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

Achieving the Goals--Goal 5 - First in the World in Math and Science Technology Resources - November 1996

Appendix A

Challenge Grants for Technology in Education

The Office of Educational Research and Improvement currently funds 19 consortia, each of which has a specific subject-matter or geographic focus. They are located in the following school districts:

San Diego, California
San Diego Unified School District

The "Triton Project" will improve student performance in mathematics and science, using a combination of technologies in an active learning curriculum with an ocean exploration theme. San Diego public schools are to be networked with each other and with several area museums, research centers and aquariums.

Richard Fabian
San Diego Unified School District
4100 Normal Street
San Diego, CA 92103
(619) 225-3416
richard_fabian@qm.sdcs.k12.ca.us

Redwood City, California
San Mateo County Office of Education

Working through a consortium, Silicon Valley high-tech corporations are providing infrastructure support for reform plans that high schools have developed with their feeder elementary and middle schools. The Challenge Grant provides curriculum support and teacher training, consistent with this overall effort.

Joe Becerra
San Mateo County Office of Education
101 Twin Dolphin Drive
Redwood City, CA 94065
(415) 802-5444
Fax: (415) 802-5665

Dover, Delaware
Capital School District

Telecommunications will connect families and schools, extending the time and place for learning and improving communications between parents and teaches. Content is focused on reading and arithmetic in early elementary grades, principally through cost-effective video based on set-top television boxes.

William McGlumphy
Capitol School District
945 Forest Street
Dover, DE 19904
(302) 672-1521
Fax: (302) 672-1714
wmcglum@udel.edu

Waukegan, Illinois
Waukegan Community Unit School District 60

The consortium is working to address problems that the district's schools face as a result of high truancy rates, widespread poverty, high mobility, and low academic achievement by implementing a community mathematics and science program that relies on innovative uses of technologies. The project has strong school-home, school-community, and school-work components, and provides extensive professional development training.

Elaine Armani
Waukegan C U School District 60
1201 North Sheridan Road
Waukegan, IL 60085-2099
(847) 360-5440
Fax: (847) 360-5628
armani708@aol.com

Anderson, Indiana
Anderson Community School Corp.

The consortium of local and state agencies in Indiana is using innovative technology to raise the academic achievement of more than 3,000 underchallenged and at-risk students and their families in six elementary and two middle schools. As part of this effort, the school district will build on previous activities in which a specially trained cadre of teachers and principals temporarily assume the role of entire school faculties to enable educators to participate in professional development activities.

Terri Austin
Anderson Community School Corp.
30 West 11th Street
Anderson, IN 46016
(317) 641-2151
taustin@acsc.net

Indianapolis, Indiana
Indianapolis Public Schools

Utilizing the experience and resources of Ameritech, a cellular service provider, the consortium is developing an affordable, scalable and equitably distributed telecommunication infrastructure linking the North Central Regional Educational Laboratory (NCREL), 25 schools in Indianapolis, 25 schools in Chicago, and 3 in Walled Lake, Michigan. The new network, which directly benefits about 90,000 students, delivers research-based curriculum and technical support in participating schools, and provides professional development activities for the program's teachers.

John Kern
Indianapolis Public Schools
801 North Carrolton Avenue
Indianapolis, IN 46202
(317) 226-4122
Fax: (317) 226-3130
kern@ips.k12.in.us

Natchitoche, Louisiana
Natchitoche Parish Public Schools

The consortium is developing comprehensive programs that use telecommunication to increase participation in high-tech learning by underserved K-12 students in five Louisiana districts. The project will integrate Internet resources and K-12 instruction at five pilot sites across the state, and expects to develop transferable models for providing underserved students access to technology. Over five years, the project is expected to serve more than 174,000 students in 48 schools and 19 communities.

Kerry Davidson
Louisiana Systemic Initiative
1885 Wooddale Boulevard, 11th Floor
Baton Rouge, LA 78006-1511
(504) 342-4253
Fax: (504) 342-9318
e-mail: davison@regents.state.la.us

Baltimore, Maryland
Baltimore City Public Schools

The Baltimore Learning Communities project uses distance learning, interactive cable TV and the Internet to connect schools to homes, places of work, and the community at large. This project provides extensive professional development for teachers, directly involves parents in the education process, and extends a wide range of new educational opportunities to more than 38,000 students in the middle and high school levels.

Michael Pitroff
Baltimore City Public Schools
2500 East Northern Parkway
Baltimore, MD 21214
(410) 396-7607
Fax: (410) 426-6750
e-mail: mpitroff@umd5.umd.edu

White Cloud, Michigan
Newaygo County Intermediate School District

The consortium has been established to develop and maintain an advanced fiber optic cable telecommunications network that will enhance educational opportunities for the county's disadvantaged students and adults, improve the professional development available to the district's teaching staff, and provide a delivery method for improved curricula. The network also supports a unified effort among all county service agencies as they seek to address the social, educational and economic needs of county residents, and supports existing data, video and voice communication capabilities available to all county residents.

Larry Ivens
Newaygo County Intermediate School District
4645 West 48th Street
Fremont, MI 49412
(616) 924-0380
Fax: (616) 924-6311

Omaha, Nebraska
Westside Community Schools

The consortium is a multi-element education program that uses technology to bring museums and other educational resources to K-12 classrooms in Nebraska and other states. The program, which is engaged in creating an integrated arts-focused curricula in all core subject areas, targets more than 41,000 students in both urban and rural settings and has a strong professional development component.

Susan Manuel
Westside Community Schools
909 South 76th
Omaha, NE 68114-4599
(402) 390-2124
Fax: (402) 390-2136

Manchester, New Hampshire
Manchester School District

The "Manchester Challenge" project is integrating instructional technologies into curricula of the district's elementary and high schools. Project technologies, which connect all schools throughout the district, include instructional television, satellite broadcasts, multimedia telecomputing, and administrative applications, and benefit more than 28,000 students. All participating educators are provided the equipment, training, time and ongoing support to enable them to use information technology effectively.

Terry Bullard
Manchester School District
196 Bridge Street
Manchester, NH 03104
(603) 624-6300
Fax: (603) 624 6337
tbullard@pop.ma.ultranet.com.

Laguna, New Mexico
Pueblo of Laguna Department of Education

"Four Directions" is an education reform project that blends American Indian culture with new educational technologies to revitalize curricula and instruction in Bureau of Indian Affairs (BIA) schools. The project is being piloted in eight schools representing tribal groups in eight states, and ultimately will expand to 24 BIA schools located throughout the country. The project involves K-12 students, parents and members of the community, and provides professional development opportunities for teachers.

Gilbert Sanchez
Pueblo of Laguna
Department of Education
P.O. Box 207
Laguna, NM 87206
(505) 552-6008
Fax: (505) 552-6398

Cuyahoga Falls, Ohio
Summit County Educational Service Center

The consortium has developed a program through which students use technology to complete substantive new work that meets high educational standards set forth in new local curricula and the Ohio K-12 competency-based education standards. The project has a strong professional development component and benefits more than 88,000 students in 18 school districts, one-third of which have high percentages of economically and educationally deprived students.

Steve Snyder or Gay Fawcett
Summit Educational Service Center
420 Washington Avenue, Suite 200
Cuyahoga Falls, OH 44221
(330) 945-5600
Fax: (330) 945-6222
e-mail: steves@summit.k12.oh.us
Gfawcett@summit.k12.oh.us
home page: www.summit.k12.oh.us/

Philadelphia, Pennsylvania
School District of Philadelphia

This consortium has developed a program to invigorate K-12 and adult education programs through the imaginative use of educational technologies. Incorporated within the district's systemic reform effort, the program uses many of the latest developments in telecommunications, multimedia, and computer instruction to build new teaching and learning processes within small learning communities. The resulting "Virtual Schools" represent a fundamental and radical transformation of teaching to emphasize interaction and inquiry for the more than 55,000 students who will benefit in the first five years. The program has strong school-home, school-community, school-work components as well as effective support for professional development.

Steven Guttentag
School District of Philadelphia
Office of Categorical Support
21st Street South of the Parkway, Room 230
Philadelphia, PA 19103
(215) 299-7802
Fax: (215) 299-7417
e-mail: gutten@sdp2.philsch.k12.pa.us

Towanda, Pennsylvania
Towanda Area School District

"New Vision" is a consortium that is designed to demonstrate the dynamic abilities of emerging technologies to expand and improve educational opportunities in rural, remote, poor school districts. The consortium is establishing "distance learning centers" at 23 school districts, six higher education institutions and the State Museum of Pennsylvania, which are being linked electronically to a network of 40 schools and agencies. These schools and agencies will be able to offer high-level classes that are not commonly offered due to low enrollment, and exemplary teachers to cover hard-to-fill positions in a number of school districts at once, conduct unique student workshops and offer advanced placement courses. The project will benefit more than 54,000 students in three states and contains a strong professional development component.

Daniel M. Paul
Towanda Area School District
101 North Fourth Street
Towanda, PA 18848
(717) 265-9894
Fax: (717) 265-4881

Sturgis, South Dakota
Black Hills Special Services Cooperative

This consortium has organized a statewide community-focused education program built around introducing innovative technologies in a statewide redesign of K-12 curricula, instruction and assessments, and capitalizing on new technologies to promote student achievement. The program is designed to impact more than 14,000 rural students in the first year alone, and has a strong professional development component.

Jim Parry
Black Hills Special Services Co-op
1925 Plaza Boulevard
Sturgis, SD 57702
(605) 394-1876
Fax: (605) 394-5315
jparry@sdtie.sdserv.org

El Paso, Texas
Socorro Independent School District

The consortium is using technology to rejuvenate the city's schools. The program is designed, among other things, to produce ten restructured partner schools and a teacher preparation institution, fully connected to the Internet and its resources; and teachers who integrate acquired technologies and challenging standards into the curriculum, and who serve as teacher trainers at 70 other schools. The program will benefit more than 10,000 students from impoverished neighborhoods, and will enable 1,000 parents to use laptop computers to provide them with technology knowledge and skills.

Ben DeBellis
Socorro Independent School District
12300 Eastlake Drive
El Paso, TX 79927
(915) 860-3438
Fax: (915) 858-1520
e-mail: bdebellis@socorro.k12.tx.us

Price, Utah
Southeast Education Service Center

This telecommunications project is providing educational opportunities to students who live in poor, rural, or culturally disenfranchised communities. The consortium builds upon existing telecommunications networks, and adds a World Wide Web capability that enables schools to develop on-line educational resources and applications. State parks and national monument resources will be used to engage students in active learning projects. The project has a strong professional development component that focuses on multiple uses of the Internet.

Lynn Bills
Southeast Education Service Center
65 East 400 North
Price, UT 84501
(801) 637-1173
Fax: (801) 637-1178
e-mail: lynn@m.sesc.k12.ut.us

Montpelier, Vermont
Montpelier School System

The consortium is using multimedia telecommunications to expand portfolio and performance-based assessment of student achievement in the arts. Based on the state's Common Core Framework for Curriculum and Assessment, this technology creates a "WEB" of evidence of student performance in multiple learning domains represented by sound, graphics, movement, data and text. The project also puts emphasis on the professional development needed to use this technology effectively.

David Gibson
Montpelier School District
58 Barre Street
Montpelier, VT 05602
(802) 223-6366
Fax: (802) 223-9227
e-mail: gibson@quark.vsc.edu
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