Three adults with severe disabilities received instructional support to make purchases in fast food restaurants. During intervention, participants were prompted to make five distinct choices during the community routine. This prompting resulted not only in increased choice making, but also in collateral increases in the performance of the…

Reports the findings of a study that examined gender differences of local community drug prevention workers regarding client participation, coping and job satisfaction, and the correlation between them. Results and recommendations are discussed. (Author/GCP)

Examined effects of Smart Start, a broad-based community initiative, on the quality of child care for North Carolina preschoolers. Found that care quality, as measured by the Early Childhood Environment Rating Scale, was significantly higher in 1996 than in 1994. Child care quality in 1996 was related to the number of local quality improvement…

The term 'community arts theatre' is used here to describe theatre created and performed by groups of adults in Telford, Shropshire, a new town in the West Midlands of England. The author, who was the co-founder and a theatre worker at Telford Community Arts (TCA), argues that their work is best understood as grassroots artistic reflections of and…

This article features an interview of Duncan Campbell. He was raised in an impoverished urban environment and went on to become a lawyer and successful Portland, Oregon, businessman. He founded Friends of the Children, a faith-based program, to provide permanent paid mentors for the most disadvantaged children in a community. Unlike more casual…

In this article, I propose a theory of pedagogical praxis. Pedagogical praxis begins with the premise that under the right conditions, computers and other information technologies can make it easier for students to become active participants in meaningful projects and practices in the life of their community and suggests that professional…

This article considers a site of practice that fosters dialogic consciousness, which I suggest is necessary to teaching social justice and diversity of thought in all sites of practice, including schools. Consciousness of one's own perspective taking and the dialogism necessary to foster voice development are grounded in a growing awareness of our…

Like all politics, adult and continuing education is local. Future directions for the field and its national associations should benefit local programs and the adult learners they serve. This column explores features of collaboration that could strengthen educational opportunities for economically disadvantaged adults. The foregoing ideas about…

Americans for the Arts is the nation's leading nonprofit organization for advancing the arts in America. Its survey shows that local arts agencies typically serve their communities through programming to the public, services to artists and arts organizations, and developing and managing cultural facilities. Community colleges share many of the…

The Youth Handgun Violence Prevention Project (YHVPP) was conducted in the Denver Metropolitan Area from July 1999 to June 2002. Several factors associated with youth attitudes and behaviors regarding handguns were identified and verified empirically. Interventions were designed to modify these factors and to evaluate their effectiveness in…

This study examines how communities participate in schools across diverse contexts in developing countries and the results attributed to community participation. It reviews evaluations of participatory approaches to education in developing countries to answer two basic questions: 1) How do communities participate in school in developing countries?…

This study examines whether a community-based physical activity intervention influenced movement in stages of change in physical activity in an adult population, whether any such effect was mediated by psychosocial influences, and whether any such mediations were moderated by sociodemographic or anthropometric factors. The 3-year-long…

"Data Trends" reports present summaries of research on mental health services for children and adolescents and their families. The article summarized in this "Data Trends" describes child maltreatment prevention programs designed to increase protective factors and decrease risk factors in families who may otherwise succumb to…

Prodigy is an example of a program that is successful due to its being a program that is community engaged. Prodigy is a community arts program, crime prevention and diversion program, serving ten thousand people in seven counties. This article discusses the roles, challenges, and successes of the partnerships with the School of Social Work at the…

A pilot research study to examine the effect of a wellness-based intervention on improving students' body image, personal attitudes, and eating behaviors highlighted the importance of a healthy school environment. Parent and teacher focus groups were conducted to explore the perceived influences of wellness-based interventions designed for…