The state of Illinois joined the National Network of Partnership Schools in 1997, and used this year to develop ambitious and coordinated plans for school, family, and community partnerships. Dan Miller, Administrator of the Community and Family Partnership Division and Key Contact to the Network, is ably assisted by Laura Berkovitz, Project Coordinator for Adult Literacy. They are supported by State Superintendent Joseph Spagnolo and Associate Superintendent Diana Robinson in plans for a statewide activity on school, family, and community partnerships. The Illinois team has a vision of statewide comprehensive and effective programs of partnership.
Illinois supports 48 Regional Offices of Education (ROEs) that assist all schools and districts in the state. The state plans to work with its ROEs to guide and support the schools and districts with their work on partnerships. This approach will be piloted in the 1998-99 school year by one ROE that will provide training, assistance, and cross-site networking to 11 districts that are ready to join the Network. These districts will have facilitators who will assist their schools to form Action Teams and write One-Year Action Plans for partnerships to involve families and communities in ways that support school improvement goals.
In addition to organizing help for schools and districts, the Illinois team is strengthening its state-level leadership on partnerships. Miller explained, "We needed to get our state department of education on board. School, family, and community partnerships cannot be the responsibility of just one division, and cannot be viewed as a project."
Miller has been able to orient the seven Centers of Educational Leadership in the State Department of Education and, particularly, the division responsible for the Quality Review Process, to help colleagues see how partnership programs are central to the State's evaluation of all School Improvement Plans. Together, Miller and his state colleagues decided to make the Network's framework of six types of involvement available to all schools to help them develop the "Community of Learning" component of the School Improvement Plan that is required by the state.
Dan Miller and Laura Berkovitz have made many presentations in and beyond Illinois about their statewide plans for improving partnerships. They have "turned on" colleagues and other educators to the need for more coordinated approaches in state leadership and guidance to schools. They also are planning to include practices for adult learners, care givers, and community participants to acknowledge and support parent and community influences on student success. Other states will be interested in Illinois' progress with its exciting and ambitious state plan for school, family, and community partnerships.