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Center of Excellence
Grant Proposal Narrative
2. Proposal Narrative
b. The Center's Purpose and Focus
Over the past
several years, many attempts have been made to solve the problems
of providing high quality education to children of poverty by sending
experts to study the problems and provide assistance to those who
work with these children. The proposed Center will operate from
a completely different perspective. Rather than relying on external
expertise, the Center intends to solve the problems inherent in
educating children of poverty by developing expertise in those that
work with these children on a daily basis. Only through developing
local capacity to solve problems will true progress be made in the
struggle to help those in greatest need -- children of poverty.
To this end, the proposal planning committee identified five goals
toward which the Center will work when funded. These goals, derived
from the "typical activities" included on the first page
of the RFP, are as follows:
Goal
1. Design and implement pre-service teacher
education programs that attract qualified applicants and enable
graduates to effectively teach children of poverty.
Goal
2. Provide high quality professional development
programs that include collaborative research activities and the
use of existing research evidence to improve curriculum, instruction,
and assessment in schools serving large number of children of poverty.
Goal
3. Equip teachers with the knowledge and skills
needed to work effectively with parents, health and human service
providers, and other community resources to meet the social, emotional,
and physical needs of children of poverty and to serve as advocates
for them in the school, community, and state.
Goal
4. Develop a master's degree program leading
to South Carolina certification as a Teacher of Children of Poverty
and is linked with National Board Certification.
Goal
5. Become the premier resource in South Carolina
for helping teachers learn how to provide a high quality education
to all children of poverty.
The first three goals will provide the focus for the Center for
Years 1 – 2. Goal 4 will provide the focus for Years 3 –
4, although work on this goal will begin in Year 2. Goal 5 will
provide the focus for Year 5, although work on this goal will begin
in Year 4.
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