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Dear School Leaders:

As we enter a new school year, I encourage you to reach out to families, community, cultural and religious organizations, and businesses and colleges in your area to get involved in children's education. Invite them to join your partnership or create a new one to improve your community's schools and connect more of your students with caring adults.

Research has found that children have better attendance records, complete more homework, achieve higher grades and test scores, and exhibit more positive attitudes and better behavior when their families are active in their schooling. The U.S. Department of Education's America Goes Back to School initiative promotes family and community involvement in children's learning through back-to-school celebrations during August through October and throughout the entire school year. Sponsored by the Partnership for Family Involvement in Education, the initiative is a vehicle through which schools and communities across the nation have organized thousands of events since 1995. This year, Tipper Gore, entertainer Patti LaBelle, and President of the National PTA Ginny Markell join me as the co-chairs of the initiative's steering committee.

The theme for this year's effort, "Challenge Our Students and They Will Soar," is a call for all sectors of communities to help provide children with a rigorous and excellent education. America Goes Back to School offers communities a unique opportunity to focus on the factors affecting the quality of education in our country and ways in which local people can help to address them. This fall, communities across the nation focus on such important issues as:

Making schools safe and drug free;
Recruiting and preparing quality teachers;
Modernizing schools;
Expanding after-school programs;
Getting high standards into every classroom; and
Increasing pathways to college and careers.

Last October, Memphis City Schools collaborated with Partners in Public Education, a local non-profit organization, to launch "Memphis Goes Back to School Week." The main goals of the week were to showcase the national school redesign models sponsor a parent and youth symposium designed to build a foundation for safer schools. This year, the cities of Houston and Chattanooga are using the excitement of the approaching new century to engage their students in the Mars Millennium Project. An interdisciplinary effort, the Mars Millennium Project encourages students from classrooms and youth groups across the nation to imagine and design a community on Mars for the year 2030.

I hope you decide to join our America Goes Back to School efforts, and work to build new partnerships to improve education in your community. In this special edition of Community Update, you will find planning tips, event ideas, successful examples of last year's efforts, and special areas of concentration for this fall. I encourage you to use the information in this newsletter to help plan events and partnerships in your schools and communities. After all, better education is everybody's business!

1999 America Goes Back to School Steering Committee

To help organize the America Goes Back to School activities during the fall, the U.S. Department of Education recruits individuals and organizations that are committed to improving children's learning and rallying support from communities. Headed by U.S. Secretary of Education Richard W. Riley, Tipper Gore, President of the National PTA Ginny Markell, and entertainer Patti LaBelle, the steering committee includes:

Examples of Last Year's America Goes Back to School Events

Congressional Budget Resolution Would Harm Education

The FY 2000 Congressional Budget Resolution falls far below President Clinton's proposal for education and training. The proposed tax cut legislation that has cleared the Congress, but has not yet been sent to the president, would force drastic long-term cuts in education over ten years. The House budget plan and action on other appropriations bills would likely result in critical funding for programs that reduce class size, expand after-school programs, provide extra resources for disadvantaged children, and help students prepare and pay for college. In fact, the House voted to eliminate the bipartisan commitment to class size reduction. Further, the congressionally approved tax bill does not include President Clinton's initiative to support $25 billion in interest-free bonds to finance construction and renovation of up to 6,000 elementary and secondary schools. Instead, it includes small adjustments in the tax law that would address only minimally the need for modern schools.

"We need to move education forward and provide practical resources to help our students, parents and teachers," U.S. Secretary of Education Richard W. Riley said. "The President's common sense agenda of improving teacher quality, helping student's to learn to read well, expanding after-school programs, increasing parental involvement, ensuring safe and drug free schools and improving Title I does just that. I urge Congress to work with us to improve education in these meaningful ways, not to undermine the support we must provide America's students."

The first chart below shows changes in education appropriations during the past three years compared to the projected allocations to the Labor-HHS-Education Subcommittee based on the Congressional Budget Resolution. The proposed tax cuts would force dramatic cuts in funding beyond the year 2000, but this is not factored in below. The second chart, based on public opinion polls, shows that a majority of Americans want to invest in education. For more information on the U.S. Department of Education's FY 2000 budget request, call 1-800-USA-LEARN.

Center Your Efforts on Key Areas of Interest

This year's America Goes Back to School initiative concentrates on six areas of education that are of particular interest to communities across the country. Below are brief descriptions of these issues, each with an idea or example of how to focus a back-to-school event on that particular area of concern. Take advantage of the attention surrounding your back-to-school event to focus on one of the following areas:

Although 90 percent of schools reported no incidents of serious violent crime in the 1996-1997 school year, nearly every community is concerned about providing children with a healthy and safe school environment and reconnecting disengaged students. Center your event on the task of reducing violence and substance abuse among youth. Organize local summits and form a school-community committee to assess your school in regard to alcohol, drugs, violence, and disorder, and review how your school is dealing with these issues.

Over the next decade, America's schools will need to hire 2.2 million teachers, more than half of whom will be first-time teachers. As classrooms become more diverse, these teachers must be able to respond to the needs of all students. In order to meet this goal, schools and communities will need to recruit and continually support well-qualified teachers to ensure that our children receive high-quality instruction. Honor your teachers with an America Goes Back to School appreciation dinner and, for your long-term project, develop mentoring programs in your school to connect experienced and novice teachers. Start "teacher cadet" programs in middle and high schools to build a pipeline of future teachers.

About 60 percent of all schools report needing to replace or extensively repair at least one major building feature. Overcrowded classrooms, deteriorating facilities, and changing technologies have made school modernization a priority not only for federal and local governments, but also for communities across the country.

Last fall, in Madison, Wisconsin, the superintendent, mayor and teacher and citizen leaders took the media and U.S. Department of Education official Terry Peterson on a bus tour of schools in need of renovation in the school district. Key leaders and the public were able to see first hand what it would take to fully modernize the schools, and what financial investments were needed to make the improvements.

At least 28 million school-age children have parents in the workforce and need after-school care. By keeping schools open longer -- before and after school, during the summer, and on weekends -- students, parents, and other members of the community can enjoy access to valuable educational, cultural, and recreational resources in a safe and supervised environment.

The John J. Pershing Intermediate School in Brooklyn, New York, hosted an America Goes Back to School kick-off for Project PACE (Parents and Children in Education). The school held a celebration breakfast for the opening of the Project PACE "Satellite Learning Center." The center provides community access to the school every weekday evening and for five hours on Saturday.

In the Hamilton County School System, in Chattanooga, Tennessee, over 60 community partners were brought together in November last year to celebrate the success of its Family Resource Center and "Lights On After-school Programs." The after-school centers offer homework assistance, health education, and cultural and recreational programs for children, as well as adult education, family counseling, parenting skills, and computer literacy for parents.

Reading well and independently by the end of the third grade is critical to continue learning. In the same way, understanding the foundations of algebra and geometry by the end of eighth grade opens the doors to more advanced math and science courses that help prepare students for college and careers.

In September last year, the Houston Community College and its partner high school hosted the "Back to School Mentoring Program Kickoff" to celebrate the beginning of an ongoing relationship. The event provided the opportunity to encourage all students to achieve to high standards in every subject, and especially in science and math.

Opening the doors of higher education to all Americans requires not only higher academic standards, but also parent and student awareness of what colleges expect of prospective students. Seventy percent of parents say they would like more information about which courses their child should take to be ready for college, and 89 percent of parents want more information on how to pay for college.

Use your America Goes Back to School celebration to help prepare students for college and future careers. Provide flyers with course requirements and financial aid information. For more long-term efforts, pair up with local businesses to start an internship program, supply mentors, or hold "Think College Early" classes to encourage families to start preparing early for higher education, starting in middle schools.

Try an Event Theme That's Out of this World!

Organize your America Goes Back to School event around the Mars Millennium Project. An interdisciplinary effort, the Mars Millennium Project encourages students from classrooms and youth groups across the nation to imagine and design a community on Mars for the year 2030. Working in teams with educators and civic, religious, business and youth-based community groups, students will weave the arts, sciences and humanities into an exploration of their own communities. The result will be student projects or designs for a new community on Mars that is scientifically sound and offers a high quality of life. Beginning in the spring of 2000, completed projects will be displayed in schools, museums, and in an online "Virtual Gallery."

Guiding the project are the U.S. Department of Education, the National Aeronautics and Space Administration, the National Endowment for the Arts and the J. Paul Getty Trust, in concert with the White House Millennium Council. To find out more about this exciting youth initiative, call (310) 274-8787, extension 150, visit http://www.mars2030.net, or e-mail the project coordinators at mars@pvcla.com. To order a participation guide, call 1-877-4ED-PUBS.

Back-to School Events Can Help Improve School-Community Partnerships

Back-to-school events can be large-scale, or they can be organized for one classroom of children. Size is irrelevant if your project demonstrates a sincere interest in improving education. After choosing the goal of the event/partnership, decide on an activity that fits your objectives. Some ideas include:

In many instances, community partnerships host an America Goes Back to School event to celebrate the beginning of another year of cooperation. Below are some ideas on how your organization can support education throughout the year:

Reminders:

Resources for America Goes Back to School Events

The U.S. Department of Education offers a number of resources and publications for distribution to parents, students and community members at back-to-school events. Covering topics of interest for parents, schools, and students, these publications are free and make a great addition to any America Goes Back to School event. Call 1-877-4ED-PUBS to order the following booklets, or ask for information that is focused specifically on one of your key areas of education.

America Goes Back to School: Information for Families and Community Members. This publication is designed for families, schools and communities around the country that are gearing up for another year of back-to-school activities. It offers tips to help children read well and independently by the end of third grade, meet high standards in math and science, and prepare for college and careers early in the middle grades. This publication is available in Spanish.

Questions Parents Ask about Schools. This booklet presents questions commonly asked by parents, and provides answers about starting school, schoolwork, homework, career preparation, safety, and family expectations. This publication is available in Spanish.

Strengthening Your Child's Academic Future. Highlighting the importance of higher academic standards, this publication provides sample questions for parents to ask teachers and administrators to find out about academic expectations in their children's schools. This publication is available in Spanish.

Challenge Young Minds: 50 Ways to Better Education. This booklet provides parents, employers, teachers, and community members with everyday ideas on how they can help improve the education of children they know.

America Goes Back to School Bookmark. Order up to 500 of our "Challenge Our Students and They Will Soar" bookmarks to distribute at your event.

Join a Back-to-School Discussion via Satellite

Every high school, no matter how many students it serves, can provide a personalized learning community where all can reach high standards. Innovative high schools are using new instructional techniques and technology, improving professional development, and engaging students in community service and work-based experiences to enhance classroom learning. Strong high schools are building partnerships with employers, postsecondary institutions, community leaders and parents. And, despite the need for large buildings and heightened concerns about security, innovators in high schools are rethinking traditional structures and creating exciting, engaging places to learn.

September's Satellite Town Meeting, "Back to School: Rethinking America's High Schools," will feature high schools that are re-imagining the way they do business, including recently recognized New American High Schools and New Urban High Schools. U.S. Secretary of Education Richard Riley will host the free, live teleconference about community efforts to improve teaching and learning, and parents, teachers, students, and community leaders from across the country will take part in the discussion. The program will air on Tuesday, September 21, at 8 p.m. Eastern time.

The Satellite Town Meeting is targeted to an audience of informed parents and community leaders who have a strong interest in education. Many sites are holding meetings where teachers, student teachers, parents, university administrators, and others are watching together and having their own discussions. In other towns and cities, the Satellite Town meeting is broadcast live on cable access, including school board and other educational channels, as well as broadcast television stations. The program is rebroadcast on TLC (The Learning Channel). You can also view the Satellite Town Meeting live via the Internet by visiting http://quest.arc.nasa.gov/.

To participate in the Satellite Town Meeting, locate a facility with satellite downlink capabilities, or call your area cable access station and encourage them to air the program. Make sure to register your participation by calling 1-800-USA-LEARN, by e-mail at Satellite.Town.Meeting@ed.gov, or by visiting http://www.ed.gov/inits/stm/.

Back-to-School: A Time to Sign Up for Low Cost Health Insurance

The United Way of America -- a participant in the Partnership for Family Involvement in Education -- is working with the U.S. Departments of Justice, Health and Human Services, and Education to organize over 20 back-to-school events around the Children's Health Insurance Program (CHIP). In 17 states across the country, local United Way offices will partner with schools, hospitals, and community organizations to secure health care for children during the last two weeks of September.

The need for such awareness and enrollment campaigns is great. Over 11 million children in the United States have no health insurance. Nearly 4 million of these are eligible for Medicaid, and more than 3 million qualify for CHIP. Uninsured children are less likely than children with health coverage to get the care they need for injuries, such as broken bones and cuts, or for medical conditions that could develop into serious problems, like asthma and ear infections. Because of the medical expenses that their parents have to incur, these children sometimes remain sick for an unnecessarily long time. All together, as many as 250 million school days are missed by children and adolescents 5 to 17 years of age as a result of acute and chronic health conditions.

CHIP and Medicaid can help students across the country stay healthy and stay in school. Administered on a state level, CHIP offers free or low-cost comprehensive health care coverage for uninsured children and teenagers whose families earn too much for Medicaid, but not enough for private insurance.

Please help spread the word about CHIP and Medicaid! Volunteer to help with your local United Way's back to school event this fall, or invite the United Way to take part in your America Goes Back to School efforts if they are not planning a separate program. Use the opportunity to distribute information on your state's Children's Health Insurance Program, or have a person who is knowledgeable about CHIP and Medicaid come to a sign up night or weekend at your local school. Call CHIP toll-free at 1-877-KIDS-NOW for details and materials for your event. To find out the locations of the United Way of America CHIP awareness and enrollment campaign, visit its Web site at http://www.insurekidsnow.gov. To learn more about school-based enrollment strategies for insuring children, visit http://www.ed.gov/offices/OUS/chip/.

A r c h i v e d I n f o r m a t i o n