The purpose of this study was to determine if there was a statistically significant difference in parents' perceptions of frequency and effectiveness regarding parental involvement among various demographic groups (ethnicity, education level, socio-economic status, number of children in the home) based on Epstein's (2007) six typologies of…

This is a story about urban students becoming urban teachers. It begins with the 1988 U.S. Department of Education funding of a bold idea: attracting multicultural/multilingual students to begin their teacher preparation at a two year college, preparing them to continue at a 4 year college. This is how the Milwaukee Area Technical College became…

The extant literature indicates that parental engagement is positively related with student achievement (Celenk, 2003; Epstein, 1995, 2009, 2011; Gul, 2007; Henderson, Daviess, Johnson & Mapp, 2007; Henderson & Mapp, 2002; Kotoman, 2008; Jeynes, 2012; Sad, 2012; Sheldon & Epstein, 2005; Sui-Chu & Willms, 1996). Despite its promise…

Educational reform is not easy. As school leaders search for a format that leads to improvement on many fronts concurrently, data teams is one such promising practice. The data team design not only involves sensemaking of data as evidence of effective teaching and learning, but also builds a professional learning community, distributes leadership,…

This system aims to improve the communication, collaboration, critical thinking, and creativity in schools that serve students with disabilities, especially those in urban and/or high-poverty settings. The STAR system outlines five practices that build a more adaptive and inclusive education environment while utilizing modes of communication and…

Community gardening provides many benefits for students like outdoor physical activity, an understanding of plant life cycles, food production and healthy eating (Blair, 2009; Whiren, 1995). Gardening also provides hands-on learning opportunities to draw parallels between what is needed for plants to grow and what students need to be healthy. When…

The objective of this paper is to explore the operation of magnet and professional development school (PDS) programs in a real life situation using an ethnographic study of Downtown Elementary School (DES--a pseudonym) that simultaneously operates as a PDS and a magnet school. The author spent almost three years at DES, located in the Southern…

The 21 urban research universities that are members of the Great Cities' Universities (GCU) annually enroll approximately 20 percent of the students in the United States who are preparing to teach in K12 urban schools. This study examined the experiences of GCU-sponsored, school-university teacher preparation partnerships in Atlanta, Houston,…

In the action research project report the teacher researchers targeted 70 elementary students in third- and fifth-grade classrooms that demonstrated a lack of social skills necessary to work cooperatively in a classroom. The purpose of the project was to improve the social skills in children. The three teacher researchers who conducted this action…

A new Sacramento State University Urban Teacher Education Center (UTEC) is located at Jedediah Smith Elementary School, a highly diverse urban school whose students come entirely from two federally subsidized housing complexes. This paper documents the integration of UTEC into the school and its community, including descriptions of the initial…

Accountability in many and varied forms is being required of teacher preparation programs. Weiner (2000) explores the dichotomy of the belief that meaningful learning needs to be situated versus policy that demands educational outcomes be standardized. This contradiction demands urgent analysis as we look for appropriate measures of accountability…

Middle school transitions can cause a decline in academic achievement and motivation in learning for many students. Low income underrepresented students are especially vulnerable to this transition. Parental involvement also tends to decrease during the middle school years. This qualitative study examined the elementary to middle school transition…

The article describes the development and implementation of an administrative internship program for selected teachers based upon their interest in and perceived potential for development in an administrative/leadership directions in the largest school system in Alabama. The system cooperated with the State Department of Education and the…