Black community members often express frustrations with engagement within school board meetings through continuous advocacy for systemic change. While scholarship has identified the racial tensions between Black community members and school board members, few studies have explored how school board meeting spaces and their practices influence Black…

This booklet addresses persons who would like information about leadership of community groups. It is meant to be read both by current community group leaders and by persons who aspire to be leaders. Roles and functions of community group leadership are presented, along with suggestions about how to carry out the leadership role in ways that…

Describes how the Bisbee Public Schools scientifically identified and involved the power elite in the community in examining, designing, planning, and implementing community education. (Author/DN)

Survey responses from 68 civic and community organizations in South Dakota indicated that one-fourth currently had some level of youth participation. Service/community, religious, 4-H/scout leaders, and youth center/after-school programs, but none of the government or business organizations, indicated that youth participated in decision making.…

This handbook outlines a variety of the strategies that the Salem Public School District in Oregon used to actively involve citizens in governing their school system through community schools. Emphasis is placed on successes, failures, and principles of the community-based problem-solving and decision-making activities which the Salem School…

Includes five administrative phases'' and nine steps followed in conducting a community survey. (SP)

This booklet is intended to help school boards, city councils, and other governing boards establish an effective working relationship with local community councils. In the approach described in this booklet, the community council is created as a legitimate problem-solving group and works with a governing board in continuously identifying and…

Methods for encouraging community involvement and training community volunteers for decision making positions in community schools are described. The functions of community schools are to provide a broad diversity of learning opportunities and to involve citizens in assessing community needs, evaluating services, and advocating…

This paper focuses on defining and comparing four approaches for identifying the community's power actors. It outlines how professional change agents might use each of the four approaches to identify community power actors who are relevant for community development. The four approaches include the positional, the reputational, the decision-making,…

This study examines and compares the perceptions of educational professionals and non-professional personnel concerning Parent Advisory Council members' degree of participatory decision making in the administration of Title I programs in New York City. The sample of educational professionals consisted of New York City district superintendents,…

Suggestions for starting or improving youth participation projects are presented for staffs in a broad range of agencies--Red Cross, YMCA/YWCA, Boy and Girl Scouts, alternative community-based programs, and government agencies dealing with youth. Two central concerns are greater involvement of young people already in contact with youth-serving…