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Building on the extensive insight gained through outreach and opinion research, The Council for Corporate and School Partnerships set out to develop Guiding Principles that incorporate key learning about relationships that have been considered successful. The eight Guiding Principles, which fall into four thematic categories, have been developed to help illustrate the characteristics of effective partnerships for school, communities and businesses that are interested in developing new partnerships or enhancing current partnerships.
THE FOUNDATION: Developing the partnership's core values
School/Business partnerships must be built on shared values and philosophies.
- Begin with an open and frank discussion about values, goals and needs.
- Respect and reflect the culture and goals of both the education and business partners.
- Support the core mission of the school.
- Bolster the academic, social and physical well being of students.
- Compliment the social values and goals of the school, business partner and the community.
Partnerships should be defined by mutually beneficial goals and objectives.
- Clearly define short and long-range goals.
- Focus on collaboration to determine activities that meet the goals of all involved.
- Partnership goals and objectives should be aligned with education goals of individual schools and/or district.
IMPLEMENTATION: Translating values into action
Partnership activities should be integrated into the school and business cultures.
- Partners should communicate frequently to respect and understand each other's cultures.
- Partnerships should provide students, teachers, and business employees with opportunities to interact at school, community and business sites.
Partnerships should be driven by a clear management process and structure.
- Each school and school district should have a point person to manage partnerships to ensure quality and alignment with educational goals for students.
- Partnerships should include written descriptions of roles and responsibility, accountability measures and guidelines for responsibilities of educators and business employees.
- Partnerships should include training for all key personnel.
Partnerships should define specific, measurable outcomes.
- Partnerships should be guided by collaborative agreement on outcomes, benchmarks and measures of progress.
CONTINUITY: Sustaining the partnership over time
Partnerships should have support at the highest level within the business and school and concurrence at all levels.
- Superintendents, principals, school boards, CEOs and managers should articulate and demonstrate support for the partnership internally and externally.
- Partnerships should be explicitly supported by teachers, employees and other constituents.
- Communities should have the opportunity to review and contribute to partnerships.
Partnerships should include detailed internal and external communications plans, which clearly illustrate expectations of all parties.
EVALUATION: Determining strengths, weaknesses and future directions
Partnerships should be developed with clear definitions of success for all partners.
- Measures for success should be established at the outset of the partnership.
- Partnerships should be evaluated on a regular agreed-upon basis.
- Evaluation should include collection and analysis of information to determine accomplishments, strengths and weaknesses of the partnership.
The Guiding Principles are intended to encourage and support local decision-making. The Council firmly believes that all decisions related to establishing or developing school-business partnerships should be made in collaboration with local school officials and school boards. When considering partnerships that involve the sale of products and services, in-school advertising and other relationships that generate competing points of view, the Council recommends that schools, businesses and communities base their decisions on whether or not the action will serve to enhance the mission of the school, and is in alignment with school values and goals.
For more information please refer to our Guiding Principles PDF
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