Institute for Educational Initiatives // Institute for Educational Initiatives

IEI Seeks Postdoctoral Research Associate in Parental Choice and K-12 Catholic Schools

2012-01-25T16:00:00-05:00

The Institute for Educational Initiatives and the Alliance for Catholic Education at the University of Notre Dame seek applicants for a two-year Postdoctoral Research Associate in Parental Choice and K-12 Catholic Schools, to begin June 1, 2012. This appointment will be awarded to a junior scholar with education research experience in one or more social science fields (e.g., sociology, psychology, political sciences, economics, public, policy, education) espousing a clear research interest in participant and school effects of school-choice policy initiatives. The Research Associate will be expected to design and lead an analysis of a set of Catholic schools participating in the new Indiana Choice Scholarship Program. In addition, the Research Associate will be expected to give a formal lecture through the Institute during the first year of his or her research, and to organize a small conference or symposium on school choice implementation at the end of the second year. He or she will not be expected to teach a course during the first year of the appointment, but may negotiate a teaching load for the second year.

The Research Associate will serve under the supervision of Dr. Mark Berends, director of the Notre Dame Center for Research on Educational Opportunity and Dr. Christian Smith, director of the Notre Dame Center for the Study of Religion and Society. He or she will receive a salary of $40,000 annually plus benefits, and negotiable research funding.

Candidates must have received the Ph.D. by the appointment date and must not be more than three years beyond the Ph.D. The Research Associate will be expected to reside in the South Bend area.

Applications must be received by 5p.m. EST on February 27, 2012. Application review will begin on March 1, 2012 and will continue until the position is filled. Candidates with a special interest in working at a Catholic university are especially welcome.

Applicants should submit: 1) a cover letter and description of no more than five pages describing their research plan, indicating how it builds on existing scholarship and how it will be developed throughout the appointment, 2) a current CV, 3) a writing sample, and 4) the names and contact information for three references. Please send completed applications via e-mail to John Schoenig at Schoenig.1@nd.edu

For further information, contact:

John Schoenig

Director, Program for K-12 Educational Access

Alliance for Catholic Education

University of Notre Dame

107 Carole Sandner Hall

Notre Dame, IN 46556

574-631-8709

http://iei.nd.edu

http://ace.nd.edu

Nancy McAdams Retiring from her ESS post

2012-01-24T08:00:00-05:00

Nancy McAdams, an educator who has helped to give countless young people transformative experiences of learning and teaching, will retire as associate director of Notre Dame’s Education, Schooling, and Society (ESS) minor program, effective Feb. 14, 2012.

Nancy’s eight years in her crucial role with ESS—neither her first nor last term of service in education—have included teaching, advising, and otherwise assisting Notre Dame undergraduates who pursued the popular, interdisciplinary minor housed in the Institute for Educational Initiatives (IEI).

“My best experiences have been with the students, talking with them about their classes and their goals for the future,” Nancy recalls. Among the approximately 100 enrolled in the minor, about 40 go into teaching after graduation, and she watches the entire group become “very knowledgeable and passionate about education.”

ESS was only about a year old, with about 12 students enrolled, when Rev. Timothy Scully, director of the IEI, invited Nancy to help administer the program and to enhance the already close contacts with undergraduates. “The minor has really grown in these years, thanks to Father Scully,” says Nancy, noting the extra faculty support and other resources made available through the IEI.

Stuart Greene, associate professor of English, and Julie Turner, associate professor of psychology, had established the minor in 2002, and Greene has served as director of the program in recent years.

Now approaching its tenth birthday, ESS is poised for a major transition. Notre Dame psychologist and IEI Fellow Nicole McNeill will take the helm as director in the next academic year, with plans to build on the strong base.

Nancy’s successor as associate director will be Julie Dallavis, a former teacher in and M. Ed. graduate of the Alliance for Catholic Education (ACE). She recently served as managing editor of ACE Press.

Nancy credits Greene and Turner with having established a tradition of strong ties to students in the minor. With leaders focused on giving the students wide-ranging insights and experiences—including a capstone independent research project—ESS has grown to be one of the largest minors offered in the College of Arts and Letters.

Enrollment typically includes students who are majoring in business and science, Nancy says. Graduates often find ways to incorporate their education-related skills and perspectives in career paths other than teaching. One past ESS student who was an engineering major has gone on to design educational software.

Degrees and careers in education are a frequent path for ESS graduates because their five-course curriculum helps them explore “where schools fit into society.” Nancy estimates that 10 of the graduates enter the ACE program in a typical year. By the way, Nancy’s own daughter was an ACE teacher and married an ACE teacher. They are Jackie and Brett Guy, both ACE 12.

For many of her ESS years, Nancy taught the program’s internship course. This provided a “student observation experience” answering the question, “What’s life like in the classroom these days?” The internship, part of the fruit of ESS’s excellent relations with educators in the South Bend area, “helped students to discern whether they wanted to go into teaching.”

Nancy’s valued ability to help in this discernment process comes partly from the experiences she had before coming to ESS. She was a life sciences major at University of California, Berkeley who also earned a teaching certificate for elementary education and biology. Years later, she added an M.S. in education degree to her credentials.

While a newbie elementary school teacher in the San Francisco Bay area, she met the man who would become her husband—A. James McAdams, a political scientist who now holds the Dr. Scholl Chair in International Relations and directs Notre Dame’s Nanovic Institute for European Studies.

As a married couple, they lived in several places, including West Berlin (before Germany’s reunification) and Princeton, N.J., until Prof. McAdams took a tenured position at Notre Dame. Before and during that latest career step, Nancy was continuing to teach in public and Catholic schools even as the McAdamses built a family.

Now, with daughter Jackie expecting a baby, Nancy eagerly anticipates becoming a grandmother soon after her retirement from ESS. “I’m really looking forward to my new role,” she says.

But she adds that she hopes to volunteer in local schools in coming years, and she is sure to be maintaining close ties to Notre Dame through her husband’s academic pursuits and through the ESS program.

She says she will cherish memories from her years of service to ESS, particularly the collaborations “making a program that we’re all proud of.”

Berends Selected as Journal Editor

2012-01-18T15:00:00-05:00

Distinguished sociologist Mark Berends, director of Notre Dame’s Center for Research on Educational Opportunity and an Institute for Educational Initiatives (IEI) Fellow, has been appointed as one of the incoming editors of the journal Educational Evaluation and Policy Analysis. Beginning with the 2013 volume year, Berends and the rest of the team of scholars will serve as editors of the journal for a three-year term.

EEPA is a multidisciplinary policy journal that focuses on education evaluation, educational policy analysis, and the relationship between the two. It is published quarterly by the American Educational Research Association (AERA).

Berends’ research is focused on the relationship of school organization and classroom instruction to student achievement, with special attention to disadvantaged students.

Other incoming editorial team members include: Laura Hamilton, senior behavioral scientist and research quality assurance manager at the RAND Corporation; Luis Huerta, associate professor of education and public policy at Teachers College, Columbia University; and Ron Zimmer, associate professor at Peabody College, Vanderbilt University.

Virtual Professional Development for Teachers

2012-01-05T13:00:00-05:00

ACE’s first virtual delivery of a professional development program will start on Jan. 11, when five schools will receive Strategic Intervention Team (SIT) training via webinars, with follow-up through wiki and listserv communication and even a virtual SIT coach.

Faculty from four diocesan elementary schools in the South Bend, Ind., area will participate in the interactive webinars on three consecutive Wednesdays this month. Nancy Masters, ACE’s associate program director for the Teaching Exceptional Children (TEC) program, will present this award-winning training.

The SIT coach, Lindsay Johns Will (ACE 14), will introduce herself to the participants via a visual link and then will offer her online services for these schools throughout the new year. Lindsay teaches at St. Clement Catholic School in Chicago. She formed a successful SIT team during her own coursework in the TEC certification program.

ACE’s Strategic Intervention Teams initiative provides ongoing assistance to Catholic schools that serve children with learning and behavioral problems. The initiative helps teachers develop the process, protocol, and strategies for teacher-led intervention teams, as well as the materials and strategies to help teachers evaluate and enhance their own teaching strategies.

The purposes of the team are threefold: to provide a forum for teachers to develop intervention strategies for students exhibiting learning or behavior difficulties; to provide personnel resource for determining appropriate interventions for students in the regular classroom setting; and to decrease the number of inappropriate referrals for testing or special-education placement.

The SIT initiative, established several years ago and overseen by ACE’s Ryan Director of Program Development Dr. Joyce Johnstone, has consistently used digital communications to help its trained teachers stay in touch. Numerous alumni of the teams around the country maintain online networks for sharing experiences and best practices.

Each of the four local schools will also receive several resources that have been found useful by teams across the nation. Also, the webinars will be archived so that future faculty members, or even parents at these schools, may view them.

The schools are: Holy Cross, Our Lady of Hungary, and St. Anthony de Padua, all in South Bend, and St. Vincent, in Elkhart.

For more information contact: Joyce Johnstone, at Johnstone.3@nd.edu; or Nancy Masters, at nmasters@nd.edu

Blog item from Darcia Narvaez Draws Attention

2011-12-22T09:00:00-05:00

Darcia Narvaez, associate professor of psychology and an IEI Fellow, reports having received 347,000 hits in the first several days after her Dec. 11, 2011, post on her "Moral Landscapes" blog. The blog is associated with Psychology Today magazine. The post that drew so much interest is entitled, "Dangers of 'Crying it Out': Damaging Children and their Relationships for the Long Term."

Narvaez, who is an affiliate faculty member with the Center for Children and Families (CCF), which in turn is affiliated with the Institute for Educational Initiatives, offers her blog readers a detailed review of reasons why leaving babies alone to "cry it out" with a minimum of "mother love" comforting is damaging to both the baby and the mother. She recalls the behaviorist approach that favors "crying it out" has been around for a long time, but the arguments against it have been reaffirmed by modern neuroscience.

These insights have implications for education because parenting practices--one of the areas studied by the CCF--have an impact on children's later intelligence, wellbeing, and moral capabilities, Narvaez points out.

Gift Helps to Address Disabilities & Sports in Play Like a Champion

2011-12-02T12:00:00-05:00

Thanks to a gift from Shire Pharmaceuticals, Play Like a Champion Today®(PLC) will develop educational materials to assist coaches to work with children with a range of learning disabilities, pervasive developmental disorders, such as Asperger's Syndrome, and health problems, such as asthma.

A team of national experts will work with directors of the Play Like a Champion Today (PLC) program to develop a national initiative preparing youth and high school coaches in the area of exceptionalities. Notre Dame’s PLC program, now in its sixth year, offers an athlete-centered, research-based approach framing coaching as a character-building enterprise that complements the educational process. More than 17,000 coaches and 4,000 parents have participated in Play Like a Champion workshops where they are encouraged to see athletics as a means of having fun as well as promoting physical and moral development.

Clark Power, a Notre Professor of Psychology and Education and Co-Director of PLC, expressed his gratitude to Shire. “This gift from Shire will enable PLC to prepare youth sport coaches throughout the country to work effectively with children, who through no fault of their own get left on the sidelines. “

Kristin Sheehan, a Notre Dame Monogram winner, who also serves as a PLC Co-Director, noted, “All children have much to gain from sports participation, this includes children with exceptionalities. This gift will give youth sport programs the resources that coaches and parents need to effectively include these children and help them to grow through the best that sports has to offer.”

The PLC directors will work with experts in the fields of psychology, psychiatry, and education. The team includes: Dr. David Baron, Professor of Psychiatry at the Keck School of Medicine at the University of Southern California and Director of the Global Center for Exercise, Psychiatry, and Sports at USC Medical Center; Dr. Thomas Power, Professor of School Psychology in Pediatrics and Program Director of the Center for Management of ADHD at Children’s Hospital of Philadelphia; and Dr. Joyce Johnstone, Ryan Director of Educational Outreach and Senior Director for Program Development for Notre Dame’s Institute for Educational Initiatives (IEI).

Play Like a Champion Today® collaborates with the IEI and with the Alliance for Catholic Education (ACE), which together embody the University’s commitment to foster excellence in K-12 educational settings, public and non-public.

# # #

Contact for more information:

Clark Power, Director of Play Like a Champion Today, at F.C.Power.1@nd.edu

IEI in Partnership for Math and Science Teaching in Indiana

2011-11-16T10:00:00-05:00

A new University of Notre Dame partnership with the National Math and Science Initiative (NMSI) will help to bring STEM college-level courses to more students in secondary schools across Indiana.

Funding from the U.S. Department of Education, announced last week, cleared the way for NMSI to make a $7 million grant to implement additional College Board’s Advanced Placement math, science, and English courses in Indiana through a program administered by Notre Dame’s Institute for Educational Initiatives (IEI).

NMSI, an initiative launched several years ago by top leaders in business, education, and science to reverse the troubling decline in American math and science education, is expanding to Indiana its highly successful program to effect large-scale change in access to and success in AP courses offered by Indiana’s high schools.

The Advanced Placement Training and Incentive Program in Indiana (AP-TIP IN), set to begin implementation in 34 secondary schools starting in 2012, aims to ensure that more students are better prepared for college and for success in the highly technical and highly competitive jobs of the future.

With the support of BioCrossroads, an enterprise catalyzing the continued growth of Indiana’s life sciences industry, Notre Dame’s IEI has already overseen the training of about 225 AP teachers. This key step toward establishing new courses through the AP-TIP IN program has also received ongoing assistance from the Lumina Foundation and the Lilly Endowment.

“This partnership is a team effort bringing together the worlds of education, business, and government,” says Joyce Johnstone, the Ryan Senior Director for Program Development at the IEI. “The grant from NMSI allows us to move forward on a path that many different stakeholders see as crucial for Indiana’s youth and for our schools.” Johnstone is primary investigator for the project.

Karen Morris, the AP TIP-IN program director, adds, “The expansion of AP teaching capacity in Indiana could not have been accomplished without the enthusiastic assistance of Dr. Tony Bennett [Indiana Superintendent of Public Instruction] and the state’s Department of Education. Our colleagues there have generously contributed to the effort,” she says, noting that schools all around Indiana have shared in the commitment.

Rev. Timothy Scully, C.S.C., director of the IEI, says the NMSI partnership also reflects Notre Dame’s commitment to advance access for the nation’s primary and secondary students to quality education. “This grant illustrates the Institute for Educational Initiatives' unwavering commitment to advance educational opportunity for all children, whether in public, charter, or faith-based schools," Father Scully says. “We seek to galvanize the efforts of all actors in our state and in our country to improve the academic quality of the curricular offerings available to students and teachers, in this instance especially in Math and Science."

Schools participating in the NMSI-supported AP program during the last three years have recorded triple-digit increases in the number of qualifying scores, based on newly released College Board data:

A 124% increase in passing exams in AP math, science, and English among all students, compared to a 23% increase nationally over the same period of time.
A 216% increase in passing exams in AP math, science, and English among African-American and Hispanic students, compared to 50% nationally.
A 144% increase in passing exams in AP math and science among female students, compared to 20% nationally.

The newly announced federal funding for NMSI makes possible NMSI’s expansion into Indiana and Colorado. These join the list of current NMSI AP partner states: Alabama, Arkansas, Connecticut, Kentucky, Massachusetts, and Virginia.

# # #

For more information:

Bill Schmitt, IEI communications/media specialist, at wschmitt@nd.edu and 574.631.3893.

Youth Mentoring through Literature Gains Support from St. Joseph County

2011-11-04T09:00:00-04:00

Reading for Life, an innovative literature-based mentoring program that provides an alternative to prosecution for low-risk juvenile offenders, was recently awarded County funding to sustain its operation in St. Joseph County, Indiana. With the unanimous approval of the County Council and Commissioners, Judge Peter J. Nemeth of the St. Joseph Probate Court has appropriated basic funding for Reading for Life for 2012.

Peter Morgan, J.D., Executive Director of St. Joseph County’s Thomas N. Frederick Juvenile Justice Center, points out that “Reading for Life has been more successful in diverting young people from the juvenile justice system than traditional programs such as community service. The program’s success makes it very cost-effective.”

Developed at the University of Notre Dame’s Institute for Educational Initiatives (IEI), Reading for Life is a character education diversion program that focuses on seven cardinal and theological virtues, and engages youth in small-group discussions of classic and contemporary literature with trained mentors. The goal is to encourage young people to make more prudent life choices. The program mentors juvenile offenders through the Juvenile Justice Center’s probation department.

“This is a very exciting development for Reading for Life,’” says Alesha Seroczynski, Ph.D., director of the program. “For those of us in the academy who conduct applied research, it is always great when a community organization sees such value in our work that they want to incorporate it into their own programming. This really is a scholar’s highest honor.”

Seroczynski, an associate program director with IEI, notes that Reading for Life could not be successful without the tireless hours that volunteer mentors from our community invest in these young people. “Our volunteer mentors are the heart and soul of the program,” she adds. “They genuinely care about these youth and want them to become successful young adults.”

Reading for Life is “a concrete example of how the Institute for Educational Initiatives’ long investment in moral education is now paying dividends,” says Clark Power, an IEI Fellow and Professor of Developmental Psychology in Notre Dame’s Master of Education (M. Ed.) program. “The Reading for Life program in St. Joseph County should serve as a model for literature-based character education across the country.”

PLC, now in its sixth year, is an innovative coach and parent education initiative that frames coaching as a character-building enterprise, with sports complementing the educational process as an avenue toward personal integrity and moral leadership for young people.

For the past two years, Reading for Life has been supported by the Arête Initiative at the University of Chicago. Learn more about this endeavor at http://scienceofvirtues.org; for information about becoming a volunteer mentor with Reading for Life, see their website at http://ireadforlife.org.

# # #

For more information: Bill Schmitt, Media/Communications Specialist wschmitt@nd.edu / 574-631-3893 Institute for Educational Initiatives, University of Notre Dame

CCF Conducting Study of Children's Memory

2011-10-24T12:00:00-04:00

The CCFis looking for children aged 4-6 and their parent to participate in a Memory Study, with psychology professor and .IEI Fellow Kristin Valentino as principal investigator.

We are looking for children, aged 4-6, and their parent to participate in the Memory Study. The study is trying to understand more about what young children remember about past events and how their memory changes with age. The study involves one 45-min. visit to the Center during which your child will tell stories about times from his/her past and will participate in language and cognitive activities designed to be fun and engaging. Parents receive a $15 gift card, and children receive a toy or book. If you are interested in more information, or in signing up for the study, contact Laureen Poinsatte at 631-1569 or email to Laureen.Poinsatte.1@nd.edu.

Target's Donation Supports New ACE Literacy Program

2011-10-19T10:35:00-04:00

The University of Notre Dame's Alliance for Catholic Education (ACE) today launched the "ACE Readers" program, a state-of-the-art childhood literacy program designed to combat the achievement gap that plagues at-risk communities. The program will be implemented in the Notre Dame ACE Academy (NDAA) schools in Tucson, Ariz., and was made possible by a $118,000 grant from Target as part of the retailer's campaign to improve education and reading.
"With Target's support, we are able to significantly strengthen literacy instruction in our partner schools," said Dr. Christian Dallavis, director of the NDAA initiative, noting that strong reading skills will bolster the students' future achievement. "The development of early childhood literacy is critical because children need to learn to read before they can read to learn. This grant provides the tools teachers need to ensure that the at-risk kids we serve can defy the odds by being on the path to college from a very young age."

             Through Notre Dame's ACE movement to sustain, strengthen, and transform Catholic K-12 education, the NDAA partnerships were established in 2010 to offer comprehensive support at three under-resourced elementary schools in the Diocese of Tucson—St. John the Evangelist, St. Ambrose, andSanta Cruz. These university-school partnerships, the first of their kind in the nation, were formed at the invitation of Tucson's Bishop, the Most Rev. Gerald Kicanas.
                ACE Readers combines research-proven methods to strengthen curriculum, instruction, and assessment in reading, with an emphasis on ensuring that every child reads at grade level or higher by grade three. New resources and activities spanning the schools' curriculum will transform literacy education for hundreds of Latino children from low-income families, many of whom do not speak English at home. The schools operate in a community—the southside of Tucson—where only half of the children are likely to graduate from high school.
                "To ensure more students are reading proficiently by the end of third grade, and in turn graduating from high school on time, Target is dedicated to providing resources to help bring learning to life," said Laysha Ward, president of community relations at Target. "We're proud to partner with Notre Dame and the NDAA schools as part of our ongoing commitment to invest in innovative education programs that help keep children on the path to graduation." Target is donating $50 million this fall to educators, schools, and nonprofit organizations across the country, with a goal of $1 billion in giving by 2015, focused on education for reading.
                NDAA's partnership in Tucson goes hand-in-hand with features of other ACE initiatives, including ACE Consulting, the Service through Teaching formation program for teachers, and the Catholic School Advantage campaign to offer the benefits of a Catholic school education to more Latino children around the nation.
                ACE, whose formation initiative for Catholic school teachers was founded byRev. Timothy Scully, C.S.C., and Rev. Sean McGraw, C.S.C., reflects Notre Dame's commitment to make a difference in K-12 education, along with the work of the University's Institute for Educational Initiatives (IEI). Find out more about Notre Dame's commitment at ACEacademies.nd.edu, iei.nd.edu, and forum.nd.edu.

ND Athletics and ACE Sports Initiative Reach Local Youth

2011-10-13T16:00:00-04:00

A new collaboration between the Alliance for Catholic Education (ACE) and the Notre Dame Athletics Department is bringing

a new experience to young people in the South Bend area, combining the excitement of Fighting Irish football and the development of life skills that can convey inspiration and success.

The new collaboration, called the “Irish Experience League” initiative, brings together ACE’s Play Like a Champion Today ® educational program and the Youth and Community Programs office within Notre Dame Athletics.

The Irish Experience League—a youth flag football league for boys and girls in grades 5-8—launched on Sunday, Sept. 25, at two community locations: the Martin Luther King Center in the Westside neighborhood and Kelly Park in the Northeast neighborhood of South Bend. The free program will continue to take place on Sunday afternoons from 1:30 pm to 3:30 pm. Registration is required, and the form can be downloaded here.

During five consecutive weeks, the League will host 60-minute flag football games, accompanied by 45-minute sessions exploring Play Like a Champion Today (PLC) lessons in character development as well as health and life skills. The games and learning opportunities, in both girls and boys divisions, will feature fun with Notre Dame varsity athletes as they join in the activities.

PLC is known nationally as an initiative of Notre Dame’s ACE program. PLC works primarily with coaches and parents to help students integrate constructive values in their athletic experiences and in their whole lives.

The goal of well-rounded human development among these young people is advanced not only through PLC’s well-respected educational approaches for young people in public and parochial schools alike, but through the compelling messages of Notre Dame Athletics. The key message for young people is the five pillars of success in the Irish Experience—namely, excellence, education, tradition, faith, and community.

“We are pleased to be working closely with Notre Dame Athletics on the Irish Experience League—a program that embodies Notre Dame’s mission to turn scholarship into service, especially to the most vulnerable in our community,” says Clark Power, a Notre Dame faculty member and director Play Like a Champion Today ®.

The League’s final session, on Sunday, Oct. 23, will bring the registered participants to the Notre Dame campus for championship games, tailgating, and fun for family and friends. Questions can be directed to the Youth and Community Programs office at 574-631-8788.

Under the direction of Kevin Dugan, manager of Youth and Community Programs for Notre Dame Athletics, and with sponsorship and guidance from Power and his colleagues, the League is catalyzing new engagement between diverse segments of the Notre Dame community—faculty, staff, and students--and the parents and young people of the South Bend community. More collaborations involving Play Like a Champion Today ®, ACE, and the Notre Dame Athletics Department are being explored for the future.

PLC has launched a “Champions for Children” initiative with the goal of ensuring that children from all backgrounds can enjoy and grow from enriching sport experiences that engage them physically, but also help them to grow morally and spiritually.”

More information: Bill Schmitt, Communications/Media Specialist … wschmitt@nd.edu/574.631.3893

Carbonaro Elected Chair of ASA Section

2011-10-06T17:00:00-04:00

Bill Carbonaro has been elected chair of the Sociology of Education section of the American Sociological Association. The section chair is res

ponsible for organizing all of the events for the Annual Meeting, as well as any administrative work that needs attention during the year. Bill is currently the chair-elect of the section, and his term will begin in August of 2012 after the Annual Meetings in Denver. He will serve as section chair in 2012-13, culminating with the 2013 meetings in New York City.

ND Forum Panelists Probe School Challenges

2011-10-03T13:00:00-04:00

The ND Forum panel discussion, "The Conversation: Developing the Schools Our Children Deserve," took place Sept. 28. Leading voices in K-12 education offered prescriptions for reforming K-12 schools, as The Observer and The South Bend Tribune reported.

Rev. John I. Jenkins, C.S.C., President of Notre Dame (right), welcomed participants from left to right, Professor David Campbell, Juan Rangel, CEO for the United Neighborhood Organization, Randi Weingarten, president of the American Federation of Teachers, AFL-CIO, Bishop Gerald F. Kicanas and Wendy Kopp, CEO and founder of Teach For America and Rev. Timothy R. Scully, C.S.C., at the opening of their discussion titled, “The Conversation: Developing the Schools Our Children Deserve” part of the 2011-12 Notre Dame Forum at the Leighton Concert Hall.

See Notre Dame's preview of the discussion and description of the year-long ND Forum exploration of "Reimagining School."

Two days earlier, on Sept. 26, Notre Dame welcomed former Florida governor and education reformer Jeb Bush for a talk entitled, "The Architect: Radical Education Reform for the 21st Century." He proposed new ideas and steps that Notre Dame could take, as reported in The Observer.

Dedication of New Home for ACE and the IEI

2011-09-19T16:25:00-04:00

A commitment to strengthen Catholic primary and secondary education prompted celebrations of joy and hope at the University of Notre Dame on Sept. 16-17 with the dedication of a new home for the Alliance for Catholic Education (ACE).

A series of events, including a blessing by University President Rev. John I. Jenkins, C.S.C., spotlighted the newly built Carole Sandner Hall as well as refurbished office and gathering spaces where ACE and the Institute for Educational Initiatives (IEI) will advance Notre Dame’s service to K-12 education. See the Chicago Tribune's coverage.

The events evoked words of gratitude and encouragement from many visitors and participants, such as the Most Reverend Kevin Rhoades, Bishop of the Diocese of Fort Wayne-South Bend; the Most Reverend Timothy Dolan, Archbishop of New York; and Governor Bob McDonnell of Virginia. Exhibits during an “open house” on Friday, Sept. 16, introduced many faculty, staff, and students to ACE’s 18 years of alliance with Catholic schools.

“The University of Notre Dame’s ACE program has helped to sustain the great hope of Catholic education in this country,” Father Jenkins said, prefacing his blessing with “a tremendous amount of gratitude.” He singled out three benefactor families—Carole and Jack Sandner, Mary Ann and Jack Remick, and Bobbie and Terry McGlinn—who made possible the construction of Carole Sandner Hall and refurbishment of the IEI Building, together just steps away from the Basilica of the Sacred Heart, the Grotto of our Lady of Lourdes, and the Main Building.

Blessing ACE’s new home with hundreds gathered around him, Father Jenkins said, “May those who teach and serve here always strive for wise stewardship of the ongoing mission to sustain, strengthen, and transform primary and secondary Catholic education in this country. Bless them and the entire ACE community, standing on the shoulders of generations of dedicated priests, religious men and women, extraordinary disciples of Christ the Teacher.”

ACE’s new home features Remick Commons, a large and welcoming space that once was the chapel for the convent of Holy Cross sisters, many of whom were Catholic school teachers. Bishop Rhoades complimented the new structure—as well as ACE’s important work in preparing tomorrow’s Catholic school teachers—during his remarks as celebrant at the Dedication Mass Friday evening in the Basilica.

He said he has met many enthusiastic young people serving Catholic schools as ACE teachers. “I see their zeal for the mission. Where does all this come from?” he asked. “It comes from our faith. That’s why we have to have these schools.” The Bishop, calling ACE “just one example of how the University of Notre Dame serves the Church,” said ACE is helping Catholic education locally and nationally in a number of ways, including its campaign to double Latino enrollment in U.S. Catholic schools and its priority attention to low-income children and under-resourced schools.

Archbishop Dolan, touring the newly dedicated space on Saturday, said ACE helps to affirm a bright future for Catholic schools. “I don’t know of any place that gives more hope and promise than here, and this beautiful building is an icon of that,” he said in brief remarks accompanying a blessing. “Keep up the good work,” he added.

The Archdiocese of New York is a partner with ACE in its Catholic School Advantage campaign to give more Latinos the benefits of a Catholic education. The Archbishop personally addressed Rev. Timothy Scully, C.S.C., co-founder of ACE and director of the IEI, noting ACE’s crucial infusion of hope among Catholic school supporters. Father Scully, along with more than 70 faculty and staff colleagues in ACE, hosted a Saturday afternoon tailgate party along with the other dedication-related events.

On the previous afternoon, Father Scully had welcomed the Governor of Virginia to the Main Building for a keynote address setting the tone of the dedication. McDonnell, a Notre Dame graduate, stressed the importance of a good education for young people. He cited Thomas Jefferson’s observation that “whenever the people are well informed, they can be trusted with their own government.”

McDonnell told his audience, “I’m so glad we’re here to celebrate the IEI today and a permanent home now for the ACE program.” He called ACE “something that will shape our values, enlighten our minds, bolster our spirits, and contribute mightily to democracy for a very long time to come.”

Separately, Father Scully thanked the McGlinns, Remicks, and Sandners for benefactions to ACE’s new home, saying “the home you’ve provided will be a vessel of hope and new life for countless thousands of children across our country and across our world for as long as there is a Notre Dame.”

ACE and PLC Cosponsor "Mighty Macs" Movie

2011-09-14T11:00:00-04:00

The Mighty Macs, a new movie that celebrates the intersection of values and sports, will be presented in a “sneak peek” on Thursday, Sept. 15, at the Browning Cinema in Notre Dame’s DeBartolo Center for the Performing Arts. The screening is accompanied by a panel discussion that will include Notre Dame Women’s Basketball Head Coach Muffett McGraw. The event, presented by the Cushwa Center for the Study of American Catholicism, is co-sponsored by the Alliance for Catholic Education (ACE) and its Play Like a Champion Today ® program.

The movie tells the true story of the 1971-72 Immaculata College women’s basketball team who started in obscurity but became a Cinderella story of success on and off the basketball court. More details, including ticket availability, can be found at http://calendar.nd.edu/events/cal/day/20110915/35_All+Events/CAL-2c9360a9-324d6d29-0132-4e36030a-00003fadcalendar@nd.edu/.

ACE and the Play Like a Champion Today program for coaches and parents, affirming values in children through athletics, are happy to join in spreading the word about this movie and its inspirational message. The viewing also fits well with the presentation of the current “Women and Spirit” exhibit at South Bend’s Center for History celebrating the contribution of religious sisters to education and faith in the United States. Some offerings from that exhibit will be on display at the Open House celebrating ACE’s new home on Friday, Sept. 16, starting at 3:30.

Sister Marian William, IHM, President Emerita of Immaculata University in Immaculata, PA, will be another one of the panelists on Thursday. Kathleen Sprows Cummings, Associate Director of the Cushwa Center, will be the panel moderator. The event begins at 6:30 pm. Call 574-631-2800 for information on ticket prices.

CREO and IEI Welcome 2 New Faculty Members

2011-08-18T17:38:00-04:00

Megan Andrew and Amy Langenkamp have joined the University of Notre Dame’s Center for Research on Educational Opportunity (CREO), the Institute for Educational Initiatives (IEI), and the Department of Sociology as Assistant Professors.

In particular, Langenkamp has received the O’Shaughnessy Assistant Professor Chair of Education. She holds a Ph.D. from the University of Texas at Austin in 2007 and was an Assistant Professor in the Department of Sociology at Georgia State University from 2008 to 2011.

Among Amy’s recent published articles are “Academic Vulnerability and Resilience during the Transition to High School: The Role of Social Relationships and District Context” in Sociology of Education, and “Following Different Pathways: Social Relationships, Academic Adjustment and the Transition to High School” in the American Journal of Education. Her research interests include education, race and ethnicity, immigration, and life course transitions.

Andrew received her Ph.D. in Sociology from the University of Wisconsin in 2009. She was a Robert Wood Johnson Foundation Scholar in Health Policy Fellow from 2009 to 2011 at the University of Michigan. Megan’s recent article, co-authored with Professor Erin Ruel of Georgia State University, “Intergenerational Health Selection in Wealth: A First Look at Parents’ Health Events and inter vivos Financial Transfers,” appeared in Social Science Research. Her research interests are education, gender, stratification, and life course transitions.

(Thanks to the CREO staff for preparation of this news release.)

Upcoming Dedication of our New Home at ND

2011-08-18T16:00:00-04:00

The Institute for Educational Initiatives (IEI) and the Alliance for Catholic Education (ACE) have a new home, located at the heart of the Notre Dame campus. A series of events on Sept. 16-17, 2011, will welcome visitors for the building’s dedication and associated celebrations.

The public events will begin with an “open house” at 3:30 pm on Friday, Sept. 16. It will feature displays and activities that tell the story of ACE from its founding in 1993 and the story of the IEI from its founding in 1996.

Visitors to the newly renovated historic IEI building and the newly constructed Carole Sandner Hall will see the collaborative work areas for ACE’s growing team of 70 faculty and staff members. They will also see the central gathering space called Remick Commons. That space, now beautifully refurbished for multiple uses by the University community, was once the chapel of the Sisters of the Holy Cross convent. Their vocation as teachers evokes a shared sense of mission connecting ACE and IEI to this nation’s Catholic school legacy--a legacy built largely by Holy Cross Sisters and other religious orders. Remick Commons is just part of the Sisters’ historic convent and novitiate, now renovated to include offices and state-of-the-art meeting space for IEI staff members.

This new home for the IEI and ACE will be blessed by University President Rev. John I. Jenkins, C.S.C., at 5 pm on Friday. The official dedication will be accompanied at 5:30 pm by a keynote address delivered by Gov. Bob McDonnell of Virginia in the Rotunda of the Main Building, only steps away from Carole Sandner Hall.

The Most Reverend Kevin Rhoades, Bishop of the Diocese of Fort Wayne-South Bend, will preside at the Dedication Mass in the Basilica of the Sacred Heart that follows the open house at 6:30 pm.

The public celebrations conclude on Saturday, Sept. 17, with a tailgate party adjacent to Carole Sandner Hall, beginning at 10:30 am. This precedes the football game between the Fighting Irish of Notre Dame and the Michigan State Spartans that kicks off at 3:30 pm.

CREO's Carbonaro Honored for Service to Graduate Students

2011-08-17T17:18:00-04:00

     The Center for Research in Educational Opportunity (CREO) at the University of Notre Dame and its director Dr. Mark Berends congratulate assistant director Bill Carbonaro, who was awarded the University’s 2011 award for the outstanding Director of Graduate Studies.

      Carbonaro is the first recipient of this new award, the Notre Dame DGS of the Year. He was honored for his excellent work as director of graduate students for the Department of Sociology.

      Department chairman Rory McVeigh had this to say about Bill’s work, “While I am certain that there are many very good directors of graduate study on campus, I cannot imagine that there is one who is more competent, conscientious, and forward-looking than Bill Carbonaro.”

      Notre Dame’s Dean of the Graduate School, Gregory E. Sterling, echoed McVeigh’s praises of CREO’s Carbonaro, “Although competition for the award was very stiff, Bill has had a greater impact on his program than any other current director of graduate studies. He has reworked the program from the ground up. He has changed most of the key elements of the program and made it far more efficient and effective for students.”

"The goal was pretty simple," Carbonaro commented after receiving the award. "We have great faculty. We needed a program that ensured that students received the intellectual and professional development necessary to be outstanding young researchers and excellent teachers. All the changes that we made were motivated by that vision.”

      CREO is proud that Bill has received this recognition and excited about his ongoing work at CREO and in the Department of Sociology. He has been a professor of sociology at Notre Dame since 2000 and the assistant director of CREO since 2007. He specializes in the sociology of education, social stratification, research methods, and statistics.

(Thanks to CREO staff for preparation of this news release.)

Greene Honored Among Civically Engaged Faculty

2011-06-22T14:44:00-04:00

Campus Compact, a coalition of more than 1,100 college and university presidents, has named Stuart Greene, an Institute for Educational Initiatives (IEI) Fellow at the University of Notre Dame and director of the Education, Schooling, and Society (ESS) program, one of the 2011 recipients of the Thomas Ehrlich Civically Engaged Faculty Award.

The award is bestowed annually to recognize senior faculty for exemplary leadership in advancing students’ civic learning, community engagement, and contributions to the public good. Recipients’ careers exhibit true dedication to service, to community, and to the integrity of higher education.

Greene, an associate professor of English, incorporates community-based research into the Education, Schooling, and Society undergraduate minor, a program he initiated. Notre Dame’s Center for Social Concerns has given Greene the Ganey Faculty Community-Based Research Award for his scholarly contributions to the local community. He played a key role in Notre Dame’s obtaining the Carnegie Foundation’s Community Engagement classification.

“Stuart is a faculty member who represents the full integration of community engagement into one’s professional life,” says Mary Beckman, associate director of the Center for Social Concerns. She notes Greene’s creation of the ESS program with its focus on community-based learning, as well as his support for community engagement during his service as associate dean of the College of Arts and Letters. “He has consistently, over the years, played a role in the development of students’ sense of social responsibility,” she added. His work has contributed to documented improvements in the community.

Campus Compact is a nonprofit coalition representing some 6 million students. It is committed to fulfilling the civic purposes of higher education. Indiana Campus Compact (ICC) supports higher education’s efforts to develop students into well-informed, engaged citizens. ICC serves as a catalyst to improve people’s lives through service-learning and civic engagement initiatives.

Greene, named earlier this month as one of the “finalists” receiving the award for civically engaged faculty, is a Fellow of the Institute for Educational Initiatives. The IEI is an academic unit of the University advancing Notre Dame’s commitment to the future of schools.

For more information: Bill Schmitt, Communications & Media Specialist for IEI, at 574.631.3893 and wschmitt@nd.edu

Berends Book on School Choice Reviewed in Washington Post

2011-06-02T16:18:00-04:00

“School Choice and School Improvement,” the new book co-edited by IEI Fellow and sociologist Mark Berends, has been reviewed by a leading education journalist in The Washington Post.
“It is refreshing to find a new book presenting some of the most recent findings, as disturbing as they might be to my favorite biases,” wrote Jay Matthews in his May 31 review. The article, Class Struggle, lists several points made by scholars in the field of education.

As summarized by Matthews, the findings include:

School vouchers work in Washington, DC.
Parents say they switch to charter schools for better academic results, but don’t appear to mean it.
Regular school principals in a position to be influenced by competition from charters don’t appear to be doing anything differently.

The research, assembled by Berends and co-editors Marisa Cannata and Ellen B. Goldring, offers answers to the question: Does school choice work as a strategy to improve schools and help students learn?

Berends is a distinguished education sociologist on the University of Notre Dame faculty. He is director of the Center for Research on Educational Opportunity (CREO) in Notre Dame’s Institute for Educational Initiatives (IEI). He is also director of the National Center on School Choice (NCSC), headquartered at Vanderbilt University. The US Department of Education recently recognized Berends’ work at the NCSC.

Berends is the author or editor of leading books on school choice and education reform, including Charter School Outcomes and Handbook of Research on School Choice.
For more information: Bill Schmitt, IEI Communications/Media Specialist, at wschmitt@nd.edu.