Education Foundation

Strategies:

Prenatal – K Education

Ensure that prenatal, Pre-K, childcare, parental and other programs will prepare all children to enter kindergarten ready to learn. Possible action steps include:
1. Providing better social and emotional skills training.
2. Implementing systems and opportunities, including parenting training on issues such as early brain development, that ensure parents and families are actively involved in their children's development and learning.
3. Implementing a citywide career ladder with appropriate standards and compensation for all Pre-K providers.
4. Implementing rigorous and standard-based systems for all early care and learning practitioners.
5. Supporting access to and the use of prenatal health care and risk reduction services for all pregnant women. February 13, 2006
6. Adopting a healthy behavior (no tobacco, alcohol or substance use) during pregnancy.
7. Stressing the importance of family literacy and reading to children in all childbirth education and parenting classes.
8. Providing home visiting support to all parents that need it to promote child health, healthy parent/child interaction and to avoid child abuse and neglect.
9. Ensuring that all child care centers meet high-quality standards including: all early education teachers should have commensurate pay with K-12 teachers, have four-year degrees and a career ladder for their professional development.
10. Ensuring all child care centers should achieve a minimum rating of "4" on the Early Learning Coalition's Quality Rating System scale.
11. Ensuring all children will have vision, health and developmental screenings to ensure healthy growth and development.

K – 12 Education

Ensure all students graduate from high school with skills required to continue education beyond high school and achieve career success
1. Ensure that students perform at grade level beginning in kindergarten through grade 12 through the early identification and immediate remediation of at-risk students. Remediation must include summer school and other options that offer the opportunity to remediate any deficiency that would limit promotion to the next grade and/or the opportunity to graduate from high school with a standard diploma. Provide support for economically disadvantaged students to close the achievement gap.
2. The school system will be standard-based and promote personal responsibility.
3. Provide appropriate resources and encourage all students to make career choices as soon as possible.
Implement systems and opportunities that aggressively encourage all parents to be involved in their children's education while recognizing the unique problems of single parents, two working parents and those who do shift work. The approach should help parents be accountable for their children, consider parents and students as the school system's customer and motivate both. The approach should address the access to social service needs of the family and provide parents with a better understanding of the education techniques being used with their children.
Ensure that every student in the school system who needs a mentor or tutor will have one. Where necessary, the community will provide a mentor or tutor from religious organizations, businesses, civic clubs, social service organizations and others.
Ensure that every student in the school system who needs behavioral or mental health assessment and counseling will have access to these services regardless of their ability to pay.
Teach basic reading, writing, mathematics and science with emphasis on learning critical thinking. Also teach basic life skills such as managing personal finances, wealth creation, respect for people and property, social skills and emotion management. Include the arts, music, physical education and vocational skills in the curriculum. Teach so that students learn in their particular learning style.
Value teachers. Increase teacher pay with incentives and provide a career path that results in retention. Provide training, eliminate red tape and encourage creative teachers who effectively teach to explicit academic standards.
Ensure that all high school students have access to Career Academies that meet defined national standards of excellence and employer needs. Academies will prepare students for meaningful careers and provide the foundation for the next level of skills training and education. Enlist businesses and higher education institutions to partner with schools to help with the skills required for specific job sectors and provide internships, field trips to businesses and apprenticeship programs.
Insist on consistent and explicit academic standards for all schools. Ensure equity in schools in classrooms, teacher assignments, supplies and technology sufficient to achieve academic excellence.
Increase efficiency, effectiveness and accountability from all education entities. Ensure that the educational system understands that children, parents and businesses are the system's customers and therefore receive customer-friendly service.
Provide strong support for teachers from school administration and school board in order to maintain discipline required to produce and maintain a safe, productive learning environment.
Involve employers, neighborhood watch groups, police and other community groups in reducing truancy and increasing student attendance.
Increase dual enrollment between area high schools and community colleges.
Promote K-20 instead of K-12 with expectations of continued education and education as a worthwhile lifetime pursuit.
Teach the necessity of accepting moral and personal responsibility for one's actions.
Expand Advance Placement offerings and participation in all high schools.
Expect mutual respect and support among students, parents, teachers, administrators and communities.
Recognize that the principal's leadership is a major factor in a school's success and ensure the highest quality principal in each school. Each principal should run his or her school using sound leadership and management techniques.
Ensure that all students have access to high-quality after-school programs

Skills Training and Life Long Learning
Increase the earnings per job potential of existing and future adult Duval County residents by encouraging every adult to increase their training and level of education. Improved training and education will result in increases in output per hour, thereby increasing productivity. Productivity increases will result in increased earnings per job and the potential to move up the success ladder. This can be achieved through:

Encouraging employers to provide incentives for further education and training.
Aligning education and skills training with employers' current and future market needs.
Ensuring skills training is available to replace retiring workers and provide workers for new, relocating, expanding or start-up businesses.
Employers helping educators and employees understand and respond to skill sets required for advancement along the employer career path.
Retraining workers who were downsized out of a current job.
Helping to remove barriers to pursuing additional education. Barriers may include transportation, childcare, and tuition costs.
Educating the homeless.
Increasing GED availability and accessibility.
Supporting vocational education and skilled employment opportunities for the non-college bound.

Increase the adult literacy rate.
Provide training for parents with emphasis on stable families and parenting skills.
Provide adequate job training, using job coaches and actual work experiences, to developmentally disabled young adults aged 15 to 21.
Recognize and encourage the use of the Jacksonville public library's resources.

Higher Education

Increase significantly the number of higher education students and the number of higher education degrees awarded each year. Increase the rankings and visibility of local higher education institutions.
Involve colleges and universities in the community to a greater extent in preparing our citizens for life and employment in the 21st Century, including helping to create high-wage jobs.
Increase university research and development that furthers the advancement of Blueprint targeted industry sectors.
Promote teaching as a career.
Develop Edward Waters College as a strong and universally respected educational facility.
Develop additional need-based scholarship opportunities.

General

Train educators and childcare providers to teach problem/conflict resolution, anger control, empathy and the value of human life.
Teach entrepreneurship to all ages and at all levels of education.
Ensure that the public library system serves the entire community by providing attractive, secure facilities and equipment, experienced staff and materials collections needed to assist all customers in meeting their information and research needs.
Educate school faculty about the in-depth resources, technologies, collections and programs available at the public library, thereby encouraging students to take full advantage of these resources.
Encourage collaboration and partnerships among schools, colleges, and public libraries in order to provide the services and materials needed to support the educational needs of the community, focusing on services to youth.
Provide diversity training for teachers, students, and administrators.