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Best practice

The processes, practices, or systems identified in public and private organizations that performed exceptionally well and are widely recognized as improving an organization's performance and efficiency in specific areas.

• A Cognitive Apprenticeship for Disadvantaged Students
  The thesis in this paper by Allan Collins, Jan Hawkins, and Sharon Carver is that the changing nature of work in society provides a potential meeting ground where education for the advantaged and disadvantaged can come together in a curriculum where the educational tasks reflect the future nature of work in society.
• Adolescents and Inclusion: Transforming Secondary Schools
  Teachers and staff of an inclusive high school share their strategies for adapting curriculum, managing behavior, designing accommodations, and performing alternate assessments in this inspiring book.
• Assessment for Equity and Inclusion: Embracing All Our Children
  How students are assessed can determine not only the quality, type, and degree of education they receive, but has long-term consequences for their future. Assessment by standardized testing often labels poor and minority children in ways that exclude them from opportunities, while failing to measure their true potential.
• Bringing Diverse Populations into the Teacher Certification Process
  The College of Education at Wayne State University focuses on the preparation of professional educators for urban settings. In 1997 the College won the AACTE award for best practice in the area of supporting diversity in the teaching profession.
• Caine Learning-Home of Brain/Mind Learning
  Caine Learning provides a good overview of how to reach "cognitive diverse_ classrooms and has a great list of online tools. We especially like the Capacities Wheel and the Guided Experience Model.
• Changing Urban High Schools
  A summary of the Cross City Campaign for Urban School Reform and the Annenberg Institute for Urban School Reform conference held in Baltimore October 2000. In small group sessions over the two-day meeting, participants discussed tactics, pilot programs, and models.
• Cooperative Learning and Strategies for Inclusion: Celebrating Diversity in the Classroom
  This book supplies educators, classroom support personnel, and administrators with numerous tools for creating positive, inclusive classroom environments for students from preschool through high school.
• Doing Good: Best Practices List
  The top 105 Best Practices as chosen by the Technical Advisory Committee of the UN in Rotterdam, March 1996. The best practices are presented by category, and within each category, by region and by country in alphabetical order.
• Effective Education of African American Exceptional Learners: New Perspectives.
  This book presents 11 author-contributed papers covering the theory and practice of effective assessment and instruction of African American students with exceptionalities, including both disabilities and giftedness. Emphasis is on effective delivery of empowering services to African American youth and their families.
• Evidence of Inviting Practice
  How Invitational Education is being used in an urban partnership the prepare novice urban teachers to reform the way practicing elementary and scondary teachers in the UTEP Collaborative interact with their students, collegues, and parents.
• Getting in Trouble: The Meaning of School for "Problem" Students
  Three students attending an alternative school were selected because they had been labeled by their previous school and teachers as "problem students." A series of interviews was completed with each individual with the purpose of exploring the meaning of school for each. Each participant indicated an acceptance of the notion that education is important, but each also felt negatively about school.
• Implementing distance learning in urban schools.
  This digest discusses how urban schools can implement effective distance learning programs through customized development of the three elements crucial to a successful distance education program: a sound instructional design; appropriate technology applications; and support for teachers, students, and collaborative partners (Steiner, 1999).
• No Dream Denied: A Pledge to America's Children
  The third in a series of reports from The National Commisson on Teaching and America's Future (NCTAF). No Dream Denied addresses the issue of retaining quality teachers in our nation's schools.
• PEF and Osborne Foundation Implement Urban Masters Program
  The Osborne Foundation has awarded $1.5 million to the Public Education Foundation (PEF) to implement a master's degree program for urban educators. The PEF, who will raise an additional $500,000 for the project, will coordinate the Osborne Fellows Project.
• Preparing Teachers for Urban Settings: Changing Teacher Education by Changing Ourselves
  This article describes the personal and professional changes experienced by a teacher education faculty who embarked on a joint project relating to urban education. The faculty members committed to write book chapters applying their areas of expertise to the challenge of preparing teachers for urban schools.
• Professional Teaching Standards Project.
  A collaborative effort between the University of Toledo and other urban state universities and their respective urban school districts, including the Toledo Public Schools, and the National Board for Professional Teaching Standards to assist teachers in preparing for National Board Certification.
• Project Site Support
  Since 1999, Project SITE SUPPORT (PSS) has made unmatched contributions to the Baltimore City Public School System by providing hundreds of highly qualified teachers who have been specially trained to meet the diverse learning needs of students in this challenging urban environment.
• School-Community-University Partnerships: Effectively Integrating Community Building and Education Reform
  Paper presented to Conference on Connecting Community Building and Education Reform: Effective School, Community, University Partnerships. The autor explains why universities are an appropriate and central partner to help develop and sustain better schools and communities.
• Standards of Mind and Heart: Creating the Good High School
  This is the remarkable story of the creation of a new kind of high school that truly aspires to educate all students to high standards. Believing that a deeply personalized culture can prevent the senseless violence that has invaded many public schools, educators at Souhegan High School in Amherst, New Hampshire set out to create a safe, caring, and academically rigorous school.
• The Future Teacher Institute. Promising Practices, The Nation's Voice for Urban Education, Council of Great City School.
  The Future Teacher Institute (FTI) is a minority teacher recruitment model which was initiated and field-tested at the California State University, Dominguez Hills (CSUDH) over a five-year period. The major goal of the FTI is to involve promising minority high school students in a direct teaching/learning experience in order to increase the likelihood that they will eventually choose a career in education.
• The NEA Foundation
  Created by the National Education Association, The NEA Foundation empowers public education employees to innovate, take risks, and become agents for change to improve teaching and learning in our society.
• The Pre-Teaching Academy at Walton High School/Lehman College
  Initiated at Walton High School in 1984 the Pre-Teaching Academy has provided an introduction to careers in teaching through college classes and classroom internships for over 700 Walton High School juniors and seniors, 25% of whom plan to pursue, are pursuing or are engaged in teaching careers. All of the students are members of minority groups and most come from low income families.
• The Urban Impact Project - Curriculum Redesign
  The Urban Impact Project's first goal is to restructure university coursework and university/school partnerships to better equip preservice teachers with the necessary knowledge, skills, and abilities to succeed with urban student populations, utilizing technology enhancements where appropriate. The Curriculum Redesign teams strive to reach this goal in three areas: science, reading, and math education.