The Policy Practice in Field Initiative was created to seed innovation and develop new models for an integrated approach to enhance the policy skill set of all social work students regardless of specialization. Funds provided to the Council on Social Work Education (CSWE) are regranted to schools and programs of social work for field placement and…

Child care has been in a downward spiral for twenty years and is a main factor exacerbating the growing worker shortage. New attention before and financial aid during the pandemic perhaps slowed the spiral, but it hasn't reversed it. The primary cause of the shortage in Greater Minnesota is simple: family child care providers, who supply the bulk…

Math Corps is an evidence-based tutoring program serving students in grades 4 through 8 that increases opportunities to learn and practice fundamental math skills related to understanding whole and rational numbers. Its intent is that all students, in particular students who are Black, Latino, and/or experiencing poverty, will reach grade-level…

This chapter describes the University of Minnesota Preparing Future Faculty program, focusing on pedagogical approaches and assignments that have made the program relevant for over 20 years. It concludes with a look at the future facing graduate student professional development.

We present a case study of a multi-year, academic civic engagement (ACE) collaboration in a computer science capstone course. ACE projects in computer science provide an avenue for students to apply software development concepts to real-world projects with actual clients, and can offer meaningful engagement with ethical issues. The typical…

This article focuses on designing and conducting action research in diverse settings. Action research is a collaborative approach to problem solving. It involves consultative problem identification, reflects context, encourages reflexive examination, and ultimately encourages and empowers beneficiaries for desirable change. In that regard, it puts…

Out-of-school time (OST) programs can play an important role in fostering the development of literacy skills among children and youth. To investigate the variety of literacy skill-building strategies OST programs use, researchers from the National Institute on Out-of-School Time (NIOST) examined the practices of 31 programs in Massachusetts. This…

Current research on millennials primarily focuses on their behavior within an academic or workplace setting. This study expands on previous analysis by exploring how millennials respond to community leadership efforts, particularly cohort leadership programs. Participant outcomes from University of Minnesota Extension's County Bridging Leadership…

The University of Minnesota Extension Center for Youth Development made an organizational decision in 2011 to invest in a system-wide approach to implement youth program quality into the 4-H program using the Youth Program Quality Assessment (YPQA) tool. This article describes the four key components to the Minnesota Youth Program Quality…

The task of moral formation has long been an important purpose of higher education in the United States. However, pluralism and lack of moral consensus within secular universities present significant challenges to accomplishing this task. One possible solution is Christian study centers, which offer thick moral cultures that can form students at…

Traditionally seen as a way for institutions to help students alleviate some of the financial demands placed on them, on-campus student employment has several additional benefits institutions can leverage to assist students along their collegiate journey. If designed and operationalized effectively, institutions can use their on-campus student…

The Minnesota Principals Academy (MPA) is an 18-month executive development program designed to enhance the performance of school leaders and improve educational outcomes for students. MPA uses the National Institute for School Leadership (NISL) executive development program, to provide principals with research-based information that they can use…

In a teacher residency, candidates receive almost all of their training in their future job site: They spend at least a year in a pre-k through 12 classroom under the guidance of a highly effective mentor teacher. This on-the-job experience is complemented by coursework that is tightly linked to and builds upon their experiences in the classroom.…

Graduate programs in adapted physical education (APE) prepare individuals to work with students with disabilities in the physical education setting. However, these APE graduate programs vary widely throughout the country, and there has never been a systematic effort to identify and analyze these programs. Therefore, the purpose of this…

Institutions of higher education frequently acknowledge their role in contributing to the common good through their mission statements. The current literature suggests that in order to be effective mission statements must be clearly articulated and reflected in all the activities of the institution including its curriculum. Faculty members at…