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From: nccrest@cudenver.edu
Date: 11/05/03

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NCCRESt News, the electronic newsletter of the
National Center for Culturally Responsive Educational Systems

Volume 1, Number 5 October 2003
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Welcome to NCCRESt News, the monthly electronic newsletter of the National

Center for Culturally Responsive Educational Systems (NCCRESt). NCCRESt
News keeps you informed of the work of this project and other news and
information related to reducing the disproportionate representation of
culturally and linguistically diverse students in special education. Each
issue features resources, research, events, and examples of educational
practices that facilitate the learning and development of all children.

==> NCCRESt Update: Upcoming regional technical assistance meeting (Dec.
8-9); October forum on disproportionality (Oct.20-21); collaboration with
the Monarch Center (Nov. 6)
==> Events: LASER's annual conference (Dec. 3-6); National Staff
Development Council (Dec. 6-10); TASH (Dec. 11-13)
==> New Resources: "Educating Cultural Responsive Teachers"; "Closing the
Achievement Gap"; "Status and Trends in the Education of Blacks"
==> NCCRESt Support Desk

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PLEASE SHARE NCCRESt NEWS WITH YOUR COLLEAGUES!
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==> Upcoming regional technical assistance meeting

Southeast Conference, December 8-9
Dallas, TX

During this conference, invited state teams from the southeast (Alabama,
Arkansas, Florida, Georgia, Louisiana, Mississippi, Oklahoma, Puerto Rico,
Texas, and the U.S. Virgin Islands) will focus on the development of
solutions to the issue of disproportionality. States teams will include
data analysts, special educators, superintendents from urban districts,
teachers, parent representatives, among others. NCCRESt will guide each
team through a group process that is designed to help them develop
technical assistance plans.

For more information, contact Shelley Zion, Project Coordinator, at
303-556-3990 or shelley.zion@cudenver.edu.

==> 27 states represented at NCCRESt's October Forum on
Disproproportionality!

State departments of education, Regional Resource Centers, and parent and
advocacy groups from 27 states in the Great Lakes, Mountain Plains, and
Western regions of the country attended NCCRESt's first Forum on
Disproportionality. Participants attending the October 20-21 forum in
Denver increased their awareness of the issue of disproportionality.
NCCRESt is excited to continue working with these states and to help them
develop strategies to reduce the achievement gap between culturally and
linguistically diverse students and their peers.

Presentation materials from this forum have been posted on NCCRESt's Web
site: http://www.nccrest.org/events.html#forum.

==> Collaboration with the Monarch Center

NCCRESt is pleased to be collaborating with the Monarch Center, a national
technical assistance center for personnel preparation in special education
at minority institutions of higher education. Alfredo Artiles,
Co-Principal Investigator of NCCRESt, serves on Monarch's advisory board.
Janette Klingner, also a Co-Principal Investigator of NCCRESt, will be
presenting at Monarch's Program Development Seminar on November 6th. The
purpose of the seminar is to bring together faculty and key individuals
from their respective states to develop and improve personnel preparation
programs for culturally competent special educators. The seminar runs
November 6-8. The states of Texas, South Dakota, Montana, and Illinois
will be represented at the November 6 session.

For more information about the Monarch Center, visit
http://www.monarchcenter.org/.

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EVENTS

==> Project LASER's 3rd Annual Urban Education Research Conference
"Fifty years of broken promises, dashed hopes, and shattered dreams:
Solutions wanted!
Only evidence-based research need apply"
December 3-6, 2003 (Pre-Conference: December 2) * Dallas, TX

NCCRESt's advisory board member Brenda L. Townsend directs Linking
Academic Scholars to Educational Resources (LASER), a project of the
Office of Special Education Programs. The mission of the project is to
enhance the capacity of faculty and graduate students in minority
institutions to engage in research that impacts children from minority
and/or low-income backgrounds. Dr. Townsend has invited a distinguished
list of presenters to LASER's annual conference, including NCCRESt's
Co-Principal Investigator Alfredo Artiles. Keynote speakers will include
Cheryl Brown of Brown vs. Board of Education (1954) and Carlotta LaNier of
Little Rock Nine.

Early bird registration due November 14. For more information or to
register online, visit http://www.coedu.usf.edu/LASER/news.html

==> National Staff Development Council
December 6-10 * New Orleans, LA

More than 3,500 staff developers and educators are expected to attend the
National Staff Development Council's annual convention. Keynote speakers
are Ted and Nancy Sizer, Founders of the Coalition of Essential Schools.
Distinguished lecturers include Gene Hall, Shirley Hord, David Elkind,
Bruce Matsui, and Wendy Puriefoy.

Examples of concurrent sessions include:
* "Closing the Achievement Gap in Seattle Through Courageous Conversations
About Race"
* "Closing the Achievement Gap Through Assessment, Inquiry, and
Reflection"
* "Improving Reading Across Schools: Leave No Teacher Behind"

For more information about this event or to register, visit
http://conference.nsdc.org/conference03/.

==> TASH
December 11-13 * Chicago, IL

The TASH conference is the largest international conference that focuses
on strategies for achieving full inclusion for people with disabilities.
It brings together the hearts and minds in the disability movement, and
features over 450 breakout sessions, exhibits, roundtable discussions,
poster sessions, and much more. Keynote speakers will include Wanda J.
Blanchett, Nicholas Dupree, John Irvin, and Luanna H. Meyer.

For more information or to register, visit
http://www.tash.org/2003conference/index.htm
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NEW RESOURCES

==> "Educating Culturally Responsive Teachers: A Coherent Approach"

This book offers a conceptual framework and practical strategies for
teacher preparation in schools with increasingly diverse racial and ethnic
student populations. Authors Ana Maria Villegas and Tamara Lucas focus on
the importance of recruiting and preparing a diverse teaching force. They
also propose a vision for restructuring the teacher education curriculum,
reconceiving the pedagogy used to prepare prospective teachers, and
transforming the institutional context in order to support the curricular
and pedagogical changes they recommend.

Contents include:

* The shifting demographic landscape
* Developing fundamental orientations for teaching a changing student
population
* Fostering culturally responsive teaching
* Modeling the practice of culturally responsive teaching
* The institutional context needed to educate culturally responsive
teachers

For more information, visit the SUNY Press Web site:
http://www.sunypress.edu/details.asp?id=60486

==> "Closing the Achievement Gap? Five Questions Every School Should Ask"

This new article published in the National Association of Independent
Schools' magazine, Independent Schools, suggests that rather than focusing
on the "achievement gap," schools might better consider the climate for
learning in their schools. The following five questions provide a starting
place for a thoughtful examination:

1) Are you sure there is an academic performance gap in your school?
2) How do you define achievement?
3) What impact does the idea of an achievement gap have on the performance
of black and Latino students in your school
4) What value do black and Latino students bring to your school?
5) What in your school supports a positive outcome for all students?

The article is available at
http://www.nais.org/pubs/ismag.cfm?file_id=2677&ismag_id=30

==> "Status and Trends in the Education of Blacks"

"Status and Trends in the Education of Blacks" draws on the variety of
statistical reports published by the National Center for Educational
Statistics and synthesizes these data in one compact volume. In addition
to indicators drawn from existing government reports, some indicators were
developed specifically for this report. The objective of this report is to
make statistical information about the educational status of blacks easily
accessible to a variety of audiences.

The volume is available at
http://nces.ed.gov/pubsearch/pubsinfo.asp?pubid=2003034.
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NCCRESt SUPPORT DESK

If you have comments or questions about NCCRESt News, or have information
you would like us to distribute to the list, please
email nccrest@cudenver.edu.
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Archives of NCCRESt News are available at
http://www.edc.org/hypermail/nccrest/
For more information about NCCRESt, please contact:
Shelley Zion, Project Coordinator
National Center for Culturally Responsive
Educational Systems (NCCRESt)
1380 Lawrence Street, Suite 625
Denver, CO 80204
Phone: 303-556-3990
Fax: 303-556-6141
Email: shelley.zion@cudenver.edu
Web: www.nccrest.org
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NCCRESt is a technical assistance center funded by
the Office of Special Education Programs, U.S. Department of Education.
Project Officer: Grace Zamora Duràn. Award No. H326E020003.
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