Florida's Strategic Plan for Extension in Metropolitan Regions reflects an adaptive management approach to the state's urban Extension mission within the context of establishing essential elements, performance indicators, key outcomes, and suggested alternatives for action. Extension leadership has adopted the strategic plan, and implementation…

Prioritizing social, emotional, and behavioral supports is essential for student success. By establishing systems to support students' social (how they interact), emotional (how they feel), and behavioral (how they act) needs and growth, educators and leaders can ensure that all students have full access to instruction and the essential skills for…

This publication highlights how state policies and guidance are supporting the transformation to personalized learning through digital instructional materials. Specifically, the report includes personalized learning approaches and the policies and processes around the selection, curation, procurement, professional learning and funding of digital…

The objective of this article is to describe seven elements important to successful implementation of early literacy intervention. The seven elements are drawn from research as well as from the authors' recent randomized controlled trial of effective early literacy interventions in kindergarten through second grade in 55 schools across Florida.…

The top priority for the U.S. Department of Education's new Race to the Top-District (RTT-D) competition is to create personalized-learning environments to bolster student achievement: "Absolute Priority 1: Personalized Learning Environments. To meet this priority, an applicant must coherently and comprehensively address how it will build on…

Computer science (CS) and computational thinking (a problem-solving process used by computer scientists) teach students design, logical reasoning, and problem solving--skills that are valuable in life and in any career. Computational thinking (CT) concepts such as decomposition teach students how to break down and tackle a large complex problem.…

Online doctoral programming geared toward working professionals can provide unprecedented flexibility in terms of time and place that affords greater access to a broader student demographic. At the same time, online learning poses its own unique set of challenges and limitations for students with and without disabilities. Universal Design (UD) is…

Civic learning for all students seems like a reasonable and important aim for all schools to achieve. If we believe that the future of our American democracy depends on a citizenry that is informed, engaged, and responsible, what better place to create future citizens than in schools? The Campaign for the Civic Mission of Schools…

The following profiles address how the state departments of education are supporting local educators in classroom implementation of the Common Core by providing and/or facilitating the development of instructional resources and materials aligned to the new standards. In order for instructional resources and materials to be aligned to the Common…

This implementation guide was developed to assist states that want to give more families access to needed educational opportunities and the ability to customize their children's learning. Surging enthusiasm among voters and policymakers means more states are likely to launch Education Scholarship Account (ESA) programs in the immediate future. The…

The concept of recentering the Deaf community in interpreter education stems from the recent discussion of program evolution away from stakeholders and into academia highlighted by Monikowski and Peterson (2005). The University of North Florida, in the initial stages of developing a B.S. degree and M.Ed. concentration in ASL/English Interpreting,…

The Literacy Design Collaborative (LDC) and the Mathematics Design Collaborative (MDC) are strategies designed to improve how teachers teach and students learn. The designs encourage teacher collaboration and creativity and offer flexible frameworks for building lessons in all disciplines. Their purpose is to engage students to read challenging…

During the 2013-2014 school year, a charter school in Central Florida (which will be given the pseudonym "The Unity School") known for its practice of full inclusion launched an unconventional project. The Unity School, which serves children from preschool through grade five, began offering foreign language to all pre-kindergarten…

The field of learning analytics is being discussed in many circles as an emerging concept in education. In many districts and states, the core philosophy behind learning analytics is not entirely new; for more than a decade, discussions of data-driven decision making and the use of data to drive instruction have been common. Still, the U.S.…

Childhood hunger is one of the nation's most insidious problems and can have profound negative effects on children's health and development. Often the cause of hunger, food insecurity can limit a child's cognitive and socioemotional development, thereby impairing school achievement, and diminishing long-term productivity and economic potential.…