Forging A Link: An Experiment in Generating Grass-Roots School - College Partnerships

Donald Cronkite1, Anne Atkins-Bostic2, James Bader3, Donald Bockler, Alice Brewington, Bev Clendening, Terri Derting, Charles Drewes, Joseph Fail, KenBek Fairbanks, Janice Haldeman, Davin Henrikson, Betty Jean Tolbert Jones, Judy Lachvayder, Janna Rynders McClean, Rod Mitchell, Alicia Mundy, Jewel Reuter, Laura Steinberg, Andrea Stewart, Joyce Tamashiro, Laura Thompson, Gail VanGenderen, Leslie White, Kathy Winnett-Murray

I.                    History

A.    Links 1: the two questions and the big idea

                                                               i.      What do we have in common?

                                                             ii.      What can we do to help each other?

                                                            iii.      The influence of Juniata on our thinking

                                                           iv.      The “Good Idea”  -- Meet again as partners

B.     Links 2:  variety in linking

                                                               i.      High School and College Share Facilities and Ideas

                                                             ii.      College Provides a Training Center

                                                            iii.      Summer Workshops at a College

                                                           iv.      College Provides Resources for Classrooms

                                                             v.      Teaching Experience as a Form of Learning

                                                           vi.      Teaming Up on Research Projects

                                                          vii.      Teacher Training

                                                        viii.      College-Elementary School Partnerships

Basic philosophy is mutuality:  The need for mutual gain from the experience and the desirability of that even if it were not needed
 
III.       Accounts and Evaluations of the Partnerships

A. Shared Facilities and Ideas

  1. Thompson/Brewington 
  2. Haldeman/Mundy-Trautman 
  3. Derting/Fairbanks 

B. Discussion Group for High School and College Faculty

  1. Tamashiro/Mitchell 

C. Summer Workshops

  1. Cronkite/Reuter 
  2. Bader/Lachvayder 
  3. Drewes 
  4. (Benner/Mills) 
  5. (Bishop/Nayar) 

            D. College Provides Resources, Expertise and Training (CRETS)

               i.   White/Stewart/(Mitchell) 
              ii.   Drewes 
             iii    Jones/(Franklin) 

            E. Teaching Experience As a Form of Learning

  1. Bockler/(Durant) 
  2. Brown/Henrikson

            F. Research Projects

  1. Clendenning/(Schorn)/(D'Angelo)/(Kurtz)/(Maitland)/(Weiss)
  2. Steinberg/Reuter 

    G. Teacher Preparation

  1. Ellis/(Mack) 
  2. Belzer/Mitton 
  3. Boyer/Burling 
  4. (Lariviere) 

            H. College-Elementary Partnerships

  1. Fail/Atkins-Bostic 
  2. Winnett-Murray/Van Genderen

IV. Assessing the Links (Seymour, VanderStoep)

  1. Objectives
  2. Numbers: # of students; # of teachers involved in some way
  3. Strengths
  4. Weaknesses
  5. Keys to success

V. Communication: e-mail, Black Board, Tapped In

VI. The Marginality Problem and the Problem of Perpetuation

  1. See Evaluation by Elaine Seymour (will be distributed at meeting)
  2. See Sheila Tobias on grants and perpetuation (available at meeting)
  3. See Bev Clendenning’s note on Blackboard (read now, distribute at meeting)

VII. Bibliography

Writing Committees. There will be 11 writing committees. Look on the outline above at Sections III. A – H. Those are the writing committees for particular types of partnership. Taken together you will be writing parts of III and IV A few of you will be removed from those committees to form committees for some overall issues. You’ll work in your particular committees at first and then get switched to a Committees for Putting it Together

Committees for particular types of partnerships.

For these sections you should produced a description of the classification that stands alone – do this during the assessment time. Then you will also be asked to integrate what you write into the overall manuscript. That will take little effort if you make a good stand-alone description.

Committees for Putting it Together

Synthesis Committee – Jewel Reuter and Donald Cronkite will oversee the sewing together of a seamless manuscript from what you write. We will produce (indeed nearly have finished producing) Sections I and II. We will also give you information on how to write so as to make the synthesis job easier.

Marginality Committee – One issue that frequently comes up is the matter of "marginality." Some of our institutions don’t see partnerships as in the mainstream of the institution’s life. That makes it hard to participate if you worry about tenure or good evaluations. We need to write about this. I would like Bev Clendenning, Paul Boyer, and Don Bockler to work on this part. It is section V.

Resources Committee (bibliography)– we need to know what important material has been written on school – college partnerships. This committee will spend time searching in the library while the rest of us write. They will provide us with (I hope) a sizeable bibliography. I’d like Judy Brown, Joyce Tamashiro and Terri Mitton to do this.

Note: This information is not for the paper, but these people who attended at least one Links Conference reported no partnership. How can we use them as a resource? Their experience should be included somehow. Think on this. There is no colleague without great value.

John Durant of Tufts University
Harry Wolf
Ted Bremner
Fe Dumapias
Arthur Koch
Janna Rynders McClean
Wayne Cowell and the other U of Colorado person
Jan Snyder and the other Arizona State person

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