An Innovative Project Response to the Early Education Challenges Facing American Indian Children
With generous funding from the I. A. O’Shaughnessy Foundation
In 2007, Search Institute began The 3-to-3rd Project, a pilot project that uses Developmental Assets® and other relevant educational research to help transform American Indian schools.
The Project supports an innovative, high-impact partnership with Head Start, preschool, and early elementary Indian educators at schools in Arizona and Minnesota. Pilot sites are schools on the Navajo Reservation in Arizona and the Mille Lacs Band Ojibwe Reservation in northern Minnesota.
The 3-to-3rd Project tackles the early education challenges teachers face in American Indian classrooms. Teachers from pre-kindergarten (age three) through third grade are the focus of the project. They are trained to implement research-based ideas, strategies, methods and resources associated with the Developmental Assets and educational practice into their instruction and classroom management.
One of the project’s primary goals is to empower participating teachers to develop culturally-sensitive and research-based resources that can be woven into an implementation package and replicated nationwide in schools serving preschool and early elementary American Indian students.
These new resources, grounded in Developmental Assets and relevant educational research, are intended to improve outcomes for American Indian children in the following areas:
- School readiness
- Social and emotional development
- Academic achievement
- Parent involvement
The pilot phase of The 3-to-3rd Project ends in June, 2009.
The Project Leadership Team members for The 3-to-3rd Project are:- Dr. Marc Mannes, Senior Consultant, Search Institute;
- Dr. Mark Sorensen, Director, STAR School, Executive Director, Native American Grant Schools Association, and Executive Director, Four Winds Principal Leadership Academy;
- Dr. Rick St. Germaine, President, Four Winds Principal Leadership Academy, and Professor of American Indian Studies, University of Wisconsin-Eau Claire.
