The Developmental Strategies for College Readiness and Success Resource Guide was produced by the Education Commission of the States and the Southern Regional Education Board for the "Countdown to 2015: Developmental Strategies to Advance Readiness in the Common Core Era" convening held April 21-23, 2014 in Charlotte, North Carolina. The…

Minnesota's Intervention for College Attendance Program (ICAP) is a program of competitive grants awarded to postsecondary institutions, professional organizations and community-based organizations. Funded programs focus on increasing the access and success of groups traditionally underrepresented in higher education by strengthening their…

In their work with various educators, artists, and learners around the world, the authors have been exploring what it takes to collaborate successfully across multiple technological platforms and cultural borders. In this article, the authors describe three international collaborations in arts learning that they facilitated and participated in via…

In February 2011, the U.S. Department of Education (ED)--along with co-sponsors from the American Association of School Administrators, the American Federation of Teachers, the Council of the Great City Schools, the Federal Mediation and Conciliation Service, the National Education Association, and the National School Boards Association--brought…

The idea behind public charter schools was to develop flexible models of public schools and to incubate innovative ideas that then could be shared with the district's public schools. Today, almost 20 years since the first public charter school opened its doors in Minnesota, one still does not see consistent, productive collaboration and shared…

The purpose of this qualitative study was to identify significant external and internal challenges that state organization leaders face in promoting science-based teen pregnancy prevention programs within their states. The state organization administrators were chosen because their organizations were funded by the U.S. Centers for Disease Control…

Student retention in postsecondary institutions continues to be a vexing problem, as graduation rates have continued to decline over the last decade. To be a competitive force in the global economy, it is crucial to keep students in school. This research uses a conceptual data model to introduce academic leaders' (N = 104) perspectives to increase…

Based on a review of state documents and interviews with state and local officials in six Midwest Region states, this qualitative study describes state education agency policy development and planning for response to intervention approaches to instruction. It also looks at the support provided to districts and schools implementing response to…

Based on a review of state documents and interviews with state and local officials in six Midwest Region states, this qualitative study describes state education agency policy development and planning for response to intervention approaches to instruction. It also looks at the support provided to districts and schools implementing response to …

Increasing numbers of school districts are starting the higher education drumbeat by the freshman year of high school, employing 21st-century technology such as the popular career-based software developed by Naviance to help students map their school and life journeys. But what is the first step in inspiring those teens to define and pursue their…

The authors describe their experiences teaching Sustainable Cities in North America, a course on both urban sociology and urban sustainability. This course brought students to Portland, Oregon, and Vancouver, British Columbia, and then compared those cities with Minneapolis, Minnesota, on various dimensions of urban sustainability. After…

Increasingly, there is a growing realization in alumni relations that successful alumni programs, benefits, and services are not ends in and of themselves. Rather, alumni engagement is ultimately all about the institution. Success in alumni relations ideally advances an institution's overall forward progress. Twenty years ago, alumni strategic…

Much recent discussion has focused on the pros and cons of cloud computing. Some institutions are attracted to cloud computing benefits such as rapid deployment, flexible scalability, and low initial start-up cost, while others are concerned about cloud computing risks such as those related to data location, level of service, and security…

"Catalyst" is a publication of the U.S. Department of Education's Higher Education Center for Alcohol and Other Drug Abuse and Violence Prevention. This issue contains the following articles: (1) From Competition To Collaboration College Alcohol Prevention in an Era of Competing Risks; (2) A Public Health Approach to Mental Health…

Twenty years ago, when the late Albert Shanker, then president of the American Federation of Teachers, endorsed the notion of innovative schools operating outside conventional district bureaucracies, his aim was to put teachers at the helm. Fast-forward two decades from Shanker's then-radical proposition and there are nearly 80 teacher-governed…