ASCD launched the Whole Child Web site following ASCD's 2007 Annual Conference in Anaheim. Education Update staff writer, Carole Hayward, sat down with Judy Seltz, ASCD's chief Constituent Services officer, to discuss the new Whole Child Web site, the compact, and ASCD's advocacy initiatives.
Q: How does the Whole Child Web site (www.wholechildeducation.org)
fit into the overall strategy of promoting and implementing the call to action on this issue?
A: Through grassroots efforts, the news about Whole Child is spreading. At this point, more than 10,000 people have visited the Web site and taken the pledge to support the Whole Child campaign. When you visit the Web site and take the pledge, you'll begin to receive the Whole Child newsletter; it arrives via e-mail every two weeks. WholeChildEducation.org features ways that you can spread the word, share your story, and grade your school.
Q: Are educators visiting the site grading their schools? How are the grades?
A: So far, more than 4,000 visitors have graded their schools at this point. ASCD is gathering that data and will soon be able to develop state-by-state reports as well as overall national results. The most recent issue of the Whole Child newsletter reports that 84 percent of respondents say that families are welcomed into their children's education and that behavioral expectations and routines are followed. Respondents also indicate that most children have access to a supportive adult at school. The bad news is that more than 50 percent of respondents say they don't have a school health advisory council, and less than 40 percent feel their school district offers multiple ways for students to show they have met graduation requirements.
Q: What role do ASCD's members play in promoting and implementing the Whole Child Compact?
A: ASCD's affiliates, networks, student chapters, educator advocates, and others can spread the Whole Child campaign to schools and school districts across the country and beyond. The success of this work depends on mobilizing first our members, and then others, to advocate for policies that support the development of whole children.
Q: Explain why community engagement is so important to the success of ASCD's whole child initiative.
A: Schools alone cannot ensure that each child becomes a whole child. That is why we ask that all institutions serving children and their families commit to a new compact to guarantee that each child enters school healthy, learns in an intellectually challenging environment, connects to the school and the community, spends time with caring adults, and leaves school prepared for study or employment in a global environment. These are promises a society makes to its young people, itself, and its future. We consider it a compact and a commitment.
Q: What is ASCD's advocacy group currently doing to persuade congressional leaders to get onboard the Whole Child bandwagon?
A: We are continually meeting and referring to the whole child issue in our letters, communications, and ideas for policies. First, our entire legislative agenda falls under the umbrella of the Whole Child. You can take a look at
www.ascd.org/legislativeagenda. Our recommendations for the reauthorization of No Child Left Behind align with the Whole Child. Those recommendations can be found through the ASCD Action Center at www.ascd.org/actioncenter.
Our positions on bills—support or opposition—are guided by the Whole Child as well. For example, we have been active on the Reauthorization of the State Children Health Insurance Program (SCHIP), which is a children's health insurance program, in the House and Senate. This is not usually a priority for education groups; however, it is very much a Whole Child issue.
Q: If you were to condense for a group of busy legislators the Whole Child message of taking a more holistic approach to educating the whole child, how would you describe the gist of that message in terms they would become enthusiastic about?
A: I'd say that today's students need the essential 21st-century skills of academic rigor as well as critical thinking and creativity. It is not enough for schools to teach a narrow curriculum that matches a standardized test. They need to prepare students to think, to work, and to solve problems.