Organization: Great Lakes Center for Education Research and Practice

Website Address: www.greatlakescenter.org

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Brief description of organization:

The mission of the Great Lakes Center for Education Research and Practice is to support and disseminate high quality research and reviews of research for the purpose of informing education policy and to develop research-based resources for use by those who advocate for education reform.

What are some recent accomplishments or projects your organization is working on?

The Great Lakes Center is involved in a myriad of education related research and advocacy projects. We are primarily designed to fund and disseminate education related policy briefs and reviews of research. We are the primary funder of the Think Twice project, a project of the National Education Policy Center. Think Twice reviews “think tank research” and offers a scholarly review of the publication. The project recently reviewed the State Policy Report Card by StudentsFirst and the Measures of Effective Teaching project (funded by the Gates Foundation.) We are very proud to support this noteworthy program.

Tell us how both your organization and convention attendees would benefit from your Hall booth?

To be honest, the education research we fund isn’t sexy or appealing to most people. However, we serve a vital role in education research. We fund projects that nobody else is working on, sometimes taking on very large organizations that have millions of dollars invested in corporate education reforms. We operate a very small organization with a part-time director and staff, with a majority of our funds going directly into research.

We will provide pamphlets and informational materials for educators and education advocate. More importantly, we will provide an opportunity for progressive advocates to learn more about the research that we fund and ways that advocates can share and expand our reach. Our primary audience is K-12 educators working in public schools, however we see a direct need to share our funded research with a broader audience – specifically the progressive community of Netroots Nation.