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Confirmation of the current enthusiasm for re-visioning progressive education arrived in inboxes this fall when the Bank Street College of Education received more submissions for this issue than for any other in the journal's 17-year history. From these the editors have selected a range of essays that reflect pre-kindergarten through high-school settings; focus on individual classrooms, entire schools and school districts; and attend to matters of pedagogy and curriculum building or to working within the constraints of the contemporary moment. Following an introduction title "Now is the Time," by Jonathan Silin & Meredith Moore, nine essays were selected. Three of the essays showcase child-centered public schools and present twenty-first century embodiments of progressive principles laid out more than a century ago. Corinthia Mirasol-Spath and Jill Leibowitz explore the benefits of play for students and teachers alike in a New York City elementary school that provides students with time to explore their interests through long-term projects of their choosing in "Reenvisioning the Classroom: Making Time for Students and Teachers to Play." Rachel Seher, Alan Cheng, and Melissa Birnbaum paint a portrait of another school with experiential learning at its core; at "City-As-School: Internship-based Learning in New York City Public Schools," internships take the place of many classroom-based courses. "The Center for Inquiry: Anatomy of a Successful Progressive School" transports the reader to Indianapolis, Indiana, where authors Christine Leland, Amy Wackerly, and Christine Collier were part of the original cohort of teachers and university faculty who founded a progressive magnet school. Premised on inquiry-based teaching and learning, the Center for Inquiry has grown from one to four schools. The second group of essays addresses the ways that progressive education in public schools has shifted and must continue to shift to meet the needs of America's increasingly diverse student population. In "Beyond Child-Centered Constructivism: A Call for Culturally Sustaining Progressive Pedagogy," Alissa Algava argues that twentieth-century constructivist pedagogies are not sufficient to fulfill progressive education's inherently political, activist and democratic potential. She calls for a culturally sustaining progressive pedagogy that critically engages questions of power with both children and teachers. Beatric S. Fennimore confronts the deficit-based talk prevalent in many schools serving marginalized students in "Say that the River Turns: Social Justice Intentions in Progressive Public School Classrooms." She argues that teaching for social justice begins by replacing deficit-based talk with clearly articulated intentions that subsequently transform into actions. Echoing the theme of the power of language, Darrick Smith summarizes efforts to transform the negative and disrespectful culture at a small California high school with a racially diverse student population, in "A Humanizing Approach to Improving School Disciplinary Culture." Here a humanizing approach to discipline, rooted in an affirmation of students and their families, and entailing an alignment of school and family values with the school's mission, has been successful. Finally, incorporating data from an ethnographic case study of a bilingual (Spanish/English) Head Start program serving the children of Dominican and Mexican immigrants, Ysaaca Axelrod explores the tensions in parents', teachers', and administrators' beliefs about language use and the role of play in ""We All is Teachers": Emergent Bilingual Children at the Center of the Curriculum." Balancing these essays on classroom life, the final two essays focus on administrative practices that support progressive education. In "Holding Space for Progressive Practices," elementary principals Abbe Futterman, Dyanthe Spielberg, and Cecelia Traugh use a descriptive review process to share their methods for maintaining educational spaces that are grounded in progressive values, in the face of conflicting mandates from the district or the state. In a provocative counterpoint, Doug Knecht, Nancy Gannon, and Carolyn Yaffe, former New York Department of Education administrators, describe their work adding a quality review process to the accountability system for city schools in "Across Classrooms: School Quality Reviews as a Progressive Educational Policy." Positing that the quality review is itself a progressive process, they argue that it can help schools to focus more on the lived experiences of their students and less on high stakes moments. Together these essays tell that only through a shared commitment of families, teachers and administrators can progressive practices flourish in public schools. They also tell that success requires a combination of hard work in the classroom and savvy political strategizing in the larger systems, along with a deep understanding of the foundational tenets of progressivism and a willingness to reimagine how best to realize them in the twenty-first century. It is the hope that these essays will inspire as they have inspired the writers to continue advocating for more just, engaging, and child-friendly classrooms for all children. (Individual papers contain references.)

This issue of "Occasional Papers" is filled with stories by and about "strangers"--people of all ages who perceive themselves or have been perceived by others as outsiders either because of who they are, where they have come from, or even how recently they have arrived in this country. Successful educators know that the ability to welcome the stranger into the classroom, indeed an entire group of strangers each September, is essential to building a productive, caring community of learners. They know, too, that, from the point of view of students new to the school or society, the culture of the classroom may feel very strange. Welcoming teachers are willing to step outside of their own cultural frames to see the school from the student's perspective. Common purposes and goals emerge in classrooms only when there is a genuine sharing of the things that really matter to everyone present, not just when the rules and routines are posted. In classrooms where students can tell their stories, they come to feel safe, to know that they will be heard, and to recognize that they can legitimately hold on to parts of the past even as they move into the future. Students also learn that difficult emotions--uncertainty, ambiguity, loss--can be managed, contained, and shared rather than ignored or silenced. Beyond the school itself, greeting the stranger is at the heart of the democratic experience. Following an introduction by Jonathan G. Silin, the following essays are included in this "Occasional Paper": (1) Building Bridges between Adult Education, Public Schools, and Health Care: A Strategy to Promote Social Inclusion (Jana Sladkova, Anahi Viladrich, and Nicholas Freudenberg); (2) Crossing Borders / Shaping Tales (Erika Duncan); and (3) Attending to "Hu'Huk": Lessons for a Teacher (Elizabeth Park). Individual essays contain references.

What counts as knowledge and whose knowledge counts? When does going away help shape a clearer sense of home, and when does it not? How does living abroad change our perspectives as teachers and learners? The educators who have contributed to this Occasional Paper share a formidable combination of purpose, curiosity, courage, and self-awareness. Reflecting on their choices to live and work in other parts of the world, they offer a provocative range of personal and professional explanations for seeking our the strange and unknown. Their letters from abroad reveal a genuine interest in what matters to others, a capacity to describe people and environments with intriguing detail, and a willingness to reveal themselves as inexpert newcomers. As these essays make clear, no preparation is ever sufficient because what happens always diverges from and exceeds our expectations. Risk-taking and error are inevitable, as integral to each story as the exhilarating discoveries that travel affords. Most important, we learn how these educators came to value the experience of "otherness" in themselves as well as in those they met. Today, we are more mindful than ever of the need for global awareness, understanding, and engagement. "Letters from Abroad" is designed to highlight what some Bank Street colleagues have sought, found, and questioned while working far from home. The editors of the Occasional Papers Series hope these missives from foreign shores will inspire others to set out on explorations of their own, explorations in which they resist the temptation to make the strange familiar and enjoy, if only for a short while, the way that the familiar itself may become strange. After an introduction by Linda Levine, the essays comprising this paper are: (1) What We Bring with Us and What We Leave Behind: Six Months in Post-Apartheid South Africa (Virginia Casper, Donna Futterman, and Evan Casper-Futterman); (2) There and Almost Back Again (Holley Adcock); and (3) Living in the World (David Penberg).

In 1918, just one year before the founding of American Council of Learned Societies (ACLS), Thorstein Veblin wrote, "In one shape or another, this problem of adjustment, reconciliation or compromise between the needs of higher learning and the demands of the business enterprise is forever present in the deliberations of the university directorate." In the early twenty-first century, forces in the political economy of higher education may be making that reconciliation even more difficult and straining academic ideals. Many see within the changes in the teaching force a transformed conception of the social role of the university. No longer conceived as a public good, the university is thought of as providing private individual goods to its students. In this view, a private, profit-making university may provide the most efficient service. The essays in this volume began as presentations in a panel session on "The Idea and Ideals of the University" at the 2004 ACLS Annual Meeting. Concern about the corporate culture defining the university invites scholars to reflect about the ideas and values that have traditionally constituted the university, evoking the questions discussed by panel participants: What is the role of the learned societies, of scholars, and of academic leaders in defining and interpreting the ethical components of a shared vision of the twenty-first-century academy? To what degree does the case for the university's autonomy carry a concomitant obligation for it to be self-policing? What will be the role of digital technology? Following an introduction (Rebecca Chopp), four essays are included: (1) Key Issues Currently Facing American Higher Education (Ronald G. Ehrenberg); (2) Humanities in the University: Retrospect and Prospect (Andrew Delbanco); (3) The Humanities: A Technical Profession (Alan Liu); and (4) What Do I Really Think About the Corporate University? (Catharine R. Stimpson). (Essays are noted and figured individually.)

Alternative routes to teacher preparation are clearly here to stay. A growing research literature on non-traditional pathways suggests the complexity of the task ahead. This report offers new teachers the opportunity to tell their own stories in their own words. In "Alternative Certification and Alternative Pathways: A Personal Take on a Core Policy Dilemma," Jon Snyder sets the scene with an insightful and provocative essay that identifies the key issues from a public policy perspective. While he has serious reservations about many alternative programs, he also has been instrumental in developing the Partnership for Quality, a collaboration between schools in the South Bronx and Bank Street College. This alternative program only allows candidates to become teachers of record after establishing the capacity to work successfully with children. In addition, candidates participate in on-going mentoring with experienced teachers in schools where they and the entire staff receive support from the College. The essays which follow Snyder document the experiences of four novice teachers. These essays are: (1) "I Hope This Will Be a Good Year for Me..." A Career-Changer Stumbles on the Fast Track to Teaching (Miranda Barry); (2) Collaborations for Success: Teachers, Families, and Funders Working Together (Sarah Samuels); (3) Getting Off the Fast Track for the Long Haul: Becoming a Teacher (Ariel Sacks); and (4) Learning a Tough Lesson: My Life as a NYC Teaching Fellow (Allen Ellenzweig). Five themes weave their way through these personal essays and remind us of the spectrum of fundamental issues that frame life in schools. These themes are: collaboration and isolation; educational vision and pedagogical skills; theory and practice; leadership and silence; and resources and barren landscapes. While offering distressing pictures of some alternative route programs, these essays also shed light on the elements that make schools work and allow new teachers to learn their craft: collaboration among peers and between professionals and families; vision informed by appropriate practices; theory offering insight into the lived realities of students and teachers; leadership that creates reliable, safe environments; rich resources. [Preface by Jonathan G. Silin.]

This collection of lectures, which is the viewpoint that considers writing not only as a thinking tool but also a communication tool, and thus, a tool of interaction. addresses the interactive view of writing. Also included in the collection are two articles by Danish and Turkish writing researchers on writing in English as a Foreign Language (EFL). Following an introduction by the editor, papers are entitled: (1) "A Discourse Analysis of Narrative Essays Written in English by Danish Students" (Dorte Albrechtsen); (2) "Should We Always Ask Students to Redraft Their Writing?" (Tim Caudery); (3) "Composing in First and Second Languages: Possible Effects of EFL Writing Instruction" (Ayse Akyel and Sibel Kamisli); (4) "Collaborative Writing: Online and Face to Face" (Stephen Doheny-Farina); (5) "Text and Dynamics: Observations on Text Production at a Technical Workplace" (Karl-Heinz Pogner); and (6) "Pretend Play and Learning to Write" (Helga Andresen). (CR)

We propose that Disability Studies in Education (DSE) offers a framework that (a) grounds policy and practice in the experiences and perspectives of people with disabilities, (c) challenges practices/ policy that isolate, de-humanize individuals, and (c) leads to new questions to pose. In this session, we describe the pedagogy that we used to develop the constructing position papers from a DSE perspective. We believe that our reflective essays can help others critically examine their own disciplines and the foundational principles on which the disciplines are built. We hope to challenge and change particular foundations that allow us to continue to marginalize people with disabilities. Using a Disability Studies in Education lens, we share position papers and discuss strategies to guide preservice and inservice teachers to challenge the paradigms, policies, and practices that lead to presumptions of failure of America's Pre-K-12 children. In this volume, professionals who prepare future teachers in general and special education and communication sciences and who work with children and adults with disabilities share their observations and concerns about their respective disciplines. The following essays are included: (1) Public Intellectuals Speak Out! (Ann Nevin); (2) Why Teach DSE Principles to Students in Elementary School? (Shawna Draxton); (3) Disability Studies Training Module: A Grass Roots Movement (Darla Hagge); (4) Presuming Competence: Developing Resistance to Ableist Teaching Practices (Joanne Murphy); (5) Untangling Family and School Relationships through a Disability Studies Perspective (Trisha Nishimura); (6) From Naming to Doing: DSE Principles in a Special Education World (Kirstee Radley); and (7) How Can DSE Support the Advancement of the African Decade of Persons with Disabilities (SADPD): A Letter to the Secretariat (Lawrence Taniform). Individual papers contain references. [Abstract modified to meet ERIC guidelines. Edited by Ann Nevin. Paper presented by Shawna Draxton, Joanne Murphy, and Kirstee Radley at Cal-TASH Annual Conference (Irvine, CA March 4, 2011).]