October 30, 2002 ADEPT Minutes

Agenda

1. Updates
2. Continue with Communication Planning
3. Annual Report Strategies
4. CTC Calendar
5. Other items: Suggestion to have only AR-related things on our agenda as this is due in such a short time.

Updates

1. Sheila Castillo is our newest member and she just started working at the Chicago Teachers' Center this week. Her main job at CTC will be to link the parent projects with the teacher initiatives. She will also be involved in fundraising, as she has considerable experience in that field. Finally she will have some responsibility in helping CTC generate articles for publications. She will make a great addition to the Chicago Teachers' Center and ADEPT is lucky to have her working with us. Welcome Sheila!
2. Dan described the newest webpage he created on the Jonathan Kozol visit last week. Look for the URL in a post made by Dan by clicking here.
3. Colleen gave a wonderful talk about the differences between experimental and quasi-experimental research. She will rewrite the handout that she presented to the team and we can post it on the weblog. She will also make a template for discussing evaluation that we can use in grants. Along with this she will construct a list of possible methods that can be used to "triangulate" research, which will make it stronger. Finally, she has been working on a way to code assignments, students products, video, etc. so those items can be used as part of an experimental design.
4. Pat said that Wendy came to her to discuss changes that might be made to the CTC website. She asked that changes not be made unless she has a group of people respond to her changes. Pat felt frustrated because it is that kind of process that makes it difficult to keep the CTC website current. She feels like it is dead on the vine, while other people take the matter into their own hands and just create pages that circumvent this accountability (e.g. the ADEPT weblog and Dan's recent Kozol page). We discussed ways in which she might be able to collect the best from all of the other CTC sites and use that for the main site, but this will be a problem that needs much more in-depth investigation.
5. Amy let the team know that she and Wendy will be meeting with Lipman-Hearne on Wednesday, November 6 to discuss the possibility of using them as an outside consultant for the AR.

Discussion:

1. The discussion about the Communications plan centered around how to make explicit the connections between things that are already existing at CTC, but do not function together thus reducing their efficiency:
   • The different websites that exist at CTC do not work together. Just "buttoning off" one site to another does not solve the problem as that kind of link can get buried and rendered useless for those not willing to navigate the depths of the website. So content important to CTC is not driven to its website, but rather lies scattered among a loose net of pages. This seems to be a problem of "the democratization of information" which happens often at CTC. The solution was not discussed much, but Pat will begin to meet with the creators of these pages so that they can discuss the problem and its possible solutions.
   • The AR and the website should have an explicit connection. As the content for the AR is developed, it should be fed through to the webpage.
   • Connections between program reports/evaluations/pictures do not flow into one central place. The team decided that the best, and most expeditious, way to ensure that we can get this information for the purposes of the upcoming AR is to create "liaisons" that gather it directly from the program directors. The liaisons and the program directors that they will be responsible for are the following:
     • Amy: Rich, Joan, Evelyn, Deon, & Jan
     • Dan: Liz Landerholm, Melinda, Cappy, & Mike
     • Emelda: Jackie, Gina, & Gary
     • Colleen: Heather

Next Steps:

1. Have the Leadership Team identify the people that should comprise the teams in charge of the Annual Report and the 25th Anniversary Celebration.
2. Hire the external consultant for the Annual report by October 31, 2002.s
3. Dan, Emelda, Amy, and Colleen will act as liaisons to program directors and will collect 1)evaluations and reports, 2) info on the three "hottest" events they have planned for the next year, 3) other program publications (newsletters, brochures, etc.), and 4) pictures.
4. Colleen will re-write her brief describing the difference between experimental and quasi-experimental research, create a template for evaluations, and a rubric for coding videos, assignments, lessons, etc.
5. Pat will meet with those individuals that have created webpages for CTC programs and develop a way to drive that content to the CTC site.
6. Steve will make an attempt at writing a vision and mission for ADEPT so that we can formalize ourselves. This will be brought back to the group for approval.

Agenda for next meeting (November 13 @ 10:30)

1. Look at example Annual Reports
2. Create a sample outline for the AR for submission and review by the Leadership Team
3. Think of some ideas for the focus of the AR
4. View the video of the ENLACE meeting to get language for the AR
5. Other items