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EDC Update Winter 2008

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EDC Update Winter 2008 (pdf, 2.06 MB)
  • Communities Build Hope

    In the last decade, the number of American Indian and Native Alaskan children has doubled, with 34 percent of the total population now under the age of 18. This boom brings hope as well as challenges to tribal communities, where rates of youth delinquency, dropout, alcoholism, and violence are among the highest in the United States.

  • Latino Network Expands

    EDC’s PALMS (Postsecondary Access for Latino Middle-Grades Students) project has selected seven middle schools in Alabama, Arkansas, California, Colorado, Illinois, and Nevada to join the project’s Outreach Leaders Network.

  • No Ordinary Walk in the Park

    When is a walk in the park so much more than that? When the walk involves real-world learning about science and nature.

  • Diversity in Preschool

    As the Latino population in the United States grows, so does a large achievement gap. An EDC-designed professional development program is helping preschools offer an enriched program that is interactive and culturally and linguistically responsive.

  • Health Video Premiers in Laos

    In a remote mountain village in Northern Laos, a crowd of 150 people gathers one evening. Many have traveled by foot from neighboring villages, eager to watch a new video drama featuring local Akha people. The topic this evening is sexually transmitted infections (STIs).

  • Food for Thought

    A new EDC curriculum, Getting Active and Eating Well, combines reading and health to arm middle-grades students with knowledge about eating right and getting exercise.

  • Home Away from Home

    Colleges and universities nationwide are working continually to keep safe the nearly 16 million students who live and learn on their campuses. Events such as the shooting tragedy at Virginia Tech and the renewed debate about lowering the drinking age from 21 to 18 have made the discussions about campus health and safety issues more urgent than ever.

  • Healing the Body, Healing the Mind

    As military personnel return from Iraq and Afghanistan, health care professionals are providing treatment not only for their physical injuries but also for psychological trauma. Employing face-to-face training and video and Web-based materials, the Veterans Health Administration (VHA), working with EDC, has trained 900 clinicians to use Cognitive Processing Therapy (CPT), an intensive immersion method for treating post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD).

  • Nurturing a New Generation

    Hisham Jabi directs Ruwwad, EDC’s youth corps for Palestinians ages 14–30. Although he is now steeped in the world of youth development, Jabi hasn’t forgotten what he learned during his years working in the private sector.

  • Sparking an Interest in Science

    As part of the ITEST program’s paleontology project, students discover a T. rex rib near Fort Peck, Montana.

    With NSF funding, EDC will work with middle school girls from across the country as they develop a series of 10–12 five-minute videos that investigate what it means to be a scientist or engineer.

  • Math Instruction Adds Up

    In New York City, EDC is providing professional development to educators to improve mathematics instruction for English-language learners (ELLs) in middle schools.

  • Lessons Learned, Lessons Shared

    From 2001 through 2007, 25 projects and 18 pilot programs have improved education systems in 30 countries around the world. Known collectively as “dot-EDU,” this EDC-led global initiative focused on applying digital and broadcast technologies in ways that improved quality, expanded access, and enhanced equity.

  • Tuning in to Teaching with iPods

    In Zambia, a select group of teachers are using iPods to enhance professional training in such critical areas as mathematics, science, and English.

  • Think Outside the Book

    Kids soak up information like sponges. As a result, they are often the targets of savvy marketing strategies that barrage them with a constant stream of programming and advertising, both on TV and online. A new study is evaluating whether these multimedia approaches can be used to deliver positive content and messages about reading and literacy.

  • Putting Youth in the Picture

    Young people from 85 countries submitted more than 1,500 photos to “Shoot Nations 2007,” a global competition to encourage youth to express themselves through photography and drawing. The winning photos included one taken by a team of students gathered by EDC in the Philippines, a group dubbed “power users” for their intensive long-term use of information and communication technologies.

  • Just Back: Pam Buffington

    EDC’s Pam Buffington works in Gardiner, Maine, a small town at the head of the Kennebec River. As state liaison for the Northeast and Islands Regional Educational Laboratory, a federally funded research center at EDC, she advises Maine decision-makers on education policy. She has years of classroom experience, most recently working with teachers to integrate technology into their classrooms. Buffington spoke to us about her work supporting elementary school teachers in Maine School Administration District #11.