The Winthrop Rockefeller Foundation has formally established an agreement with the Mashburn Center for Learning to write three comprehensive white papers that examine what is working in Arkansas to increase graduation rates at two-year colleges, four-year universities, and high schools.
A fourth comprehensive white paper will focus on improving STEM education in Arkansas, with specific focus on the impact of STEM education on graduation rates. The foundation has asked the Mashburn team, Drs. Mark Cooper, Patty Kohler-Evans, and Lisa Daniels and Ms. Renee Calhoon, to investigate interventions that impact hard to retain students and marginalized populations attending two-year colleges or four-year universities, students attending high-poverty high schools, and low income, minority, and rural students participating in STEM education.
The foundation has instituted a multi-year strategic plan that builds on the Winthrop Rockefeller Foundation’s 35 year history of grant-making. The multi-year strategic plan is called Moving the Needle. The ultimate goal of the foundation is to move from the nation’s bottom five in economic and education indicators to one of the nation’s highest ranking states. Dr. Cooper, director of the Mashburn Center for Learning, finds that the WR Foundations mission and the Mashburn Center for Learning mission is completely aligned.
“The WRF has a history for helping. They continue to obligate the use of its resources to understand not only the problems contributing to educational challenges, but also the solutions necessary to eliminate those challenges,” Cooper said. “When you consider the significance of this comprehensive agenda outlined by WRF’s funding mission, it is clear that the Mashburn Center team has a very significant responsibility to Arkansas educators, policy-makers, state department stakeholders, legislators, and especially the recipients of education – the students.”
The Mashburn Center for Learning team is very excited to participate in this strategic alliance with WRF due to the special focus on improving education for challenged learners attending high schools, two-year-colleges, and four-year institutions.
“We will make every effort to describe practices we believe contribute to successful interventions that appear effective for retaining students and enhancing their progression toward successful completion of programs of study within high schools, vocational schools, and colleges,” said Dr. Daniels, associate professor in the Department of Teaching and Learning at UCA. “Such efforts shall be most important considering Arkansas’ rank as 50th in the rate of college completers.”
