Over the past 10-15 years, the Volunteer Program at the Natural History Museums of Los Angeles County has undergone an immense transition. This program overhaul tackled historical methodology that had been creating barriers to participation, addressed the changing needs of modern volunteer audiences, and worked to highlight access and inclusion in…

Maximize learning by making grades more meaningful and motivating to students. With the support of this practical guide, professional learning communities (PLCs) will discover a clear road map for implementing a standards-based grading system at the secondary level. The authors provide all of the actionable ideas and tools needed to not only…

Equity is not just about what colleges do: it is also about who they are, what they believe, and how they are situated within society at large. Equity-minded coaching seeks to make visible the social and structural context of exclusionary practices embedded within the leadership and institutions of American higher education. Equity-minded coaches…

This tool is designed to be used by Student Success Center executive directors to gather input and prepare coaches to integrate and enact an equity frame in guided pathways implementation. The tool utilizes the Community College Research Initiative's (CCRI) Coaching for Change framework to apply equity and equity-mindedness (Center for Urban…

This tool is intended to help leaders reflect on the ways they are/are not facilitating the integration of social-emotional learning through both their individual actions and the systems and structures they work to create and uphold. Through reflection statements and accompanying sample indicators, practitioners are able to take stock of the ways…

ExpandED Schools (formerly TASC) has spent the past 17 years helping schools and community organizations find the right partners. This resource guide offers a guide to the strategic questions school teams might ask themselves and their potential partners to have the best outcomes for young people. The following attachment is included: School…

Being a cheerleader for innovation or change is great. Implementing specific strategies to increase the likelihood of success is essential. In this key book from bestselling author and speaker Todd Whitaker, you'll discover clear ways to lead and manage school change by setting realistic goals, planning your approach, and tracking your progress.…

This study investigates the use of transfer guides to help students identify transferrable prerequisite credits for academic majors. Employing administrative data of students enrolled in Ohio community colleges, I examine the impact of these curricular roadmaps, called Transfer Assurance Guides (TAG), which were featured in reforms of the state's…

No Child left Behind, The ESEA Flexibility Program, and the Race to the Top contest have spurred a multitude of School Improvement programs, businesses, initiatives and more. The current emphasis on standardized testing, data gathering and analysis, and measuring effective schooling has caused many education agencies, state and local, to seek…

Turn your school into a student-centered learning environment, where rigor is at the heart of instruction in every classroom. From the bestselling author of "Rigor is Not a Four-Letter Word," Barbara Blackburn, and award-winning educator Ronald Williamson, this comprehensive guide to establishing a schoolwide culture of rigor is for principals and…

The community college should be the catalyst to reverse the downward trend of community change. A community renewal college would serve as a change agent for the betterment of life conditions at the local level. Such a college would unite and improve the community by bringing its residents together and teaching them the attitudes, skills, and…

The rationale for taking bold action on the nation's persistently failing schools can be summed up in one dramatic and disturbing statistic: half of the young Americans who drop out of high school attend just 12 percent of the nation's schools. Ending the cycle of failure at schools is a daunting challenge and a surprisingly controversial one.…

Place- and community-based education--an approach to teaching and learning that starts with the local--addresses two critical gaps in the experience of many children now growing up in the United States: contact with the natural world and contact with community. It offers a way to extend young people's attention beyond the classroom to the world as…

Written to accompany the strategies presented in "The Principalship from A-Z," the activities in this book will help you apply the leadership concepts of Blackburn and Williamson to your own experiences as principal. Here, the authors guide you through the process of turning each idea into an actionable plan for your school, allowing you to take…

"Reinventing the Open Door" is designed to serve as a practical guide for community college leaders and practitioners as they work to align their programs, services, structures, and processes to meet the demands of their increasingly diverse student bodies and communities. It is also intended for use by community college boards of trustees and…