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AU Education outreach to receive $305,000 in grants

December 2006

The Truman Pierce Institute (TPI) in Auburn University's College of Education has been awarded $305,000 in grants to benefit impoverished school districts in rural Alabama. The Jessie Ball duPont Fund has awarded TPI $165,000 during the next three years for the Leadership in Action Network (LAN). The Alabama State Department of Education has awarded TPI $140,000 for 2007, with the potential for increased funding, during the next three years for the Leadership for Effective Academic Reform, Now (LEARN) program.

LAN and LEARN have been developed based on the lessons learned from TPI's work with the West Alabama Learning Coalition (WALC), the AU/Tallapoosa County Leadership Academy and the Instructional Improvement Institutes. This work is coupled with information obtained from formal and informal needs assessments within these school districts. Successes associated with past partnerships include lowering dropout rates, increasing academic achievement and building strong coalitions for educational renewal and professional development.

The Leadership in Action Network (LAN) will create a sustainable leadership capacity building and research network among 10 school districts in rural Alabama. This initiative improves instructional leadership through professional development and action research, increasing student leadership capacity, and investigating the effectiveness of these networks in solving issues common to the districts.

More than 200 student leaders, 50 teachers, 30 principals and 10 superintendents will participate in focused school improvement efforts through LAN. Student participants include both traditional leaders and non-traditional leaders, those young people who although they have potential, do not perform well academically, and/or tend to get into trouble at school. Without programs such as LAN, these young people are unlikely to reach their potential. Nine rural county school districts -- Fayette, Hale, Lee, Macon, Sumter, Tallapoosa , Bullock, Lowndes and Dallas -- and Alexander City Schools will participate -- each having made both a philosophical and a financial commitment to the program.

Leadership for Effective Academic Reform, Now (LEARN) seeks to address the need for on-going and sustainable professional development for school administrators and teacher leaders through developing or supporting leadership academies in 11 Alabama county school systems -- Wilcox, Sumter, Monroe, Lowndes, Fayette, Hale, Macon, Tallapoosa and Dallas -- as well as Alexander City Schools and Loachapoka High School in Lee County. After assessing present skill levels as school leaders, school administrators and teacher leaders will work with university personnel to develop and implement professional development focused on leadership capacity building. This training will address individual, site-specific and network-wide leadership needs and engage in action research teams that address specific issues within each respective school system.

Last Updated: May 12, 2011