This report explores the impact of schools and other settings working with families to improve learning and achievement. It identifies the key features of highly-effective practice in engaging families in learning and provides examples of quality family learning which are helping to secure better outcomes for children and young people. The case…

Synergizing the community means the process of complete utilization of the potential human and material energy in the community for the common good. Community education provides evidence for the premises of synergistics. (Author/IRT)

This handbook is designed to guide readers in developing a local assessment of the community's progress toward the National Education Goals. It is organized around those questions that the National Education Goals Panel has used to measure national and state progress in its 1991 report. Information in the introduction includes the history of the…

This article shares critical reflections on cultivating community partnerships through arts education and provides an analytical framework for community building. It is argued that increasing access to arts education requires attention be paid not only to content issues in arts education, but, also, to holistic approaches that address the contexts…

This booklet describes the CORAL (Communities Organizing Resources To Advance Learning) program within five California communities: Pasadena, Long Beach, San Jose, Fresno, and Sacramento. This initiative, begun in 1999, is committed to a community-based and community-building approach to supporting learning and focuses on improving academic…

Sponsored by Rural Action, an Ohio multicounty community development corporation, artist Geoff Schenkel involves Appalachian Ohio communities and schools in the creation of community murals. The projects counter Appalachian stereotypes and boost self-esteem and community revitalization. Includes photographs. (SAS)

The state of Victoria (Australia) is attempting to adopt the following premises: education ought to be a continuing, lifelong process; it should take place through living, that is, in the interaction of the individual with the rest of the community; and it ought to provide experiences that benefit a person. (Author/IRT)

This paper focuses on how to develop a community-based educational intervention when community apathy is present, or where the isolation between school and community makes partnership more difficult. The key elements for this model are three steps: (1) determining the school-community relationship, establishing that a condition of isolation…

This essay considers the worsening plight of the American family from the perspective of major social-structural dynamics, such as decline of community, corporate-induced consumerism, invasion of professionals into family life, etc. Proposed is an invigorated vision of community life and the supportive political-economic conditions that can…

Maintaining that there is considerable confusion over the term "community education," this paper begins by offering a number of definitions. It then seeks to unravel some of the complexities of community education as it exists in the United Kingdom; to explain the growth of interest; to examine the underlying principles and different…

The possibility of converting a vacated school building into a useful resource presents a community with an interesting situation. During a 5-year period ending in 1997, over 100 rural Illinois communities encountered this situation. This report explores what happens to vacant school buildings and offers case studies of various re-uses, new…

This document profiles 11 examples of arts and education institutions across the country that are working to solve community problems. Programs, which reflect a number of purposes, are organized by category. Large Urban Profiles, include: (1) "Bridgemaking" in Chicago: Chicago Arts Partnership in Education; (2) Learning by Working: Young Artists…

This collection of briefs comprises a guide to minority-activity planning designed by the Steering Committee for Minority Communications of the Westinghouse Foundation. They are intended to further the following Westinghouse goals: (1) to encourage youth to pursue careers in technology; (2) to develop strong links with the minority community; (3)…

This paper addresses the nature of educational reform and recommends strategies to better reflect the needs of rural schools and their communities. The furor over education reform is largely produced by those who stand to gain from it, including politicians who promote their own agendas and consultants, professors, and experts who make a good…

This paper proposes particular areas in which research is needed within the fields of community organization and community development. Proposals are based on field research and findings of a two year (1977-79) Community Citizen Organization Study. The report is organized according to the four major categories of analysis in this original…