During the closing plenary of the Broadening Impact: NSF-Funded Projects at Two-Year Colleges Conference, Celeste Carter addressed several issues that surfaced during small-group discussions about grant funding.
The groups were asked to identify the challenges community college educators face when submitting proposals to the National Science Foundation and programmatic areas the NSF should consider funding.
Read Full Article ›Rassoul Dastmozd’s methodical approach to mentoring produces exceptional benefits for the educators he teaches and their students. 
Dastmozd’s first MentorLinks college obtained $1.5 million in funding for a new mechatronics program under his guidance. His second MentorLinks college won state approval for a new welding degree program and established a partnership that provides significant tuition discounts for students. And since 2006, Dastmozd—who this fall will serve as president of St. Paul College in Minnesota —has volunteered to work on a U.S. steering committee that uses MentorLinks as a model to improve vocational and technical training in India.
Read Full Article ›INDIANAPOLIS — If Toby Dewayne Daughtery writes a biography, the title will be “My Heroes at My Community College.”
His college: Pulaski Technical Collegein Arkansas. His heroes: Pulaski’s faculty and staff members who patiently explained financial aid and registration and in countless other ways helped him transform himself from a prison inmate into a straight-A student.
“If this is a dream, I pray no one wakes me up too soon,” Daughtery said during his alternately humorous and heart-wrenching speech at the opening of the 2011 Achieving the Dream (ATD) Strategy Institute this week.
Read Full Article ›INDIANAPOLIS — Achieving the Dream educators this week received a boost from the Obama administration.
Leaders of the White House Initiative on Educational Excellence for Hispanics, President’s Board of Advisors on Historically Black Colleges and Universities, and thePresident’s Board of Advisors on Tribal Colleges and Universities attended ATD’s Strategy Institute this week.
“On behalf of President Obama and our Education Secretary Arne Duncan, way to go—congratulations—we know the hard work you’ve been doing,” said Juan Sepúlveda, executive director of the White House Initiative on Educational Excellence for Hispanics, as he gave the thumbs up to the 1,400 people attending the institute.
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