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Lessons in Learning: Canada’s high school dropout rates are falling
High school dropout rates have been declining steadily over the past decade. However, certain groups experience dropout rates well above the national average – rural and Aboriginal students in particular. This article examines what we know about factors affecting high school completion, and identifies ways to encourage all students to complete high school. Read article »
CCL co-sponsors community-based researcher in residence
The Canadian Council on Learning (CCL) and the Vancouver School Board (VSB) have partnered to sponsor a researcher in residence who will work with the school district’s Community Schools teams and Inner City Schools’ project staff.
Martin Guhn, the researcher in residence, will work with the VSB to build research capacity at the staff level and at the district program level. Guhn is a doctoral candidate in measurement and evaluation at The University of British Columbia. He will assist VSB staff to develop assessment instruments and assessment methodology to gather valid and reliable information to inform decisions affecting the students for whom the Community Schools Teams and the Inner City Project staff are responsible.
The main focus of the research will be to identify policies and practices that offer support to students at risk, and ways to track the progress of at-risk learners.
Thomas Grant, Associate Superintendent of Schools, is optimistic about the value the researcher in residence will bring to the children in Vancouver’s most impoverished communities. “We believe Mr. Guhn’s expertise will help us develop a research plan that engages our staff in examining the work they do and its benefits for young people,” said Grant.
Charles Ungerleider, Director of Research and Knowledge Mobilization, CCL, sees the researcher in residence initiative as an experiment in capacity building for both practitioners and the researcher in residence. “Helping organizations to develop an agenda for research on learning is one of the mandates of CCL. Helping researchers to understand the real-world problems faced by learners and those who seek to help them is the other side of the knowledge mobilization coin. We don’t know if the experiment will work, but two of the ingredients are present: a well-defined need and a highly-qualified researcher.”
The researcher in residence is a three-year partnership between the Vancouver School Board and the Canadian Council on Learning.
For more information, please contact Charles Ungerleider, Director, Research and Knowledge Mobilization at CCL.
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