Community Update

No. 57, May 1998
U.S. Department of Education

• The America Reads Challenge: Help Meet the Challenge This Summer and Throughout the Year
• May Town Meeting Will Focus on Ways to Start and Expand School-Community Reading Programs
• America Goes Back to School 1998: Get Involved! Stay Involved!
• Education Leaders Use Technology to Get Parents Involved in Education
• America Goes Back to School Planning Tip
• Announcements
• Calendar
• "Honor the Past; Imagine the Future"
• Vice President Gore Focuses on Making After-School Count
• Help Meet the Technology Challenge

The America Reads Challenge: Help Meet the Challenge This Summer and Throughout the Year
May 13, 1998

President Clinton issued a grassroots call to action, the America Reads Challenge, in 1996. This unprecedented national campaign challenges every American to help all our children learn to read, including those with disabilities and limited English proficiency. The America Reads Challenge touches citizens from all walks of life and encourages collaborations between educators, parents, librarians, business people, senior citizens, college students, community and religious groups.

The America Reads Challenge:

• Mobilizes volunteers to give students extra help after school and during the summer.
• Motivates parents as their child's first teacher to foster a love of reading at home.
• Recruits colleges to enlist work-study students to tutor children.
• Engages businesses to involve employees and offer incentives to young readers.
• Unites communities to form strong partnerships to promote child literacy.

The America Reads Challenge seeks to improve literacy in the following areas:

Early Childhood: More parents need to know that it's never too early to read to a child. More pediatricians and hospitals should recommend books as well as immunizations. Day care centers need book drives and volunteer readers.

K-3 Students: Many more children need mentors to meet with them weekly to practice reading. Creative summer programs can help children catch up or build on skills gained during the school year.

Family Literacy: Parents who don't read well themselves need assistance so they can help their children and serve as positive role models.

What can you do to meet the America Reads Challenge? Many resources are available from the U.S. Department of Education. The publications Simple Things You Can Do, Ready*Set*Read and Read*Write*Now! are available at the America Reads Challenge Web site at http://www.ed.gov/inits/americareads/, or by calling 1-800-USA-LEARN.

May Town Meeting Will Focus on Ways to Start and Expand School-Community Reading Programs

U.S. Secretary of Education Richard W. Riley and his guests will discuss ways to enlist local libraries to help students continue to progress in reading during the summer months, as well as ways to encourage college and university students and senior citizens to serve as tutors and reading partners for younger students. Entitled "Reading Partners: Teaming Up to Help Children Read Well," the hour-long Satellite Town Meeting will air on Tuesday, May 19, at 8:00 p.m. Eastern time.

The U.S. Department of Education produces the Satellite Town Meeting series in partnership with the National Alliance of Business and the U.S. Chamber of Commerce, with support from The Bayer Foundation, The Procter & Gamble Fund, and The SC Johnson Wax Fund. Broadcast and cable partners include Discovery Communications, the Public Broadcasting Service, and Channel One. The program will be closed-captioned and simulcast in Spanish.

The satellite coordinates are as follows:

C-Band: Galaxy 3, Orbital Location 95 degrees West; Transponder 21; Horizontal Polarity; Channel 21; Downlink Frequency 4120 MHZ; Audio Subcarriers 6.2 MHZ (Spanish) and 6.8 MHZ (English).

Ku-Band: SBS6, Orbital Location 74 degrees West; Transponder 9; Horizontal Polarity; Channel 9; Downlink Frequency 11921 MHZ; Audio Subcarriers 6.2 MHZ (Spanish) and 6.8 MHZ (English).

To participate in the Satellite Town Meeting, ask your local Public Broadcasting Service (PBS) member station or Chamber of Commerce if your group can use the facility as a downlink site, or call your local public, education, or government access channel. Call 1-800-USA-LEARN for additional information or to register your participation, or visit http://www.ed.gov/inits/stm/.

America Goes Back to School1998: Get Involved! Stay Involved!

Parents, grandparents, community leaders, representatives from colleges and universities, employers and employees, members of the arts community, and religious leaders are all great resources to help improve our schools. By helping to launch an new partnership among these groups or by getting involved in an existing partnership, local leaders can take advantage of the America Goes Back to School initiative and improve education in their communities.

A great way to launch your America Goes Back to School effort is by holding an event to kick off the school year in a positive, exciting way. This can set the tone for the entire year and can lead to year-round partnerships and improvement efforts. The 1998 America Goes Back to School Partners' Activity Kit can help you plan your event for the fall. The kit is full of suggestions on the types of activities you and your partners could organize, a planning calendar to help you get started, and information on how to make your event a success. Call 1-800-USA-LEARN to order your free copy of the kit.

This fall, make the theme of this year's America Goes Back to School initiative -- Get Involved! Stay Involved! -- come alive by encouraging everyone to go back to school along with the students in your community. Play a role in improving education, and join hundreds of thousands of families, schools, employers and communities around the country as they say, in word and in action, that "better education is everybody's business!"

For more information about the Partnership for Family Involvement in Education, call 1-800-USA-LEARN, or visit the U.S. Department of Education's Web site at http://www.ed.gov/Family/agbts.

Education Leaders Use Technology to Get Parents Involved in Education

Editor's Note: Member organizations in the Partnership for Family Involvement in Education are using technology to support family involvement in education. Below are two examples of ways that organizations are helping to link families and educators to promote a better understanding of the Internet and build parents' involvement in their children's education.

Every day, young people across the country use the Internet to research subjects for school and for fun, communicate with their friends, visit chat rooms to discuss topics of interest, and play games for entertainment. Soon, millions more will have access at home, school or in their community. Following an "Internet Online Summit: Focus on Children," member organizations in the Partnership for Family Involvement in Education joined with other family, school, community, and business organizations to develop America Links Up: A National Teach-In. This effort includes a series of educational events designed to help parents, teachers and others learn how to use the Internet, understand the online issues relevant to them, and find out about existing tools that can help enrich their children's online experience.

The America Links Up Teach-In tutorials will demonstrate the uses of the Internet, and how it works, and outline online issues about which every parent, teacher, librarian and child should know. The Teach-In week will take place as part of the 1998 America Goes Back to School effort this fall. Participating schools, libraries and community organizations across the country will open their doors so that adults and children can learn the basics about the Internet and tools that promote safe, rewarding online experiences, information about good quality content and how to use it, and ways families can safely navigate their way around this new medium. For more information, visit http://www.kidsonline.org.

Family members and schools are increasingly using technology to strengthen family involvement in education. The National PTA, the American Association of School Administrators, and the Family Education Company have undertaken an effort to link families via the Internet to school districts, local schools and other community resources. For more information, call toll-free 1-888-881-3472, e-mail community@familyeducation, or visit http://www.familyeducation.com/home/.

America Goes Back to School Planning Tip: Enlist the media partners in your community now to help get the message out about your America Goes Back to School event planned for the fall. Submit a request to the mayor's office or to another local or state official to issue a proclamation commemorating your back-to-school celebration. Starting in late May, call 1-800-USA-LEARN for a free America Goes Back to School Partners' Activity Kit to help organize your event.

Announcements

• The deadline for nominations for the APPLE PIE (Parent Involvement in Education) Awards is June 1, 1998. The competition is cosponsored by Working Mother magazine, Teachers College at Columbia University, and the Partnership for Family Involvement in Education. Nominations can be submitted for individuals, schools, community groups, and employers that support partnership efforts around family involvement in education. Your nomination packet should include a brief (200 word) description of the program or individual being nominated, contact information, biographical information on central figures in the organization, summary of results to date, printed brochures and other supporting materials, and press clippings or publicity (if available). Mail nominations to: APPLE PIE Awards, Working Mother magazine, 135 W. 50th Street, New York, New York 10020. For additional information, contact Catherine Cartwright by e-mail at CatheirnWM@aol.com.

• The publication Family Involvement in Children's Education: Successful Local Approaches identifies and describes successful strategies used by 20 local Title I programs that have overcome barriers to parent involvement in education. The publication is available via the Internet at http://www.ed.gov/pubs/FamInvolve/. To order, write to: New Orders, Superintendent of Documents, POB 371954, Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania 15250-7954. Stock number: 065-000-01085-2 and the price is $13.00 per copy. Credit card orders may be faxed to (202) 512-2250.

• The publication The ABC's of Parent Involvement in Education: Preparing Your Child for a Lifetime of Success is a compilation of ideas, tips, and information by members, associates, and experts affiliated with the National Parents' Day Coalition. It is available at a nominal cost from 7-Eleven stores around the country. For multiple copies, contact the National Parents' Day Coalition at (202) 530-0849.

• The San Bernardino citywide school district has launched "City of Readers," a new reading project to help ensure that every child learns to read well and independently by the end of third grade. "City of Readers" supports the America Reads Challenge, and involves all facets of the community in cooperation with the school system. For more information, call Sheri Becar at (909) 425-9245 or Judy White at (909) 381-1280.

• For more information on the fathers' involvement in their children's education study, visit the National Center for Education Statistics' Web site at http://NCES.ed.gov.

• The Hewlett-Packard E-mail Mentor Program provides one-on-one telementoring for fifth through twelfth grade students as well as college age students. Hewlett-Packard employees assist students in the areas of math, science, communication skills and career/education planning. Teachers who are proficient using e-mail and the Web, and who would like to offer this program to their students, are encouraged to apply between April 6, 1998 and October 9, 1998. To apply, access the HP E-Mail Mentor Program Web site and select the "For Teachers" link at http://mentor.external.hp.com.

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Calendar May 7-8 -- "Technology in Education Is Everybody's Business," a business-education conference with The Conference Board. For more information, call (212) 339-0345, fax to (212) 980-7014, or visit order@conference-board.org. August 23-25 -- Boy Scouts of America National Leadership Conference in Nashville, Tennessee. For more information, call (972) 580-2217. October 19-24 -- The 1998 NAPE Symposium on Partnerships in Education, "The Power of Partnerships: Linking Education to the 21st Century," Los Angeles Airport Marriott. For more information visit the NAPE homepage at http://NAPEhq.org.

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"Honor the Past; Imagine the Future"

Gearing Up to Commemorate and Celebrate the New Millennium

All around the globe, there is a growing excitement that we are living in a rare, historical moment; a moment in time when a century concludes and new millennium is born. To celebrate and commemorate this milestone in human history, President Clinton and First Lady Hillary Rodham Clinton have invited all Americans to participate through the year 2000 in meaningful activities that strengthen our democracy, improve communities, and provide lasting gifts to the future.

• Planning programs and events to recognize the history of, and past accomplishments in, American education, and engaging futurist thinking about new advances in American education;

• Producing informational and resource materials that will emphasize education milestones; guide citizens in understanding and appreciating America's rich education history; and inspire thought and discussion concerning the future;
• Encouraging communities and citizens to initiate and participate in local projects that inspire Americans to remember past educational achievements and make concrete contributions to the next generations of students.

The White House has launched Millennium Evenings, a series of lectures and cultural showcases that highlight prominent scholars, creators and visionaries who share their expertise through lectures and interaction with audience members. Speakers have included American historian Bernard Bailyn who spoke on the topic "The Living Past -- Commitments for the Future;" theoretical physicist Stephen Hawking who addressed "Imagination and Change: Science in the Next Millennium;" and three American poets laureate--Robert Pinsky, Robert Hass, and Rita Dove, who, along with President Clinton and the First Lady, shared their favorite American poems and discussed the many voices that create the one voice of American poetry.

Each Millennium Evening is cybercast over the Internet and broadcast via satellite. Check future editions of Community Update to find out more about activities, resources and events being planned by the U.S. Department of Education.

Vice President Gore Focuses on Making After-School Count

The program was produced in partnership with The Charles Stewart Mott Foundation, The National PTA, National School Boards Association, National Association of Elementary School Principals, National Collaboration for Youth, National Community Education Association, and Fight Crime: Invest in Kids. The Partnership for Family Involvement in Education and the U.S. Department of Education also participated in the production.

The teleconference highlighted new resources from local, state and federal agencies, including the U.S. Department of Education's 21st Century Community Learning Centers program, that are available to create and expand after-school programs. Vice President Gore encouraged parents, teachers, principals, business and community leaders to work together to:

• Build community partnerships to support quality before- and after-school programs;

• Identify private and public funding sources;

• Increase access for families in middle and low-income neighborhoods; and

• Keep school buildings open longer to provide quality extended learning programs.

President Clinton's fiscal year 1999 budget request to Congress includes $200 million for the 21st Century Community Learning Centers program. This program will enable schools to stay open during non-traditional school hours, offer mentoring in basic skills and enrichment in the core academic subjects, arts and music, and provide safe, drug-free, and supervised environments for drug and violence prevention.

The U.S. Department of Education's publications Family Involvement in Education: A Snapshot of Out-of-School Time, and Keeping Schools Open as Community Learning Centers: Extending Learning in a Safe, Drug-free Environment Before and After School are available by calling 1-800-USA-LEARN. Additional information about the teleconference hosted by Vice President Gore is available at http://www.mott.org.

Help Meet the Technology Challenge

The Technology Innovation Challenge Grant Program supports local initiatives that will help make these goals reachable. Grants have already been awarded to 62 school districts between 1995 and 1997. These districts are supporting cutting-edge learning technologies to improve teaching and learning with the help of consortium members that include more than 551 school districts, 284 business partners, 140 colleges and universities, dozens of museums and libraries, and hundreds of community-based organizations across the country. More than 1,200 partners have made commitments to these projects, and the value of their contributions exceeds by more than three-to-one the value of federal dollars awarded.

Community partnerships that integrate computers and telecommunications networks into the schools are critical to the success of these projects. One example is the Lemon Grove School District's Project LemonLINK. To help all students learn to challenging standards, the district and its partners have developed the infrastructure for building a learning community which links all students and their parents to the classroom from home through a district Intra/Internet system based on a hybrid wireless fiber network.

While access to computers and computer networks has become increasingly available, teacher preparation and professional development efforts that support the integration of educational technology into the curriculum have not kept pace. The challenge for 1998 is to help the 2.8 million teachers in public and private K-12 grade schools effectively incorporate technology into the teaching and learning process.

On March 5, 1998, the U.S. Department of Education announced a new competition focused on teacher preparation and professional development activities. Applications are being solicited from local education agencies on behalf of consortia that have developed innovative programs or are adapting or expanding existing programs for technology training for teachers and other educators to improve instruction. Applications that involve state education agencies (SEAs) and schools of education in the activities of consortia that are dedicated to teacher training in technology, and propose innovative training approaches and involve model programs that can be replicated at other sites, are encouraged.

The deadline for the competition is May 29, 1998, and about 20 awards will be made by September 30, 1998. For more information, call (202) 208-3882, fax to (202) 208-4042, e-mail to ITO_STAFF1@ed.gov, or visit http://www.ed.gov/Technology/challenge/. The publication Meeting the Technology Challenge: Building New Learning Communities will be available in June from 1-800-USA-LEARN.

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