E-News—Issue 5, Number 2

Welcome to the January issue of E-News!

E-News is designed to keep individuals informed of new developments in urban education and inclusive schooling practices in urban schools. In particular, E-News includes brief items of interest around the work of the National Institute and other organizations engaged in similar work, current research, upcoming conferences and events, new online and off-line products and resources, and other news happening in the field.

Features this month

• Publication Highlight: National Institute staff co-author new book and release new editions of the "School on the Move" series
• Events: Literature with Inclusive Themes, Borderwalking Conference, Teleseminar with Reid Lyon
• New Resource: PACER publishes financial guidebook for parents
• National Institute Help Desk

Publication Highlight

National Institute staff co-author new book!

"Designing Personalized Learning for Every Student" by Dianne Ferguson, Cleo Droege, Hafdis Guojonsdottir, Jackie Lester, Gwen Meyer, Ginevra Ralph, Nadia Sampson, and Janet Williams

Today's students are more diverse than ever before—in cultural backgrounds, learning styles and interests, social and economic classes, and abilities and disabilities. How can schools accommodate these differences while also dealing with other demands for change, from the push for tougher standards to the call for more discipline in the classroom?

This book offers answers—and challenges schools to reinvent themselves as more flexible, creative learning communities that include and are responsive to the full range of human diversity.

A table of contents, excerpts from the book, and ordering information are available from the Association for Supervision and Curriculum Development's Web site: http://www.ascd.org/readingroom/books/ferguson2001_toc.html.

JC Nalle Elementary School and Kepner Middle School are "Schools on
the Move"

JC Nalle Elementary School is located a few miles from the Lincoln Memorial in a neighborhood of our Nation's Capitol that is struggling with poverty and neglect. It is a symbol of human potential that tourists seldom visit, or as one teacher puts it, it's "an oasis in the darkness." Visitors to Kepner Middle School in Denver, Colorado should not be surprised to hear children speaking more Spanish than English, afterall about 85 percent of its students are Latino or Latina. Many of the classrooms are small and overcrowded, but this does not prevent the teachers and administrators from running this school in an orderly fashion.

What do these two schools have in common? According to the National Institute, both JC Nalle Elementary School and Kepner Middle School are urban schools showing great promise in ensuring that the needs of all of their children are met despite some difficult circumstances and challenges. These schools are the subject of two new installments of the National Institute's popular "Schools on the Move" series. Copies are free and available on the National Institute's Web site: http://www.edc.org/urban.

Events

2002 Borderwalking Conference, Las Cruces Hilton, Las Cruces, New
Mexico

February 21-23

This conference features collaborative bilingual sessions with educators
from Mexico and keynote speakers:

• Dr. Leonard Baca, Bueno Center, University of Colorado, Boulder
• Dr. Gil Garcia, National Institute on the Education of At-Risk Students
• Dr. Peggy McCardle, National Institute of Child Health & Human Development

Topics will cover bilingual special education and communication disorders, equality and social development, multicultural literacy development, retention, tracking, and much more—music, entertainment, and Southwestern fun! CEU's available for educators. For more information or to download a copy of the registration form, please visit the Linking Academic Scholars to Educational Resources (LASER) Web site: http://www.coedu.usf.edu/laser.

Literature with Inclusive Themes: Help Me! Find What Works for the Middle Grades

March 1-15 - a free e-learning event at http://www2.edc.org/literacymatters

Middle-grades teachers (English language arts, social studies, the arts, and English as a second language), language arts coordinators, special education teachers, and Title 1 teachers are all invited to participate in Literature with Inclusive Themes: Help Me! Find What Works for the Middle Grades. This online professional development opportunity is an easy and fun way for teachers to enter the world of e-learning.

Funded by the Annenberg Foundation, Literacy Matters focuses on what matters most in adolescent literacy development, especially for struggling readers and writers. The National Institute and the Urban Special Education Leadership Collaborative are proud co-sponsors of this exciting follow-up to the celebrations that occurred as part of National Inclusive Schools Week. Judy Zorfass and Julie Wood both of Literacy Matters will facilitate this event which they call a "happening"--similar to an online workshop, but more playful and fun.

For more information, please visit the Literacy Matters Web site—http://www2.edc.org/literacymatters—or contact Judy at jzorfass@edc.org or Julie at jwood@edc.org.

Rethinking Learning Disabilities

March 29 A telephone seminar for district and school leadership teams with presenter/moderator G. Reid Lyon, Ph.D.

The National Institute's partner, the Urban Special Education Leadership Collaborative, continues its series of provocative teleseminars with an interactive presentation by G. Reid Lyon, Chief of Child Development & Behavior Branch at the National Institute of Child Health & Human Development. This teleseminar will be based on "Rethinking Learning Disabilities," a paper co-authored by Dr. Lyon for the Fordham Foundation publication's Rethinking Special Education for a New Century. The teleseminar will examine current methodologies for assessment, identification, and instruction of students with learning disabilities. These promise to be critical issues in the upcoming reauthorization of IDEA. Participants will receive the added benefit of being able to probe Dr. Lyon's thinking on topics, such as the relationship between reading disabilities and learning disabilities, the role both special education and general education play in the prevention and remediation of reading disabilities, and the importance of early intervention. Register now by calling 800.775.7654 or at http://www.urbancollaborative.org.

New Resource

"Possibilities: A Financial Resource Book for Parents of Children with Disabilities"

Recently published by the Parent Advocacy Center for Education Rights (PACER) Center, this is a simple, straightforward guide to money management and financial resources written for parents of children with disabilities. It includes a discussion about how to maintain financial eligibility for programs, such as Medicaid and SSI. For a copy, send $3 to cover postage and handling to Publications Desk, Bazelon Center, 1101 15th Street NW, #1212, Washington DC 20005 (note that you are requesting a copy the PACER Center Resource Book).

National Institute Support Desk

Previous issues of E-News can be viewed at: niusi.obiki.org/enews.htm.

For more information about the National Institute for Urban School Improvement, please feel free to contact us.