Purpose/Objectives: School Food Focus (Focus) developed the Focus Midwest project on the premise that school food professionals (SFPs) could work together to minimize effort and maximize potential to find new or improved products to serve. Focus designed this project as an experiment to explore how and to what extent this collaborative approach…

Illinois State Board of Education (ISBE) invited 10 districts to participate in a community of practice designed to increase understanding of how to braid and blend federal funds. District teams composed of principals, superintendents, business managers, and other district leaders participated in four 90-minute virtual sessions. The purpose of…

This qualitative mixed methods study explored how Special Education Directors transformed and maintained a successful inclusion model throughout their district. The study identified leadership strategies and inclusive behaviors utilized by Special Education Directors who have successfully transformed their district into inclusive school districts.…

Recent state policies demand universities restructure principal preparation programs. Mandates, though unfunded, provide an opportunity for universities to engage representative stakeholders who benefit from context specific instruction. This article demonstrates how professors in one research university used collected programmatic information and…

Once changes or innovations reach the tipping point, they spread throughout an organization and become entrenched as part of the culture, becoming "just the way we do things around here." These authors see the tipping point at play with systemic improvement in two urban school districts with which they have worked. Here, they describe…

A product of the Effective Use of Resources Project (EURP), which was co-sponsored by the Illinois State Library and the Illinois Board of Education, this manual describes a 7-step process for the development of community-based cooperative planning between school and public libraries. The objectives of school/public library cooperative planning…

Intended for use in conjunction with the Illinois Office of Education's School/Public Library Cooperative Community Planning Process Training Manual, this resource supplement contains guidelines for collecting information on planning team members; a suggested agenda for a cooperative planning training seminar; a suggested seminar evaluation form;…

Describes a cooperative program between small school districts in Grundy County to provide ideas, techniques, and resources to implement career education. Program activities described include teacher in-service sessions, the cooperative resource library, a newsletter, a resource guide, special projects, and a one-and five-year vocational plan. (TA)

These proceedings consist of papers presented at a conference devoted to educational resource sharing. Included in the volume are the following papers: "Educational Resource Sharing: The Challenge for Illinois" by Lewis D. Patterson; "Resource Sharing: The Test Is Yet to Come," by John W. Huther; "A Response to the…