Browsing by Author "Grim, Jim"

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    Best Practices Framework for Out-of-School-Time Program Parent & Family Engagement
    (At Your School, IUPUI, 2017-07) Grim, Jim
    This framework outlines five steps based on best practices and strategies to enhance parent and family engagement in out-of-school time programming observed at AYS program locations in MSD Decatur Township, Spring Semester 2017, as well as evidence-based activities recommendations from the Harvard Family Research Center, Harvard Graduate School of Education, National PTA and our own Indiana Afterschool Network. The framework also reflects two decades of engagement in out-of-school time programming with parent, family and school communities by the author. It is intended to inspire innovative and creative ideas for expanding parent and family engagement in diverse AYS program settings. While no two school communities may seem the same, solutions to further engage families in programming cannot be cookie-cutter either. Evidence-based, targeted strategies help to move efforts in a productive direction.
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    Building on a legacy – taking a community schools project to scale
    (Partnership Press, Children's Aid Society, New York City, 2016) Grim, Jim; Medina, Monica
    School community partnerships provide a bedrock of stability and continuity in the midst of a tsunami of educational change on the Near Westside of Indianapolis. Central to the firmly imbedded partnerships is George Washington Community High School (GWCHS) — as well as Mary Rigg Neighborhood Center and IUPUI (Indiana University Purdue University Indianapolis), two key collaboration facilitators for decades.
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    Building Trusting Relationships. Evaluating a School-Based Community Health Worker Program to Reduce Chronic Absenteeism
    (2023-10-12) Garcia, Silvia; Roelecke, Kate; Grim, Jim; Mohlman, Rachel; Peterkin, Allyson
    In 2021, MCCOY and the Daniel Webster School 46 (DWS) were awarded two grants1 to implement a Community Health Worker intervention at DWS to increase student engagement as a protective factor to prevent juvenile delinquency and improve youth outcomes. The project took a holistic approach to engage families and students who were chronically absent throughout the school year. Relying on multiple evidence-based and promising practices in youth violence and juvenile delinquency prevention, a certified Community Health Worker partnered with the school social workers and teachers to encourage consistent student attendance using coaching, referrals, goal setting, and family engagement activities to facilitate learning and address family needs. The evaluation, conducted one year after implementation, yielded the following results: The CHW at DWS has proved valuable for students, teachers, and families in several ways. The CHW provides services and builds trusting relationships with families, eventually influencing how families engage with the schools and their students' education. The CHW also connects directly with students, providing emotional support and encouragement, hence supporting the teachers’ work. Being part of the community where parents came from and previously volunteering in the school made the difference in becoming the bridge between the school, the families, and the community. Regarding absenteeism, several improvements in reducing the number of absent days were observed in students receiving support for themselves and their families. Some of the students reduced their absent days to less than half. More importantly, three chronically absent students became “improved attendees” after the first year. The short time the CHW has been in the school (10 months) has brought small but significant changes in students’ behavior.
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    Closing the Gap between Schools and Community: University/Community Collaboration Addresses Identified Barriers to Student Learning
    (Office of Community Engagement, IUPUI, 2023-03) Roelecke, Kate; Grim, Jim; Garcia, Silvia
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    Community Engagement Through Partnerships: Lessons Learned from a Decade of Full-Service Community School Implementation
    (Journal of Education for Students Placed at Risk, Special Edition Prospectus, 2020) Medina, Monica; Cosby, Gayle; Grim, Jim
    Improving performance in an environment often tested by intermingled social problems, including poverty, racial isolation, cultural clashes between teachers and students, and school funding disparities requires authentic, committed family, school, and community partnerships. Using Bryk’s (2010) model for effective and improving schools, our study describes challenges and achievements experienced over a decade of implementing the full-service community school (FSCS) reform in two neighborhoods in Indianapolis, Indiana. We also share lessons about funding, collaborative structures and processes, and organizational responses to change. The study has broad implications for both FSCSs and urban schools with comparable demographics that are working to build effective partnerships to address social problems in lasting ways
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    Community Engagement Through Partnerships: Lessons Learned from a Decade of Full-service Community School Implementation
    (Journal of Education for Students Placed at Risk, 2019-05-14) Medina, Monica; Cosby, Gayle; Grim, Jim
    Improving performance in an environment often tested by intermingled social problems, including poverty, racial isolation, cultural clashes between teachers and students, and school funding disparities requires authentic, committed family, school, and community partnerships. Using Bryk’s (2010) model for effective and improving schools, our study describes challenges and achievements experienced over a decade of implementing the full-service community school (FSCS) reform in two neighborhoods in Indianapolis, Indiana. We also share lessons about funding, collaborative structures and processes, and organizational responses to change. The study has broad implications for both FSCSs and urban schools with comparable demographics that are working to build effective partnerships to address social problems in lasting ways.
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    Community Schools as a Vehicle for Social Justice and Equity
    (University of Tennessee-Knoxville, IGI Global, 2020) Medina, Monica; Murtadha, Khaula; Grim, Jim
    A deficit narrative of academic success in low-performing schools is articulated in cultural norms set by those who fail to understand how poverty and racial inequality manifests through daily interactions, beliefs, and biases. Work to address race and poverty are emotional, complicated, and challenging because the concepts are avoided, minimized, or disputed by a dominant narrative and privileged cultures that oppress students of color. This chapter is not about a study of race or poverty nor does it seek to forward understanding of how race and class intersect. Instead, it focuses on the ways a university has promoted social justice and equity in the development of community schools. This work encompasses: the influence of change through advocacy and policy, issues of school culture and climate, and shared leadership. It recognizes emerging perceptions impacting health, violence, and food security that cause socio/emotional issues not considered when critically addressing issues of race and poverty. Therefore, community schools are a vehicle for social justice and equity.
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    A Decade of Lessons: Community Engagement Perspectives from a University-Assisted School Community
    (Center for Service and Learning, IUPUI, 2011) Grim, Jim; Medina, Monica; Officer, Starla
    In 2000, the Indianapolis Near-Westside welcomed the reopening of George Washington High School as George Washington Community School. The school had closed in 1995. This document draws on the decade of lessons and is designed to serve as a resource for groups harnessing the power of their own school communities.
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    Family, School, Community Engagement in Community Schools Research Brief
    (Midwest Center for University-Assisted Community Schools, IUPUI, Indiana Partnerships Center, 2011-09) Grim, Jim; Medina, Monica; Short, Angela; Garvey, Jackie; Malone, LaTasha; Daugherty, Lindsey
    Discussion of public school reform draws attention to a typically overlooked essential of academic success: family and community engagement. Any serious reform cannot ignore authentic family/school/community engagement as an essential ingredient, according to a seven-year study by researchers at the University of Chicago who looked into some 200 “turnaround” schools efforts and outcomes in the Windy City. In fact, the Chicago study found that only 10 percent of the turnaround schools without solid family and community engagement (or one of four other identified essentials) realized academic improvement (Bryk, Sebring, et. al., 2010)
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    George Washington Community High School, A Community-University Partnerships Success Story
    (Netter Center for Community Partnerships, University of Pennsylvania, 2010-05) Grim, Jim; Officer, Starla
    A meandering White River separates the Indiana University-Purdue University Indianapolis (IUPUI) campus from the neighborhoods of Stringtown, Hawthorne and Haughville that make up the community of WESCO (Westside Cooperative Organization). Al-though the river that separates the two represents a historical as well as geographic boundary, the city bridges that join the university campus with its west side neighbors are both symbolic as well as utilitarian. Rich connections that have developed between IUPUI and the Near Westside have taken years to develop and are best illustrated at the nearby George Washington Community School (GWCS). The very existence of this school is a community/university partnership achievement, a significant one according to Robert Bringle, Director of the IUPUI Center for Service and Learning and professor of psychology. “When we started working with the WESCO community and they said they wanted to reopen their closed high school, we thought it was a rather remote possibility,” Bringle explained. “Never underestimate the power of determined, united people. Four years later it had students in classrooms.” "e building was once home to George Washing-ton High School. "e high school had nearly 70 years of rich tradition that included multiple athletic milestones (half a dozen alumni ABA and NBA players among them) and had closed in 1995. "e closure, designed to reduce costs for the financially challenged urban school district, devastated the Near Westside. However, its reputation on the athletic field had not matched with high academic achievement (e.g., 40% graduation rate) and this helped tip the scales in favor of closure. Logical financial reasons for closure did not matter to the community it most affected. Five neighborhood schools had already been closed, and the closure of the final two meant no schools were left in the three neighborhoods. No public schools remaining in WESCO galvanized a grassroots movement, under the leadership of neighborhood leader Danny Fugate, to form the Westside Education Task Force, which was focused on getting schools back into the neighborhoods.