Chad Policy WORK
Newark Community Innovations Lab (NCIL)
Newark Community Innovations Lab Is a new city-wide peer participatory research initiative sponsored by the Chad School Foundation program designed to empower Newark based high school and college students to collaboratively address some of the most pressing challenges and opportunities in the city. The Newark Community Innovation Labs are designed to allow young people to discover things about themselves as students, issues facing our society, and how we can collectively work together as citizens of Newark and also as citizens of the world!
The Newark Community Innovation Labs will work as a catalyst for social impact and local empowerment. The mission of the Newark Community Innovation Labs is to build social capital and invest in new approaches to solve present and emergent challenges in Newark. The labs aim to foster innovation, research and development (R&D), entrepreneurship, and human capital development talent among those invested in Newark’s future. The Newark Community Innovation Labs will collaborate with both K-12 and post-secondary partners in the Newark education community to address some of the most pressing challenges across seven key dimensions of urban life:
- Community Infrastructure Lab
- Education Lab
- Energy & Environment Lab
- Health Lab
- Immigration Reform
- Law & Justice
- STEM Lab
Black & Latino Male Achievement Roundtable
The Foundation held its third citywide policy roundtable where stakeholders were engaged to learn about the challenges facing Black and Latino young men, as well as opportunities to more effectively respond to the needs of boys of color.
Building on the theme, “Encourage and Equip,” an audience of over 160 parents, school practitioners, youth service providers, and policymakers were allowed to examine evidence-based models and strategies proven to yield positive results with young men (e.g., improving reading proficiency, increasing high school completion rates, and college and career readiness). Equally critical, participants were provided the opportunity to weigh in on a positive dialogue highlighting the aspirations of young men, including examples of boys beating the odds and succeeding in spite of the lack of familial and/or school and social supports (see video below). Speakers and panelists included Newark Mayor Ras Baraka, Shawn Dove, CEO, National Campaign for Black Male Achievement; David Banks, CEO, Eagle Academy Foundation; Robert Clark, Executive Director of Youth Build Newark; and, Mark Comesanas, Principal of Fast Track Success Academy, Newark
Call to Action
Prior to the close of the program, the audience participated in a collective call to action by adopting three policy recommendations to include the following:
1) Develop an Early Warning System for at-risk students;
2) Provide adequate college guidance to all students;
3) Establish moratorium on excessive student disciplinary practices.
An Examination of Newark Education Philanthropy: 2012-2015
Rationale and Objectives:
- Catalogue education grant making during fiscal years 2012-2015.
- Summarize lessons learned from individual and collective philanthropic strategies designed to strengthen public education in Newark.
- Identify reforms funders believe demonstrate promise and should be preserved.
Areas of Focus
•Arts
•Charter Development and Expansion
•Early Childhood Education
•Extended Learning and Out of School Time
•Health
•Independent and Parochial
•Innovation
•Post-Secondary Supports
•Talent
•Vulnerable Populations
Policy Recommendations
Two overarching recommendations concerning the access and use of data are detailed below.
Access to Data · There is consensus among all participating foundations about the need for the Newark Public Schools to make available a much greater amount of academic, fiscal, and demographic data regarding the progress of schools and students. Funders believe the availability of such data will have the potential to create a shared understanding across stakeholders on the needs and challenges of Newark students and help inform an assessment of improvement efforts to date.
Framework for Data Collection and Evaluation · Building on the Newark Arts Education Roundtable’s efforts to develop multiple measures to assess the impact of art programs on academic and social emotional achievement and other indicators, funders are calling for the adoption of an evaluation framework for education grantmaking encompassing all ten categories reviewed in this report. The framework would include requirements for the use of outcome data to assess the extent of change, and multiple methods and techniques to gauge impact.