Education Commons^™

Art To Bring About Change: The Work Of Tyree Guyton, Melanie L. Buffington

Art Education Publications

Public art takes many forms including commemorative sculptures, site-specific works, and collaborative murals. Additionally, public art can beautify an urban environment (Riley, 2005) or raise awareness of social issues in a manner similar to the AIDS quilt (Russell, 2004). Another possibility is that public works of art are a form of discourse and open conversations and dialogue. Such works of art can help communities work toward unity and empowerment (Hall, 1989; The Heidelberg Project, n.d.; Senie, 2006). As noted by Russell (2004) and Argiro (2004), studying public works of art can be an important part of art education. Tyree Guyton …

Mind The Gaps: Exploring The Use Of Technology To Facilitate Parental Involvement, Particularly For Historically Underserved Populations, Jonathan D. Becker

Educational Leadership Publications

Decades of research establishes positive associations between parental involvement and a number of important student outcomes, including student achievement. Furthermore, a number of technological innovations make facilitating parental involvement more possible than ever. Those possibilities, however, require varying levels of technological sophistication and infrastructure developments in the homes and communities. That a well-documented digital divide exists between low-income and more-affluent communities means that students and families who live in low-income communities--generally, people of color--can be denied access to opportunities for meaningful involvement in and engagement with the schools. To avoid creating an opportunity gap, school leaders must therefore understand and …

Six Themes In The History Of Art Museum Education, Melanie L. Buffington

The Melanie Buffington Papers

This chapter explores six important themes in museum education: experimenting and responding to society; educating to improve society; delivering appropriate content; meeting school curricula and collaborating with teachers; improving practice with theory and research; and developing and implementing emerging technologies.

Enhanced Care Assistant Training To Address The Workforce Crisis In Home Care: Changes Related To Job Satisfaction And Career Commitment, Constance L. Coogle, Iris A. Parham, Rita Jablonski, Jason A. Rachel

Virginia Center on Aging Publications

Changes in job satisfaction and career commitment were observed as a consequence of a geriatric case management training program focusing on skills development among personal care attendants in home care. A comparison of pretraining and posttraining scores uncovered a statistically signifi cant increase in Intrinsic Job Satisfaction scores for participants 18–39 years of age, whereas levels declined among the group of middle aged participants and no change was observed among participants age 52 and older. On the other hand, a statistically signifi cant decline in Extrinsic Job Satisfaction was documented over all participants, but this was found to be primarily …

Contemporary Approaches To Critical Thinking And The World Wide Web, Melanie L. Buffington

Art Education Publications

This article begins with a review of the history of critical thinking and some current ideas on the topic. Then, I explain my working description of critical thinking and how critical thinking is currently articulated in discussions of the WWW in schools. I conclude with ideas for teachers related to developing critical thinking in art classrooms using the WWW.

Middle School Students With Learning Disabilities And English Sols: Part Ii Best Practices, Paul J. Gerber

MERC Publications

This paper reports the findings of Phase II of a MERC study on middle school students with learning disabilities (LD) completed during academic year 2005 – 2006. Phase I investigated the success and failure of students with LD on the English SOLs by analyzing three consecutive years of individual education plans (IEPs). (Please see the MERC report titled “Accountability Testing and Students with Learning Disabilities: Factors of Passing and Failing the Virginia SOL Tests” (2004) for finding of the study.)

The goal of Phase II was to obtain best practices used for preparing students with LD on English SOLs in …

Fairness In Secondary Specialty Centers And Magnet School Admissions: Contending With The Equity-Excellence Tension: A Review Of Literature, Kurt Temhagen

MERC Publications

The purpose of the review is to consider the fairness of admissions processes related to magnet schools and specialty centers. Are criteria appropriate? Is there an under-representation of minority/low socioeconomic groups in such schools and programs? If so, what built-in and unforeseen bias exists in the admissions process? Finally, are there examples of programs that are overcoming these admissions-related problems and, if so, what can be learned from them?

There is some conceptual muddle as to whether magnet schools and specialty centers “work.” In order to know what is meant by “work”, relevant terms must be clarified and aims must …

Alignment Of District Assessments With The Virginia Standards Of Learning (Sol), Joan A. Rhodes

MERC Publications

Parents, teachers, and school administrators all have one common goal — student success. Teachers have been trusted to impart knowledge to students, while hopefully fostering a love of learning, then assessing how much the students know. Assessment in the classroom, whether informal, formative, or summative, has been the major source of identifying students strengths and weaknesses. Today, there is increased pressure on teachers to ensure they are accountable for what they do in the classroom. Within the educational system, students’ success has been measured inconsistently from state-to-state, district-to-district, and even classroom-to-classroom. In this age of accountability, national and state standards …

Team Vision Focusing On The Future: Assessing Community Needs And Outreach, The Grace E. Harris Leadership Institute At Virginia Commonwealth University

The Grace E. Harris Leadership Institute Publications

Faced with this challenge, Team Vision took a multi-pronged approach toward generating a solution. The first prong looked internally to delineate the scope of the problem, define community and community engagement, and understand VCU’s current commitment to community engagement. Next, looking external beyond the University, the team identified model institutions from which an approach for assessing community needs and determining appropriate projects could be garnered. Specifically, Team Vision, investigated Carnegie designated “Community Engaged Universities:” those institutions which have met stringent curricular and partnership criteria. The third step was to identify assessment tools and methods already in use at the University …

The Work Skills Mismatch: A Review Of Literature, Martin Reardon, Wendy E. Balliet

MERC Publications

For the purpose of this review, imagine the case of a firm which has job openings for recent high school graduates. In choosing new employees for these openings, the potential employer is trying to select the most suitable applicants from a pool of people about whom he or she has very little knowledge. It could be thought that an obvious predictor of future employee behavior is the performance of any particular applicant while he or she was in high school. However, “for the most part, employers never ask about high school achievement or performance on standards-based assessments. Moreover, states offer …