The Center for Educational Pathways

The Center for Educational Pathways

Dr. Michael Bitz, Ed.D, Executive Director

Executive Summary

Mission

The mission of the Center for Educational Pathways (CEP) is to research, develop, and distribute alternative pathways to learning for children (grades K-12) in urban areas. These alternative pathwaysinspire learning by integrating the arts and entertainment that children pursue outside of school settings. It must be said that CEP is not a proponent of “edutainment”—materials that employ entertainment formats to simply instruct in traditional and unoriginal ways. Rather, the goal of CEP is to engage children in the creative development of materials, then publish, distribute, and sell those materials for other children to use as learning and motivational tools. The revenues generated from this process sustain CEP and its programs in the urban areas that need it most. CEP is not-for-profit company with 503(c) status; it was incorporated in December, 2002.

The Need Addressed

Many deeply rooted problems in urban America—including crime, poverty, and poor health—are correlated with illiteracy and low academic achievement. Simply put, urban citizens who do not succeed in school are at a clear disadvantage in life. They are more likely to be poor. They are more likely to be incarcerated. They are more likely to have health problems. Meanwhile, another body of research shows a strong correlation between arts-rich environments and academic performance. A steady stream of studies carried out over the past two decades has found gains in writing, reading and reading comprehension, and verbal expression among elementary and middle age children following creative experiences in the arts. Furthermore, engagement in arts experiences has been found to relieve prejudice, hedge against violence, and help children become better risk takers, become more sociable, and enhance self-esteem.

Unfortunately, children in urban areas are rarely afforded the opportunities that enable them to connect arts learning to academic learning. Urban school budgets are perpetually strained, and arts programs in particular are often renewed on an annual basis depending on the availability of funds. Despite the many studies demonstrating how the arts can have positive influences on urban youth, both academically and socially, the arts are an afterthought in most urban educational settings.

Major educational publishing companies and providers are neither interested in nor equipped to address the heart of the problem of urban education—children are neither engaged in nor inspired by the learning process. CEP intends to foster that necessary engagement and motivation through innovative, research-based programming, combined with teacher training and curriculum development.

Programs and Services

CEP has four main programs, reflecting the key content areas in elementary and secondary education: literacy, mathematics, social studies, and science.

The Comic Book Project: This program focuses on reinforcing literacy skills through the comic book format. Through the project, children brainstorm, plot, sketch, outline, write, design, and produce original comic books on an identified theme through the Manuscript Starter and the Comic Book Canvas. All of the comic books are featured in an online art gallery; select comic books are included in a publication and distributed to children in the city where the project was implemented.The Comic Book Project is being incubated by Teachers College, ColumbiaUniversity, one of the most prestigious schools of education. In 2003, the project received a grant from the Cleveland Foundation for implementation with public schools in Cleveland on the theme of conflict resolution. Also, the Environmental Protection Agency awarded a grant for implementation with after-school programs in New York City on the themes of pollution prevention and energy conservation. The resulting comic book publications from these grant projects will be published by Dark Horse Comics, the publisher of Star Wars and Disney comic books.

CEP’s three other programs in development are The Hip Hop Project(social studies), The Video Game Project (mathematics), and The Trading Card Project (science).

The Population Served

The goal of CEP is to develop programs that speak to the needs and interests of urban youth. When children in urban settings direct the creative process, they not only hone their academic skills but also express themselves in areas of the “hidden curriculum”: individual identity, cultural identity, social development, and character development. The identified areas of urban education that CEP targets are schools, after-school programs, mentoring programs, home schooling organizations, and correctional education facilities. The flexible format of CEP materials allows the programs to be adapted by children in grades K-12.

The table below outlines the population demographics of children we have served to date:

*C = Caucasian A = African American H = Hispanic O = Other

Strategy for Achieving the Mission

In the development stage of each of its programs, CEP relies on grant funding for the initial implementation. However, after the first round of implementation, CEP relies on direct sales, catalogue sales, and on-line sales to develop and implement its programs. CEP will eventually sell the programs directly to schools and other educational outlets, as well as incorporate on-line and catalogue sales of the material.

CEP also conducts research that examines the children’s work at target sites—and the process they went through to create that work—in an effort to advance the body of knowledge in the education-related fields of literary, mathematics, history, science, the arts, self-esteem, and urban education. This research includes an assessment of student performance in light of state and national education standards. The assessments are driven by student and staff surveys, student and staff interviews, site observations, and video documentation.

Management Team

The founding director of CEP isDr. Michael Bitz, Ed.D, a senior research associate at Teachers College, ColumbiaUniversity in New York City. Dr. Bitz first identified alternative pathways to learning at the Center for Arts Education Research, which was responsible for a major component of President Clinton’s commissioned research project in education called Champions for Change. Dr. Bitz has published several articles on alternative pathways to learning and has been featured at numerous conferences and symposiums.

CEP has an advisory board led by two professors at Teachers College: Dr. Harold Abeles, the chairperson of the Arts and Humanities Department, and Dr. Judith Burton, the director of the Art and Art Education department. These recognized leaders in their fields help formulate the direction and implementation of CEP’s programs.

Financial and Social Impact Summary

While CEP has relied on grant funding for the development and implementation of its first programs, the company aims to be profitable within two years. This profitability will result from sales of its programs to the educational market as well as sales of the materials that result from its programs (comic books, CDs, video games, etc.) to the retail market. The profits will be used to sustain the small, flexible CEP infrastructure, but more importantly to sustain the programs in the urban areas in most of need. CEP is seeking approximately $100,000 to develop and launch future programs.

The social impact of CEP is based on the number of children it serves and how much those children demonstrate academic and social improvement. Their improvement is measured by a program assessment that accompanies each implementation. The assessment is based on a quantitative analysis of the children’s work in light of stateand national learning standards, along with qualitative measures such as surveys and interviews of students, teachers, administrators, and parents. Within five years, CEP aims to have reached 200,000 children in at least seven major urban areas: New York City, Los Angeles, Atlanta, Chicago, Cleveland, Baltimore, and Miami.

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