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This mid-point report from a seven-year study about building a college culture investigates how a multifaceted approach including mentoring, technology, campus visits, parent involvement, and tutoring impacts at-risk middle school students' college aspirations and eventual success gaining college acceptance. Based on NAEP report data, many young adolescents may not be adequately prepared for postsecondary education and workforce success. This longitudinal study follows a student cohort (n = 50) starting in their sixth grade year, uses a quasi-experimental design including three comparison groups, and collects data from surveys, interviews, written reflective statements, and student academic measures to evaluate efforts and outcomes of building a college culture. Midpoint findings suggest that experiencing college life through campus visits and vicariously through mentoring experiences with preservice teachers may be linked to improvements in at-risk middle school students' perceptions of college. Digital story-writing projects and on-campus writing marathons helped these students gain insight on their academic and career futures. Different strategies have been implemented to increase parental participation in building a college culture. Because many of these students need higher grades, the project shifts emphasis during year three to academic tutoring by preservice teachers as the students enter eighth grade. (Contains 2 tables.)

The hallmark of the reading/writing workshop approach is its flexibility--its accommodation to the unique creativity of every student and of every teacher across a landscape of unique and distinct classroom communities. From the collective works of leading proponents, the following principles for workshop teachers can be liberally abstracted: the reading/writing workshop teacher is a facilitator, mediator, and mentor; the teacher reads, writes, and learns with the students; reading and writing are not separate subdisciplines; and reading/writing workshop students are trusted to construct and direct their own learning. The traditional approach to instruction can be reduced to a brief analysis of four "C's": a canon of privileged works of literature; a curriculum which is clearly defined and carefully structured; classification of students according to whether they achieved the skills; and teacher as conductor of an orchestra, overseeing the transmission of knowledge to students. Generalized features of the workshop approach can be loosely classified under four more "C's": choice, allowing students to choose what to read and how to interpret it; collaboration, the sharing of responses, ideas, drafts, and finished written products; cultural diversity, encouraging students to bring to the classroom context their knowledge of different social and cultural communities; and charter, a coalition of readers and writers, teachers and learners, that binds the members toward a common goal. What often emerges as teachers implement a reading/writing workshop is a blend of the two versions of the four C's. (Contains 12 references.) (RS)

Young adolescents' low scores on the National Assessment of Educational Progress (NAEP) force the question of whether these students will be ready for college in four years. Our efforts to build a college-going culture emphasize strengthening students' writing skills by using preservice teachers to lead writing marathons for at-risk middle school students on university visits. Structured interviews, surveys, and written reflections reveal that what students write about changes with age, their motivation to write varies, and their college aspirations and perceptions become more positive after completing several annual writing marathons on a college campus. The writing marathon structure makes the college visit truly meaningful to students, and it provides a compelling incentive to write by supporting characteristics of middle school students, as defined by the National Middle School Association (National Middle School Association [NMSA] 2003). The marathon model focuses on four key elements: setting, timing, small groups, and writers' level of commitment.

Because approximately two-thirds of the nation's middle school students are writing and reading below the proficient level (NCREL, 2005), researchers warn that we may be facing a literacy crisis in the next decade unless schools commit to creating a culture that promotes college or other postsecondary education. The authors endorse the position that schools should create a "college culture" that encourages all students to consider college by introducing information about higher education opportunities during early adolescence and in high school. This article details a project, intended to inspire this consideration, in which 50 sixth-graders were selected to participate in a writing activity that was coupled with a visit to a university campus. The interaction with campus life and the glimpse of college classes seemed to yield positive results.

Describes the use of video in preservice teacher education to collectively view and critique methods of teaching as observed in a classroom. Discusses the benefits of shorter segments that can be reproduced on CD-ROM, laserdisc, and DVD; describes four sample video cases; and considers planning, costs, copyright, and evaluation. (LRW)