This paper suggests some things caring educators can do to promote quality instruction that prevents, or at least lessens, the incidence of school failure in minority children. The paper first describes the James Comer School Development Program, which connects minority children to caring adults. The program focuses on community, parents, church, and school as valuable resources for developing students' psycho-emotional, social, and intellectual aspects of learning. It then incorporates the School Development Program with staff development efforts to promote effective literacy learning for the children of the Westbury (New York) School District. Some of the staff development efforts discussed in the paper are monthly grades 3-5 staff workshops, as well as observation and participation in classroom lessons by university educators. The paper outlines the following recommendations from workshop participants: faculty from the C.W. Post School of Education should conduct comparable workshops for the K-3 staff so that all elementary teachers are on the "same page"; Westbury staff is encouraged to connect workshop activities to curriculum development and to align curricular outcomes to the New York State Education Department's standards for English language arts; college faculty should continue to nurture Westbury's learning environments; college faculty and Westbury staff need to develop stronger partnerships with parents so that all key players are supporting children's literacy learning; and both formal and informal assessment should be administered to determine the effects of professional development and parental involvement on student achievement. (Contains 51 references.) (NKA)