In recent years, discourses about youth have been mired in narratives of learning loss and mental health crises. These cultural stories often pathologize youth, offering little in the way of generative pathways for educator practice to aid young people as they navigate the very real challenges in contemporary society. The experiences and…

Solar eclipses are a rare phenomenon that everyone should have the opportunity to explore in depth. This article describes two programs developed by a science, technology, engineering, and mathematics (STEM) outreach center with the goal of bringing the excitement of eclipses to all learners. The STEM outreach center collaborated with local…

This report details how Reynoldsburg City Schools utilized the Inclusive Innovation model to introduce an innovative Open Educational Resource, Socratic Circles, designed to assist teachers in guiding discussions on racial and social justice in the classroom. These OER will be accessible to educators who are inspired by this work and interested in…

Community-Based Research (CBR) presents a wide range of benefits in higher education to students, community partners, and universities. Yet on our campus (and many others), CBR remains less common than other high-impact practices (HIPs) such as service learning and undergraduate research due to lack of effective institutionalization. Moreover,…

The COVID-19 pandemic has brought many physical, mental, and economic challenges and has provided an opportunity for academia to participate in community engagement to help support public health. Through a partnership between a university and a local health district, a contact tracing training program was developed and implemented in the late…

Collaboration between school and community service providers allows for positive outcomes for students across academic and social-emotional functioning. The emergence of the subspecialty field of pediatric school psychology highlights the need for consultation and collaboration between school professionals and medical providers and opens the…

Schools, community organizations, and major cultural entities can address educational inequities by engaging parents and children in arts processes, projects, and performances. Three cases featuring work in the arts show promise in contributing to the positive academic and social development of learners across the socio-economic spectrum. Learning…

School closures can occur not only during a pandemic, but also during disasters, which can impact students' social and emotional well-being and lead to detrimental behavioral outcomes and trauma-related symptomatology. Such negative impacts can potentially be alleviated by inclusion of effective virtual or blended SEL programming that supports…

Approved by the Kansas State Board of Education in 2017, the school redesign project has seen more than 160 schools to reimagine their learning models in a state-led, multiyear process. Annual cohorts named for NASA lunar missions, the fourteen schools in seven districts that formed the initial Mercury cohort engaged in intensive planning and…

For more than a year, the Learning Policy Institute (LPI) conducted research in New Mexico, including interviews, site visits, document review, and new analyses of data provided by the New Mexico Public Education Department (NMPED). The purpose of the study was to provide New Mexico leaders a research perspective on the challenges facing education…

Amaya Garcia of New America talks with Kappan about grow-your-own programs, in which school districts partner with teacher preparation programs to recruit and prepare community members, often current students or school staff, to teach in local schools. A recent 50-state scan shows that there is a great deal of variety in how these programs are…

The CARES (customer-focused, action-oriented, responsive, empathetic, and service-driven) initiative was launched in AISD in 2018-2019 to bring about a culture of respect and inclusiveness throughout the district. The initiative puts an emphasis on positive customer experiences for families, students and staff members. In the spring of 2020, the…

In collaboration with an urban public school, teacher candidates at a nearby university created a social-emotional skills project called Knight Brigade. The author discusses the project planning, implementation, and results as part of this ongoing partnership.

The purpose of this article is to share tensions experienced by the Center for Community-Based Learning and Engagement (CU Engage) at the University of Colorado Boulder during its attempts to facilitate social justice-oriented community change. These tensions speak to larger questions about the goals of community-campus engagement (CCE) programs,…

This paper describes consultation training experiences offered through a decades-long partnership between a university school psychology graduate program and a local Head Start center. The collaboration provides a field placement setting where beginning students engage in activities tied to first-year coursework, and an advanced practicum site for…