaking many languages and families who came to the city generations ago. The challenge facing Seattle and all other major…

This article examines how a small group of high-socioeconomic status (high-SES) parents organized community opposition to the integration of a special-needs student into a grade 3 classroom in an urban elementary school in Ontario. Using data gathered in a participant observation study, this article shows how parents came to believe that existing…