The National Museum of Mexican Art was founded by a group of educators in 1987. Twenty-three years later, as the first and only Latino museum accredited by the American Association of Museums, it presents exhibition programming of the highest quality, and conserves an extensive and inclusive art collection. Unlike many museums, it places…

Black Hawk College (BHC) is a comprehensive community college serving all or part of nine counties and a population of approximately 224,510 residents in a mostly rural area of north-west Illinois. This practice was fully developed and implemented for the Shifting Gears (SG) initiative during the 2007-08 academic years. Heeding BHC's strategic…

Quality Rating Systems (QRS) are currently operating, under development, or being piloted in over 25 states or local areas. As the QRS model becomes integrated into the landscape of child care and education service delivery, policy, and the decisions parents make about child care across the United States, there is an increasing need for…

From 2003 to 2008, Treatment Alternatives for Safe Communities of Illinois (TASC) implemented the Reducing Risk: Outreach and Pretreatment for Probationers program (RROPP) in Cook County (Chicago), Illinois. The goal of RROPP was to reduce probationers' further penetration into the criminal justice system by increasing participation in substance…

This report provides a summary of major results of the Illinois Bridge Status Survey, administered online between April and June 2010. The purpose of the survey was to understand the extent to which bridge programs are being implemented in Illinois, as well as to build an online directory of bridge programs. Bridge programs are an emerging…

An increasing number of jobs in today's workforce require postsecondary education, yet large numbers of workers lack the essential skills and credentials to fill these jobs. The result is that many workers remain underemployed, reaching a ceiling early in their working careers. In 2007, the Joyce Foundation launched the Shifting Gears initiative…

Adult education services, including education for those lacking basic literacy and numeracy, preparation for the high school equivalency diploma, and English-as-a-second-language courses, play a crucial role in bridging the basic skills gap for Latinos and other workers with limited formal education and training. With recent policy and program…

The collaborative effort between two Special Collections librarians and a history professor at DePaul University led to a quarter-long undergraduate project in the archives using China Missions Correspondence. In a reversal of traditional methods that assumes archival use to answer a question, this project looks at the document as the source of…

Sometimes a simple idea, such as selling gel bracelets that say "Libraries Matter" to raise money, can spark something much bigger. In this article, the authors explain how their Libraries Matter campaign grew beyond their own regional system to cover their whole state and eventually other points around the globe. This successful…

Describes the Consumer and Homemaking Education Program (CHEP) designed by the Illinois Cooperative Extension Service to help low-income families improve their use and management of available family resources. Description of the program includes program delivery, program assistants, teaching materials, and recent program innovations. (TA)

Provides an overview and evaluation of an Illinois public library project that gave large-group workshops about the Internet and Web page construction, and encouraged intergenerational programming, new library users, and cooperation between adolescents and veterans. Provides the Web address for "Vets on the Net," a Web site for veterans.…

The Computer Assisted Language Learning Outreach Project for Education (CALLIOPE) was established in 1985 to enhance foreign language instruction in Illinois elementary and secondary schools through inservice teacher education in the form of short workshops, intensive summer institutes, and an internship program. The specific approach is to…