“If we have a school that needs help in our neighborhood, and we have a solution, then we, as educators, truly have a moral obligation to do what we can to improve the situation,” President Susan Fuhrman said in her keynote speech to the annual meeting of the International Association of Lab Schools . She described TC’s experience partnering with its REACH (Raising Educational Achievement Coalition of Harlem) public schools and founding the Teachers College Community School (TCCS). Conference attendees also toured TCCS during the school day.

“If every university with a graduate school of education and other professional schools were to partner with their local school districts, we would generate a rising tide of education excellence and opportunity that would lift all boats,” Fuhrman said.

A panel of experts at the conference broadened the notion of “lab school” beyond the traditional on-campus learning site for faculty children and discussed challenges and successes of their university-assisted schools. The panel was moderated by James Gardner, TC’s Asssociate Vice President for External Affairs, and featured Nancy Streim, TC’s Associate Vice President for School and Community Partnerships; David W. Andrews, Dean of the Johns Hopkins School of Education (who was representing the Henderson/Hop¬kins Partnership School in Baltimore, co-founded and co-managed by The Johns Hopkins University); and Beatriz Rendón, Associate Vice President of Educational Outreach and Student Services at Arizona State University (representing ASU Preparatory Academy, a group of public charter schools that was created by the university).



Watch excerpts from the conference at bit.ly/1j0KU92

Published Tuesday, Jun. 3, 2014