Approve Agreement for Technical Services with Character Education Partnership to Conduct Summer Institutes for the Project RESPECT (Responsible Engaged Students Promoting Empathy, Caring, and Trust) Grant (Curriculum and Instruction)

Project RESPECT is a Federal Department of Education Character Education grant. As part of Project RESPECT, Character Education Partnership (CEP), a national leader for the Character Education movement, will conduct two summer institutes impacting 120 participants at 40 elementary schools. These custom institutes are designed to help schools with the implementation of their character initiatives by identifying best practices in teaching strategies. CEP will work with each participant to develop the working knowledge of pedagogy and character content necessary for lasting systemic change in their school by integrating character education throughout the entire school.

The proposal for this federal grant mandates providing summer institutes for teachers. The proposal also states that we would send 20 teachers, the project director, and the project manager to the CEP National Conference each year at a cost of $23,545 per year. In lieu of travel, this contract has been written to provide the same CEP training locally at a savings of $14,745. Bringing CEP to our district enables us to provide this training to 120 teachers at 40 schools participating in the grant and brings the cost per participant down from $1,070 for 22 people to $73.33 for 120 teachers and completely eliminates the need to travel outside the district.

These summer institutes will provide an in-depth study of the Eleven Principles of Character Education and 35 indicators of Character Education Quality Standards to drive student achievement, ethical growth, and social and emotional skill development. Participants will be reflecting on current strengths and weakness of their school’s character education practices and will be creating action plans for their school sites. The summer institutes will be held June 16 - 17, 2010, and June 23 - 24, 2010, at Twin Lakes Elementary School.

The schools involved in Project RESPECT include the following Title I elementary schools: Alexander, Bing, Bryan, Burney, Cahoon, Chiaramonte, Clair-Mel, Davis, DeSoto, Dover, Edison, Egypt Lake, Forest Hills, Graham, Jackson, James, Kenly, Kimbell, Lanier, Lockhart, Mango, Mendenhall, Miles, MOSI Partnership, Oak Grove, Oak Park, Palm River, Potter, Reddick, Riverhills, Tampa Bay Boulevard, Thonotosassa, Trapnell, Twin Lakes, USF/Patel, B.T. Washington, West Shore, West Tampa, Wilson, and Witter.

* Motivate students to become responsible learners

Funds of $8,800 are included in the Project RESPECT Grant budget (Project 1637).

Each school team will use CEP's Quality Standards as a pre-assessment to evaluate their schools effectiveness in each of the 11 areas indicated. Using this data, teams will create action plans to improve on areas of need. Action plans will be sent to the grant facilitator. At the end of the school year, school teams will use the same Quality Standards document as a post-assessment to determine the effectiveness of their action plans.