Rapid City,
S.D. — The Board of Directors for Mid-continent
Research for Education and Learning (McREL) will meet at the
Rapid City-Rushmore Plaza Holiday Inn on September 17–19.
McREL is a nationally recognized, private, nonprofit organization
located in Aurora, Colo. It is dedicated to improving education
for all students through applied research, product development and
service.
McREL’s 27-member Board represents educators, policymakers,
and business people from the seven-state region — Colorado,
Kansas, Missouri, Nebraska, North Dakota, South Dakota, and Wyoming — that
McREL serves through contracts with the U.S. Department of Education.
Through these competitive contracts, McREL provides research-based
products and services to educators and policymakers.
In South Dakota,
for example, McREL is currently assisting state officials in
a three-year effort to improve the performance of
a statewide consortium of schools: Spring Creek Elementary on
the Rosebud Indian Reservation, Newell Elementary and Middle Schools,
and Alcester-Hudson Elementary School.
“[Our] veteran teachers were good teachers, but with McREL’s
help they have become great teachers,” said Kathy Johannsen,
Elementary Tech Coordinator for Alcester-Hudson Elementary Schools. “We
have gone from a Title I school put on improvement two years ago
to a school with an Advanced + Proficient rate of 93 percent in
reading and 94.5 percent in Math. I feel we would not have achieved
this without the help of McREL.”
Current South Dakota Board
members include Dr. Rick Melmer, South Dakota Department of Education
Secretary, Dianna Miller, Executive
Director of the South Dakota Mining Association, and Jay
Mickelson,
an award-winning high school teacher from Pierre, whose term
expires at the end of 2003. Dr. Tom Hawley, Dean of Education at
Dakota
State University and former interim South Dakota Department of
Education Secretary, has been nominated to replace Mickelson.
In
addition, Gene Enck, executive director of the Associated School
Boards of South Dakota, and Glenna Fouberg,
president of the South
Dakota Board of Education, serve on McREL’s policy advisory
team. Dr. Jack Keegan, superintendent of the Sioux Falls School
District, participates in McREL’s network of urban superintendents.
In 2002, McREL delivered services to clients
in 40 states and seven foreign countries and had annual revenues
of more than $11 million.
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McREL is a nationally recognized, private, nonprofit
organization located in Aurora, Colo., dedicated to improving education
for all students through applied research, product development and
service. Its staff of highly respected educators and researchers
focuses on providing educators and policymakers with the highest
quality, field-tested, research-based products and services available
in PreK–16 education.
