This paper is written for state educational agency (SEA) leaders who are considering the benefits of collaborative benchmarking, and it addresses the following questions: (1) What does benchmarking of best practices entail?; (2) How does "collaborative benchmarking" enhance the process?; (3) How do SEAs control the process so that "their" needs…

Lack of money has long kept promising preventive programs from expanding. Existing government-funded programs are furthermore subject to budgetary cutbacks or complete loss of funding. Moreover, preventive programs traditionally offer no accountability for success or failure. This leaves government entities in a bind where if they invest their…

On February 17, 2009, President Barack Obama signed the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act into law. Passed in response to the 2008 recession, the Act's purpose was to create jobs, pump money into the economy, and encourage spending. Through the Act, states received $1.2 billion in funding for the workforce investment system to provide…

It is well documented that undetected hearing loss can have a profound effect on a child's holistic development, including communicative, language and cognitive development. It is crucial therefore that deaf and hard of hearing infants are detected as early as possible so that appropriate intervention services and support can be initiated. To…

The Community Action Education Case Management program was developed in Fayette County, Pennsylvania, to provide 50 homeless, undereducated adults and their families with case management services. These services were to include: individual, group, and in-home counseling; advocacy; service coordination; and evaluation. During the program, 58…

The extreme variability of the 50 projects under the NIE Program to Increase the Participation of Minorities and Women in Educational Research and Development necessitates an evaluation design that is flexible enough to accomodate significant differences in project characteristics, yet comprehensive enough to allow meaningful aggregation of…

This report provides in matrix form a comprehensive overview of three Parent Child Development Centers (PCDC) projects located in Birmingham, Houston, and New Orleans. The report is divided into five sections. In Section I, the introduction, a brief description is given of the study's purpose. Section II provides demographic data from each of the…

This paper describes the Elder Program, a 3 year Model Demonstration Program designed to strengthen neighborhood support systems for older persons through an educational program emphasizing information, resources, and skill development. A discussion of basic assumptions and the theoretical background of the model focuses on the principles of…

Between 1965-1972, a total of 150 Michigan farmers participated in the 3-year Kellogg Farmers Study Program, a model for leadership development established at Michigan State University. Participants were selected primarily on the basis of their demonstrated interest in community affairs and their potential leadership abilities. The liberal arts…

This paper examines how selected characteristics of a program and attributes of key actors affected a particular collaborative effort to increase the supply of secondary math and science teachers. A funded grant created the need for collaborative linkage between schools and a university which had no prior experience with joint efforts. Elements of…

The project described in this report was designed to provide a delivery system serving single parents/homemakers by developing a strong network among the area's social service providers and project collaborators that could be sustained following termination of project funding (June 30, 1987). During the first phase of the project, plans were made…

The Partners in Action and Learning Program at Florida's Miami-Dade Community College (M-DCC) was established in 1994 to aid the integration of service learning into the college's general education curricula. Goals for the first year of the program included the establishment of service-learning centers at MDCC's Homestead and Medical Center…

This six-chapter document constitutes the final implementation report of Project Redirection, a demonstration of a comprehensive program designed to provide a range of services to adolescents who are pregnant or have children. Following an introductory chapter, chapter II examines characteristics of the four sites where programs were set up to…

A project was conducted to introduce adults in a rural community in New York to Apple computers. Adults in the Addison School District of Steuben County were recruited through the county cooperative extension program and through high school and elementary school bulletins. Four courses were conducted with from 10 to 25 adults in each four-part…

Between July 1, 1991 and June 30, 1993, Washington State's Displaced Homemaker Program (DHP) served a total of 55,363 individuals. The program's intensive instructional services component was completed by 2,496 eligible displaced homemakers, 84% of whom were aged 30-59. Of the DHP participants, 84% were white, 75% were separated or divorced, 79%…