LEARN NC goals and guiding principles

This document describes LEARN NC’s guiding principles and lists our short-term goals for 2009-2010.

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• Email updates from LEARN NC: LEARN NC sends out monthly email updates to subscribing educators. These updates contain summaries of new articles, information about new resources, and announcements of online course offerings and upcoming professional development opportunities.

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• Learn more about LEARN NC and goals.

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Guiding Principles

To define the scope of our activities, LEARN NC has delineated these guiding principles.

• Through content: Strengthen and achieve balance in our collection of educational materials by increasing quantity and quality in order to efficiently meet educators’ information needs and facilitate the acquisition of professional skills.
• Through community: Encourage a culture of continual learning and collegial sharing in K-12 education by providing a safe and supportive environment that fosters communities of practice focused on innovative content, effective strategies, and professional opportunities.
• Through outreach: Leverage our creativity and expertise to integrate programs and resources and build partnerships.

Goals 2010-2011

To direct our activities and programs to the needs of teachers in North Carolina, LEARN NC has created a set of short-term goals based on the state’s priorities for professional development and perceived needs. These focus areas reflect our priorities, but do not preclude our publishing resources on other topics nor guarantee publication of related resources.

• Reach all learners. We will address the needs of learners of every age, ability, and learning style, including English language learners, students with learning disabilities, academically gifted students, and students with varying learning styles and intelligences.
• Promote informed teaching and learning. We will seek to improve outcomes for teachers and students in North Carolina by providing standards-aligned, researched-informed professional development courses, articles, and lessons. These multimedia-enhanced materials will provide the content and context necessary to develop teachers’ understanding of the evolving standards including Common Core, their proficiency in using data and formative assessment to inform their teaching of every child, and to support them in the development of a mastery-based learning environment in which students are self-directed learners, responsible for working toward learning goals.
• Improve support for STEM education (science, technology, engineering, and math). We will address the needs of teachers and students for high-quality resources in the critical areas of science, technology, engineering, and mathematics.
• Foster connections between UNC and K-12 schools. We will serve as a bridge between UNC and the K-12 educational community in North Carolina.
• Adapt to changing needs. We will stay abreast of important political issues in the state, both in the educational world and beyond it, in order to meet the changing needs of teachers and students.