Success by Degrees: Addressing Teacher Shortages through a School-Community College-University Partnership

Using a teacher recruitment and preparation model, a unique partnership between PK–12 schools, a community college, and a university is examined. The focus is on the training and credentialing of future educators, particularly from underrepresented backgrounds, in an efficient and quality manner to assist in meeting the current PK–12 teacher shortage. Data indicate that the partnership is progressing towards, or has met, its targets in addressing said shortage.     

Changing the Game: The Role of Social Media in Overcoming Old Media's Attention Deficit Toward Women's Sport

Social media is now an integral part of modern sports broadcasting, which combines old and new media into a redefined and multidimensional experience for fans. The popularity of social media has particular implications for professional women's sports due to this convergence, and may be utilised by organisations to address some of the issues women's sports face from a lack of traditional broadcast coverage. This article discusses Twitter activity surrounding the ANZ Championship netball competition and analyses the ways social media can help transcend the structural challenges that “old” media has placed on professional women's sports.     

Early academic skills and childhood experiences across the urban–rural continuum

The urban–rural continuum provides unique contexts for development. Differences in access to resources and childrearing norms and practices in urban, suburban, and rural areas may be linked to disparities in early achievement. Yet, few studies examine associations between urbanicity and children's early academic skills. Using nationally representative data from the Early Childhood Longitudinal Study, Birth Cohort (N ≈ 6050) this study examined differences in academic skills at kindergarten entry across large urban, small urban, suburban and rural areas. Additionally, it considered whether home environments and child care experiences explained disparities in early achievement. Results showed that children in large urban and rural areas entered kindergarten with less advanced academic skills than children in small urban areas and suburbs. Lower achievement for rural children was partly explained by less advantageous home environments and increased use of home-based, rather than center-based, preschool. Parents living in large urban areas had less knowledge of child development, which helped explain their children's lower achievement.     

REAL Camp: A School–University Collaboration to Promote Post-Secondary Educational Opportunities Among High School Students

The REAL Camp-NIU Experience established at Northern Illinois University serves as a model to afford high school students an experience in science- and mathematics-related careers. The participants’ perceptions of the college-based camp curriculum were very favorable, as were the perceptions from preservice teachers and practicing teachers concerning the overall effect of the camp on student participants. Data indicated that the camp has shown success over time, with 21 of the 26 participants enrolling in some form of post-secondary education.     

Selection into early education and care settings: Differences by developmental period

Early education and care programs (EEC) serve important functions in promoting children's school readiness skills and supporting parental employment. Yet knowledge remains limited concerning factors inhibiting or increasing families’ use of EEC programs for their young children and whether such factors function differently as children age. This study employed nationally representative data from the Early Childhood Longitudinal Study, Birth Cohort (ECLS-B) following 10,700 children from infancy through early childhood to assess predictors of home and center-based EEC and to delineate whether predictors differed by developmental period. Drawing on Meyers and Jordan's (2006) rich accommodations model of EEC selection, analyses found that factors associated with family needs and resources (parental employment, income, education, and family structure), cultural norms and preferences (race, ethnicity, and immigration status; geographic location; child characteristics; and parental priorities regarding EEC characteristics) and contextual opportunities and constraints (availability of care in the community) were all associated with selection into EEC settings. Many patterns were similar for infants, toddlers, and preschoolers, although race/ethnicity, employment, and availability were most strongly linked to EEC type during infancy, whereas parental priorities for features associated with higher-quality care programs predicted EEC most strongly for preschoolers. Results are discussed in terms of efforts to increase family choice and access to EEC programs.     

Building a Community-Based Identity at Anacostia Museum

A historian explores the construction of Anacostia Museum's identity from the 1960s to the present by examining the history of its exhibitions. Direct community accessibility was part of the museum's founding mission, but Smithsonian administration, museum staff, and community residents all seemed to have different ideas about the meaning of the “neighborhood museum” concept. Designated a “Smithsonian outpost,” and intended to draw African-American visitors to the Smithsonian museums on the Mall, the new museum's mission was instead shaped by community advisory groups to focus broadly on African-American history and culture. Staff efforts to “professionalize” and upgrade museum operations later threatened community access to the exhibition-development process, and most community/museum interaction was relegated to the program and outreach activities of the education department. The 1994 Black Mosaic exhibition provided an opportunity to devise new ways of integrating the perspectives of a changed community into the exhibition-development process.     

Immigrant families’ use of early childcare: Predictors of care type

Early care and education (ECE) settings are important developmental contexts for young children, with nearly half of all U.S. children experiencing non-parental care during infancy and toddlerhood. However, there is little research examining patterns and predictors of ECE selection among immigrant families even though children of immigrants represent the fastest growing population in the U.S. Using data from the Early Childhood Longitudinal Study, Birth Cohort (N ≈ 10,700), including a diverse group of children with immigrant parents (N ≈ 2950), this study aims to fill gaps in the literature by examining predictors of the type of ECE (parent, relative, home-based, or center-based) children experience during infancy and toddlerhood (children aged 7–38 months). It examines how immigrant, family, child, and contextual characteristics predict ECE selection within immigrant families and whether these correlates of ECE selection differ across native and immigrant families. Results show distinct patterns of infant and toddler ECE related to immigrant status, particularly when it came to socioeconomic advantage predicting increased relative care for children of immigrants but not native families. Furthermore, several immigrant-specific characteristics, including region of origin, English proficiency, and availability of non-English ECE options, were associated with immigrant families’ ECE choices for their infants and toddlers.