Agenda

Speaker Presentations, Sunday, March 26, 2006

Projects Related to School Improvement at CCSSO
Elaine Bonner-Tompkins, Director of Special Education, Council of Chief State School Officers

The CSR Support and Capacity Building Program
Brett Lane, Project Director, The CSR Support and Capacity Building Program at The Education Alliance at Brown University

The IDEA Partnership
Joanne Cashman, Project Director, The IDEA Partnership at the National Association of State Directors of Special Education

The Center for Comprehensive School Reform and Improvement
Hugh Burkett, Director, The Center for Comprehensive School Reform and Improvement

Speaker Presentations, Monday, March 27, 2006

Joint Statement from All Conference Partners
Julia Lara, Deputy Executive Director, Council of Chief State School Officers

The Role of State Government in Supporting Struggling Schools
Pedro Noguera, Executive Director, Metropolitan Center for Urban Education, Steinhardt School of Education, New York University

Response to Intervention (RtI) in General, Remedial and Special Education
Daniel Reschly, Professor of Education and Psychology, Vanderbilt University, Nashville, TN

Promising Practices for African-American Students: Research Findings
Olatokunbo S. Fashola, Senior Research Scientist, American Institutes for Research, Washington, DC; Adjunct Research Scientist, Johns Hopkins University, Baltimore, MD

Findings from the National Literacy Panel on Language Minority Children and Youth
Diane August, Senior Research Scientist, Center for Applied Linguistics

Creating a Model for Systemic Change in Schools that Results in Significant Improvement in Academic Achievement on the Part of Students with Disabilities
Mike Jones, Assistant Superintendent, Educational Services
Diana Walsh-Reuss, Director, Special Education
Dawn Walsh, Project Monitor, Focused Monitoring Facilitated Districts Grant Project
Riverside County Office of Education, Riverside, CA

Extended Learning Opportunities – Summer Adventures in Learning: A Comprehensive Program to Close the Achievement Gap
Chrisandra Richardson, Director, Academic Support, Federal and State Programs
Felicia Lanham-Tarason, Principal, Wheaton Woods Elementary School Montgomery County Public Schools, MD

Native American High Performance Learning Communities: A School Improvement Process Focused on Culturally Appropriate School Improvement Strategies
Patricia Stone, Director, Native American High Performance Learning Communities

Developing a Strategic, Integrated, and Multilevel Approach for English Language Learners from Pre-K to 12th Grade
Susan McGilvray-Rivet, Director
Sara Hamerla, Assistant Director Bilingual Education, English as a Second Language and Sheltered English Programs, Framingham School District, MA

Speaker Presentations, Tuesday, March 28, 2006
Concurrent Sessions

Scaling up Access to the General Education Curriculum for Diverse Learners
Anita Buckley Commander, Director, Classroom Improvement, Alabama State Department of Education

Closing Achievement Gaps in Norfolk Public - Journey to World Class
Part 1
Part 2
Part 3
Gloria P. Hagans, Senior Director, Compensatory Education Programs
Bythella Hickman, Supervisor, Title I Schoolwide Programs
Rhonda Ambrose, Early Literacy Specialist
Sarah Peoples-Perry, Principal, Campostella Elementary
Kathy Gradeles, Instructional Specialist, Campostella Elementary, Norfolk Public Schools, Norfolk, VA

Universal Education
Elizabeth W. Bauer, Member, Michigan State Board of Education

Response to Intervention in Pennsylvania
Judy Marquette, Program Director, Pennsylvania Department of Education and Pennsylvania Training & Technical Assistance Network (PaTTAN)

Addressing the Disproportionate Representation of Linguistically and Culturally Diverse Students in Special Education
Edward Fergus, Director, Research and Evaluation, Metropolitan Center for Urban Education, New York University

Comprehensive School Reform Support and Capacity Building Program: Developing a Framework for Inclusive and Sustainable School Improvement
Brett Lane, Project Director
Phyllis Hardy, Program Planning Specialist
Maria Pacheco, Director, Equity and Diversity Projects
The CSR Support and Capacity Building Project, The Education Alliance at Brown University


Critical Challenges and Promising Practices Identified by States and Districts
The conference gave participants three formal opportunities to network and reflect on what they heard from the plenary and breakout sessions. Facilitated by content experts, these sessions grouped participants across states and roles, by comprehensive center regions. The following critical challenges and promising practices emerged from these conversations.

Critical Challenges

Monday’s plenary and breakout sessions applied research to strategies for diverse learners. The following obstacles were repeatedly cited in relation to the implementation of research- and evidence-based strategies:

• Overcoming resistance to using research findings
• Building staff capacity
• Aligning strategies with different contexts
• Working within an infrastructure that does not support implementation
• Involving families and parents in a meaningful way
• Addressing conflicts between research on early literacy and research on second language acquisition
• Translating research findings into action
• The importance of building relationships and establishing trust
• Retaining excellent teachers
• Identifying and learning from successful large-scale reform

• Maximizing inadequate and fluctuating resources
• coordinating complex systems within the organization