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Active Business Community
Background
While we have chosen to use the words Active Business Community for this category, we are using the word Business in the widest sense possible: urban, rural, small, large, corporation, incorporated group, economic coalitions, or any other group. When we say business in the text that follows, please use this wider definition.
Also, we have narrowed the topics we introduce in this document to those that are addressed by PEN's Civil Index Poll. This poll is based on a series of public forums and surveys carried out across the nation over a five year period. As a result of this effort, we have identified indicators or common qualities that encourage meaningful involvement in public education. As you read the information in this series of support tools, consider carefully the situation in your community.
How can you use the information and suggestions included in this material to help you build stronger civic involvement in education in your community?
PEN's Civic Index Indicators for Active Business Community are:
Using this Resource
As you explore the ideas presented in this material, you will find new ways to start school-business partnerships. Local businesses and corporations can offer valuable ideas and a range of resources to support schools and students. You will have an opportunity to:
Examine the benefits and challenges of school-business partnerships Understand guidelines that will help your school-community to involve businesses Plan for ways to use this information in your school and business community
Remember that by making use of this material, you have taken a first step in involving an Active Business Community in efforts to support education. However, the most important thing in exploring new materials is figuring out how you can use the materials. You can choose to study them as an individual or you can review them with others who are interested in this category.
Click here to download the Active Business Community worksheet to help you to work through the things you have learned. You can use this as a tool to record your own thoughts or as a worksheet for group discussion.
Exploring and Organizing the Indicators
Though each of the indicators is separate, each also connects with all the others. This is true of all of the indicators. When a business encourages its staff to participate in career planning days at the local high school, the business is providing resources and giving staff paid leave for these efforts. Or when a school actively seeks the participation of business leaders on long-term curriculum planning efforts, these partnerships help to identify community and school needs as well as draw on resources that businesses can provide. Each indicator may stand alone, but they also are interrelated parts of an Active Business Community that supports education. Schools and community members can involve the business community in different ways and for different purposes. In order to make our discussion of the Active Parent indicators simpler, we've combined them into them into two large topics.
Increasing business community participation in supporting education
In the last 30 years, businesses have actively played a role in education reform. Business leaders fully understand that business success relies on the base skills and knowledge of their employees which depends on the K-16 education received by the employees. Well-designed partnerships between business and education can have an effect on your Civic Index Score.
To increase business community participation in supporting education, these partnerships should include specific planning strategies to:
come up with ways business can best support education in the community, and develop specific procedures and processes that school staff, family members, students, or others in the community will use to attract business resources.
When the business community is actively involved in supporting education through carefully focused activities and clearly established procedures, schools gain additional support for their improvement efforts.
Asking for resources from businesses and corporations
The resources that businesses can provide fall into many categories: funds, volunteers, work opportunities, and more. The key to raising your Civic Index score is in developing a creative approach to determine what resources will provide the greatest support to school improvement efforts.
To put successful ideas into action that involve business and to be able to ask for resources, you need to:
establish long-term relationships with businesses so that planners have access not only to needed resources, but also to the staff who can provide those resources; and think about both local and non-local business as a source of resources.
When you plan and put strategies into action to encourage an Active Business Community, you will have a greater effect on meeting schools' needs if the strategies build long-standing relationships with local and non-local businesses and corporations.
Overview of Research and Best Practices in this Field
Typically, businesses are seen as a source of money for fundraising activities. However, an Active Business Community can fulfill other roles in providing support to education. Small local businesses and large corporations alike care about the quality of their community's schools and the skills and knowledge of graduates. In fact, businesses are often an unused resource in the school community. In addition to funds, they also can provide materials, in-kind services, volunteers, and work experience opportunities, as well as ideas on how the knowledge and skills gained in school are used in the "real world." The business community's viewpoint and expertise are important as schools prepare their students to be successful in the workplace and higher education, and effective and responsible citizens.
According to survey results from the National Association of Partners in Education, businesses between 1990 and 2000 became one of the most likely community groups to partner with schools, equaling the partnerships of parent groups. These partnerships have focused on a wide range of education issues, including student achievement, technology, school-to-work, school readiness, family literacy, community involvement, school safety, professional training, and system-wide change (Ferguson, 2001).
In creating these partnerships, it is important to remember that businesses seek partnerships with schools for a number of reasons. Some business leaders see education as a shared responsibility and feel it is important to help schools and support students as good corporate citizens. Others feel that businesses have an important role in preparing youth for success as employees, consumers, regulators, and neighbors. Some businesses and corporations want to conduct market research on children and advertise in schools. When schools become partners with businesses, the reasons for involvement need to be carefully considered alongside the benefits.
Schools and students can benefit from school-business partnerships in many ways.
Businesses have traditionally worked with schools by providing support and opportunities to school-to-career, internship, and vocational training programs. Schools are increasingly looking to the business community for funding, materials and equipment, and volunteers. Limited resources in many schools make fundraising and establishing business sponsors an important activity. Also, in one study of the outcomes of student participation in activities supported by school-business partnerships, the study authors suggest that the business community offers a valuable source of caring adults that can establish relationships with youth and promote physical, mental, emotional, and social development. Students that were supported by school-business partnerships reported better grades, better school attendance, and more academic motivation (Scales, et. al., 2005).
As you work to increase business involvement with education, remember that each community is unique. Because each community has its own situation, there are no one-size-fits-all methods to put these programs into action. However, when those involved
explore the advantages to business involvement and the roles business can play in improving education for all students
help business leaders and school staff to see the value and advantage of working with each other to provide additional support to schools, and develop long-lasting partnerships that build meaningful relationships between business and education that lead to increased business involvement and support for all students;
these efforts can provide new resources to support student needs.
Key Issues
The information in this section is designed to provide an understanding of key issues connected to efforts to build Active Business Community involvement in schools. As stated in the first section, we have limited the key issues to those connected to the indicators.
What we know about school-business partnerships will highlight important things to think about for businesses and the school community:
Key Issue 1: Business Partnerships-How Do You Know It's a "Good" Match?
Schools have successful partnerships with both small local businesses and large corporations. Partnerships with small businesses can be just as effective as those with large corporations. In fact, while large corporations often have more revenue and can offer support at a greater scale, small businesses are more commonly found in communities and often end up representing the largest share of business-school partnerships. However, each business, small or large, may need different methods in order to encourage involvement . Some businesses and corporations need formal applications or presentations before they form a partnership. Others don't need anything besides a phone call, e-mail, or a person-to-person request.
No matter the size of the business or the process for creating a partnership, the key to forming a successful business-education partnership is making sure the resources provided by the business match the identified educational need. A partnership that is not directly addressing a specific need may be actually draining resources.
Key Issue 2: Rural or Disadvantaged Communities-What Actions or Resources Provide the Greatest Support to Communities with Special Needs?
Businesses located in rural and disadvantaged communities often have limited resources to share with schools. However, this does not mean they cannot provide resources. Instead, those involved need to be creative in the ways they become partners and in the goals that are set. Typically, these businesses provide donations of time and materials, work experience opportunities, volunteers, and other support. Moreover, in rural and poorer areas, businesses also can provide new ideas about how educational institutions can build programs that link career and academic programs and efforts to successfully transition students from education to the workplace.
The key to creating successful partnerships in special need communities is to make certain efforts tie directly to specific educational goals and in using carefully identified resources to support these efforts.
Key Issue 3: Lack of Research-based Information-How Do Businesses Know What Works Without Evidence?
Although recent research provides descriptions about the types and nature of school-business partnerships, there is little research available on student performance outcomes. In short, there is not a lot of evidence about the results of specific actions that come from these efforts. Until such research-based information is available, people must rely on information sharing between school communities and business networks as well as on their own knowledge as to what works for students.
However, using well-planned evaluation and after-event reflection procedures as a regular part of the development of business-school partnerships will provide information to determine if the effort is meeting the intended goals.
Key Issue 4: Ethical Considerations-How Do Educators and Business Leaders Address Differing Needs and Motivations?
Asking for and using private money for public schools creates ethical challenges and legal questions that must be considered in business-school partnerships. Corporate sponsors may have an interest in pursuing market research on students or advertising in schools. Also, when the business is a named partner with a school project, the outcome of that project can reflect on the business. If the result is positive, that is usually not an issue. However, if the result is not positive, it can become an issue.
In the planning stages, schools and businesses should fully explore the possible ethical and legal questions - privacy and protection for students, school staff, parents, and business employees - before a partnership is made formal. Businesses and schools are advised to establish policies to manage these agreements if they do not exist before pursuing partnerships.
Once you've completed the Civic Index Poll in your community find out how you can improve your score in this category by visiting the Tips and Strategies section.
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