Building relationships is the essence of the community college. Higher education administrators learned long ago that building rapport with businesses, state and local government, and constituents is the best way to represent the interests of the community. But that does not make it easy. Board members come and go and the shifting dynamics of…

From statehouse to schoolhouse, interest in community schools and expanded learning opportunities (ELO) has grown. This report captures the interaction between these two mutually beneficial education reforms in local communities and draws important lessons that will help schools, districts, community partners, and others. It illustrates the…

Leaders in the nation's schools and communities are working together across the boundaries of education, government, and public, private and community-based agencies to create community schools. The 11 communities profiled in this report illustrate how cross-boundary leadership helps community schools move from pilot projects to large-scale,…

The purpose of this study was to examine the impact of Whole Faculty Study Groups on student achievement and teacher practices in grades K-3 of a Nebraska school district. Whole-Faculty Study Groups (WFSG) are a type of professional learning community (PLC). Using a mixed method approach, both K-3 student scores on Dynamic Indicators of Basic…

What happens when teams from 57 cities building afterschool systems gather to discuss two key system responsibilities--improving afterschool programs and using data for informed decision-making? Lots of rich discussion. This report covers a national afterschool conference held in February 2013. It details what mayors, program providers, system…

A primary goal of the Nebraska Center for Research on Children, Youth, Families and Schools (CYFS) is to create, nurture, and develop an environment that builds capacity for a strong relationship between researchers and community partners for the conduct of high-quality research that translates into effective community-based practices. The…

The collocation of services in regional Western Australia (WA) is an important strand of WA's regional development policy. The initiative is intended to foster working relationships among stakeholder groups with a view toward ensuring that regional WA communities have access to quality services. Clustering compatible services in smaller…

The role of the rural school on the plains of eastern Nebraska from the early days of the frontier to 1980 is examined in this portion of an eight-state research effort, the Country School Legacy Project, sponsored by the Mountain Plains Library Association to locate and preserve information related to country schools. Data and anecdotes obtained…

Rural Amrica has been experiencing dramatic changes in the transition toward a socially and culturally diverse society. This study is a first effort to explore multicultural reform in rural schools. Multicultural education is the process by which the school environment is modified to accommodate cultural differences as well as to teach the role…

In rural America, community members are working together to reform education, revitalize communities, and improve the quality of life. This article describes long-term efforts, such as Alabama's PACERS program, Georgia's REAL Enterprises project, and Minnesota's Center for School Change. Smaller-scale efforts in Nebraska, Mississippi, and South…

Part of an 8-state effort to study the role rural schools have played in the history of the frontier and to locate and preserve information related to country schools, this report presents information drawn primarily from interviews with 30 former country school students, board members, and rural school teachers in western Nebraska and from visits…

The mission of the Nebraska Center for Research on Children, Youth, Families and Schools (CYFS) is to advance the conduct of high-quality interdisciplinary research to promote the intellectual, behavioral, and social-emotional development and functioning of individuals across educational, familial, and community contexts. Central to this is…

The School at the Centre pilot project in Queensland, Australia, seeks to assess the transferability to Queensland of the philosophy and practice of the Nebraska-developed School at the Center program. The pilot project consists of three phases: information gathering, planning, and implementation and evaluation. This report covers work done during…

This book depicts the lives of women who taught school in the late 19th and early 20th centuries on the prairies and plains of Iowa, Kansas, and Nebraska. The book is based on the narratives, letters, and diaries of 96 schoolwomen and on interviews with living pioneers, memoirs, school reports, photographs, and other documents. Part 1 includes…