A r c h i v e d  I n f o r m a t i o n

Ideas for Long-term Efforts

America Goes Back to School events set the stage for yearlong family-school-community partnership activities aimed at improving education. These efforts are challenging--they take time, planning, and coordination--but they are definitely worth the investment. Children benefit from the extra attention, and often show academic growth and achievement as a result. Below are some ideas on how to make better education everybody’s business in your community:

• Partner with a local college or university to start a volunteer tutoring or mentoring program--especially to help students to read by the end of third grade and to help middle school students learn math and take algebra by grade eight.
• Train a corps of volunteers from the community (senior citizens, students, parents, and professionals) to be mentors and tutors for students of all ages.
• Focus on the new era with a Millennium fair -- get your school or some of your classrooms to participate in the Mars Millennium Project: An Arts, Science, and Technology Initiative (visit the Mars Millennium Project web site at http://www.mars2030.net).
• Help find ways to bridge the computer gap by giving opportunities to students who may not have a computer at home.
• Forge a relationship with a community outside the United States--host students, start pen pal partnerships by letter or on-line through the Internet, offer classes in your partner country’s language, or create educational projects centered around the culture and history of the sister community.
• Build a parent resource room in your school to provide families with publications of interest, and a space where parents can talk with teachers and other parents.
• Offer in-school and after-school programs to give new opportunities for children to learn a second or third language, become engaged in the arts, improve their English, reading, and math skills, and use computers to do research and solve problems.
• Partner with architects, builders, and community leaders to discuss the issue of overcrowded classrooms in your area, and how schools can be modernized to be centers of learning for the entire community.
• Create a "Dads Club" to boost fathers’ presence in schools.
• Work with local businesses to offer job-shadowing and interning opportunities to high school students.
• Link middle and high schools with community and four-year colleges and universities in order to help students have a pathway to college and promising careers.
• Raise awareness about the importance of family involvement in education through speeches, articles, and other outreach efforts.
• Formulate a parent-involvement policy for your school, so parents and school teachers/administrators can together commit to common goals through a parent-teacher or school compact for learning.
• Launch a yearlong Mars Millennium project – an arts, science, and technology initiative -- to encourage students to create a community on the planet Mars for the year 2030 (visit the Mars Millennium Project web site at http://www.mars2030.net).
• Form an action group to evaluate the standards of education in your community – and improve them!
• Start parenting classes for young mothers and fathers – prepare them to be involved participants in their children’s education.
• Link with engineers, accountants, health professionals, and people interested in math and science to encourage and help students take more rigorous math and science in high schools, Advanced Placement courses, and Tech Prep.
• Partner with a local college or university to begin a tutoring or mentoring program with Work-Study students.

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