February 2008
Started in 2006, LearnmoreMN looks for solutions to ensure that more Minnesota students succeed in school and move on to college. Producing more educated workers is critical for our state given demographic shifts and changes in our economy.
In this issue
New LearnmoreMN home pageWe have a blog!
What's new
LearnmoreMN TV program in the works
Join in
New LearnmoreMN home page
We've re-vamped the LearnmoreMN home page to highlight new and interesting content. It's now easier to find and navigate to the information that you want to view. For example:
- The central images (you can click on tabs 2 and 3 too) sum up what LearnmoreMN is all about.
- Preview an inspirational story about people who are doing something about school success.
- Link to the latest news stories — updated each weekday.
- See recently-added research summaries.
- Answer the question of the week and see how your answer stacks up.
- Check out the featured comment from the blog.
- Click on what's new to find the latest additions to the site.
As always, we welcome your feedback. Send us a note to share comments and suggestions.
We have a blog!
Monthly guest bloggers will share their perspectives on the new LearnmoreMN blog. Willy Tully of Big Brothers, Big Sisters is our inaugural blogger for the month of February. His first post focuses on mentoring. Tully suggests that all adults have the capacity — as well as the responsibility — to positively invest in our youth. Join in the conversation by sharing your comments.
Bloggers scheduled for upcoming months include Josie Johnson, former University of Minnesota associate vice president for minority student affairs (March); Karri Plowman, Saint Paul Area Chamber of Commerce and American Indian community activist (May); Jon Pekel of MyGrowthPlan.Org, a nonprofit serving high school and college students, (June) and Kathy Glampe, who directs the TRiO/Student Support Services program at St. Olaf College.
Visit the blog regularly or sign up for e-mail notification or RSS feeds.
What's new
LearnmoreMN is regularly updated with the latest news, current research studies, inspirational stories and practical ideas about what you can do. Here is a sampling:
- St. Paul's Circulator bus: A neighborhood connects the dots — get inspired by what one community is doing to get students to extracurricular activities.
- Student Success & Minnesota's Future is the latest version of the LearnmoreMN presentation, which walks through our education challenges.
- Find out what others say about the challenges that LearnmoreMN addresses. Recent additions include a link to the promotional video for Two Million Minutes, a documentary that contrasts the high school experience of seniors in the USA, India and China. "Talking About Elephants" speaks to our failure to educate most African-American male students well.
- Visit inspirations for stories about what parents, individuals, businesses, educators and communities are doing to improve school success. And get ideas for what you can do.
LearnmoreMN TV program in the works
Our efforts to capture Minnesotans' interest in addressing our education challenges are growing with the development of a new TV program. Titled "Vanishing Graduates & Minnesota's Future," the program is a partnership with public television station TPT's Minnesota Channel. Beginning this month TPT will start taping interviews with experts on our economy and education. The program will capture the issues that we face as a state when too many students are not succeeding in school and moving into college; it will also aim to inspire viewers to take steps to help address the issue.
You'll hear more from LearnmoreMN about the program as well as the initial airing times this spring on TPT's Minnesota Channel. After it airs, we will be eager to work with anyone who can imagine ways to reuse all or part of the program, for anything from Web site offerings to community meetings.
The program is being supported by Travelers Foundation, through a grant awarded for LearnmoreMN,as well as by the Foundation for Independent Higher Education. In addition, the Minnesota Private College Council is contributing to the project, in recognition of the state's sesquicentennial and the role education has played in Minnesota's history.
Join in
LearnmoreMN is a great resource for Minnesotans who want to learn more about the education challenges facing our state. Check out what the site has to offer, share it with your friends and colleagues and add a LearnmoreMN link on your own Web site. Visit the blog and consider leaving a comment. Sign up as a supporter and Send us a note to offer your suggestions and ideas. Thanks for visiting LearnmoreMN!
