NATIONAL EDUCATION POLICY CENTER LAUNCHES SPANISH-LANGUAGE INITIATIVE-- KUDOS TO NPEC!

National Education Policy Center Launches Spanish-Language Initiative Contact Jamie Horwitz; (202) 549-4921; jhdcpr@starpower.net URL for this press release: http://tinyurl.com/bjchb49 Denver (February 5, 2013) -- The National Education Policy Center (NEPC) of the University of Colorado Boulder has released three Spanish-language policy briefs explaining research-based and equity-focused approaches to key education issues: charter schools, teacher incentives and promoting involvement of parents of English language learners.   The following briefs and press releases are now available on the NEPC website:   •  Promoting ELL Parental Involvement: Challenges in Contested Times, by Beatriz Arias and Milagros Morillo-Campbell.  The Spanish-language brief can be found athttp://nepc.colorado.edu/node/3467, and the Spanish-language press release can be found at http://nepc.colorado.edu/newsletter/2008/01/promoting-ell-parental-espanol. The English brief and press release are available athttp://nepc.colorado.edu/publication/promoting-ell-parental.   •  Chartering Equity: Using Charter School Legislation and Policy to Advance Equal Educational Opportunity, by Julie Mead and Preston Green. The Spanish-language brief can be found athttp://nepc.colorado.edu/node/3294, and the Spanish-language press release can be found athttp://nepc.colorado.edu/newsletter/2012/02/chartering-equity-espanol. The English brief and press release are available athttp://nepc.colorado.edu/publication/chartering-equity.     •  Creating Teacher Incentives for School Excellence and Equity, by Barnett Berry and Jon Eckert. The Spanish-language brief can be found athttp://nepc.colorado.edu/node/3295, and the Spanish-language press release can be found athttp://nepc.colorado.edu/newsletter/2012/01/creating-teacher-incentives-espanol. The English brief and press release are available athttp://nepc.colorado.edu/publication/creating-teacher-incentives.     “Our goal at NEPC is to make high-quality research accessible to communities throughout the U.S.,” said NEPC director Kevin Welner, a professor at CU Boulder’s School of Education. “Nearly one in four public school students is an immigrant or the child of immigrants, and this means that a language other than English is spoken in many of our students’ homes. Because almost 80 percent of the nation’s English language learners speak Spanish, we think this new initiative is extremely important, and we hope to release many additional policy briefs in Spanish in the years to come.”   Funding for all three briefs was provided by the Great Lakes Center for Education Research and Practice.  Funding for “Chartering Equity” and “Creating Teacher Incentives” was also provided by the Ford Foundation.   The National Education Policy Center unites a diverse group of interdisciplinary scholars from across the United States.  The Center is guided by the belief that the democratic governance of public education is strengthened when policies are based on sound evidence.  To learn more about NEPC, please visithttp://nepc.colorado.edu/.