This paper discusses some theories and models of school-community relationships, especially those implied by the coordinated or collaborative services movement, which represents the effort to coordinate activities of schools and other human services agencies serving children and families, especially those at risk. Questions of the relative roles…

Designed to inform and empower women to participate in debates and decisions about the future of work in Australia, this kit provides everything needed to run a discussion session on the future of work with women in the community. It consists of a guide for users, workshop guide, topic sheets, and background reading. The guide for users introduces…

Child care provisions in the federal welfare bill allow state policymakers flexibility in child care fund allocation. This report, prepared for the 75th Texas Legislature, reviews research on the importance of child care programs to low-income families. The report notes that the child care needs of many low-income Texas families have not been met…

If children are to benefit from a healthy, supportive early childhood experience, it is important to strengthen transitions between early childhood experiences in educational and care settings and the more formal educational system. This issue of Coordinator's Notebook focuses on strengthening linkages and transitions between home, preschool, and…

The fact that much of learning occurs beyond school walls points to the need for a holistic approach to education. Such an approach involves planned cooperative links between family and the formal and informal learning environments that exist in the community. This monograph advocates such a holistic approach, discussing not only the value of…

This document is comprised of four booklets (in Spanish and English versions) providing Arizona parents with information on the Arizona Academic Standards and describing how parents can support their children's learning. The first booklet describes kindergarten as the readiness level during which parents help their children prepare to learn and…

Studies have found that students who live apart from one or both of their biological parents tend to do less well in school than students who live with both their biological parents. Some observers have speculated that differences in levels of parents' school involvement may account for observed disparities in academic outcomes. For this study,…

This report is the first step in a multi-year effort to identify and demonstrate community-based strategies for helping family, friend, and neighbor caregivers meet the needs of working parents, their children, and employers. Information for the report was obtained through interviews with experts, employers, employees, and their caregivers. The…

At first look, it seems inconsistent and unjust to give help to families which place their children in nonparental care, and deny equivalent help to families in which a parent provides all the care. One might argue that parents who buy care and parents who give care themselves have the same very burdensome problem to deal with and are just…

In response to recent state legislation, school districts in New York developed plans for universal prekindergarten (UPK) programs for the 1998-1999 academic year. Based on an analysis of the first year prekindergarten program plans for 63 upstate New York districts (with follow-up information on 29 districts) and 32 New York City districts, this…

This action research project sought to increase parental involvement in targeted kindergarten classrooms. Evidence for the problem included the lack of family attendance at school functions, declining membership in the parent-sponsored Booster Club, and lack of parental support for school policies. The project focused on three areas of parental…

This paper describes activities and achievements of a South Dakota project to improve the delivery of educational services to children with deaf-blindness and their families. Accomplishments are provided for specific objectives under the following goals: (1) children with deaf-blindness and their families will have enhanced skills and abilities…

This book shares the author's discoveries in a first-grade classroom about Family Message Journals--notebooks in which children write a message to their families each day about something they did, learned, or thought about in school, and then a family member writes a message in reply. The book is intended to spur other teachers to reflect on how…

When teachers as members of the community realize that every day in the United States 10 children of school age or under lose their lives by being burned to death, no effective effort should be considered too great to prevent such tragedies. Those who work constantly in the fire-prevention field say that adults are not easily educated to the need…

Ten years ago higher education scholars predicted a major faculty turnover in the late 1990s and into the twenty-first century--a prediction based on demographic data on an aging faculty. The turnover is under way, accelerated by early retirement policies. Currently blocks of faculty positions are opening up at regional colleges and universities,…