National Family and Community Engagement Conference 2015 Focuses on "Shaping Our Future by Leading Together: Families, Schools and Communities"

The Institute for Educational Leadership (IEL) hosts the National Family and Community Engagement Conference in Chicago, the theme for this year being “Shaping Our Future by Leading Together: Families, Schools, and Communities.” IEL works across boundaries to connect policymakers, administrators, and practitioners at all levels to better prepare children and youth for college, careers and citizenship.

Offering over 70 workshops, the event will feature evidence-based practices and leadership at all levels to showcase how schools and communities across the country realize mutual goals through productive partnerships. The structure of the conference encourages networking at the local, state and regional levels, team planning, and in-depth discussions.

The 2015 National Family and Community Engagement Conference will include:

4 Plenaries:

• Setting the Stage 
• The Chicago Story 
• Family Engagement & Equity 
• Taking it to Scale 

70 Workshops:

• Sessions will highlight high quality family and community engagement on the following topics: 
• Early Learning & Literacy (Birth to Age 8) 
• Student Achievement and Schooling 
• Community Partnerships 
• Teacher Leadership & Professional Development 
• Systemic Practice and Policy 
• Inclusive Education 
• Parent Leadership & Advocacy 
• High School, College & Career Transition

The conference will take place June 22-24, 2015 in Chicago. Policymakers, administrators, and practitioners are encouraged to attend. Visit the website to learn more or register.

The BUILD Health Challenge: Improving Health through Community, Health System and Public Health Collaboration

The BUILD Health Challenge has announced that it will award up to $7.5 million in grants and low-interest loans over two years to support up to 14 community-driven efforts. BUILD stands for Bold, Upstream, Integrated, Local and Data-Driven, words that represent the core principles of the Challenge. These core principles serve as guidelines for the types of strategies the Challenge hopes to support: strategies that are innovative when facing complex problems, that focus on social, environmental and economic factors rather than direct service, that are committed to true partnerships between many different players in community health, that focus on solutions that are led by an urban community, and that use data to identify the needs of their communities and to measure their impact.

Eligible to partnerships located in cities with populations greater than 150,000, the awardees will also be given support in the form of technical assistance, coaching and networks of health innovators. The BUILD Challenge will give two types of awards: planning and implementation. These awards are designed to support community collaborations that strengthen partnerships among hospitals, nonprofits, local health departments and other community organizations around health in low-income neighborhoods. The partners in the BUILD Health Challenge are the Kresge Foundation, the Advisory Board Company, the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation and the de Beaumont Foundation.
 

Round 1 of applications for the Challenge are due by January 16, 2015.  Invitations will then be extended to a number of select applications for Round 2 on February 20^th.  Awardees will be announced in June 2015.