Building Effective School-Business Partnerships. The School to Work Alliance's fall series on building effective school-business partnerships are underway. The series begins with introductory sessions to enable potential participants to learn more about the workshops and whether it meets their needs. Thirty-seven individuals attended our two orientations and nearly all of them registered for the ensuing partnership building series.

Determined to maintain the high quality of the workshops, we quickly decided to organize a second strand to accommodate the demand. A total of 35 educators are enrolled in the three-part series, which orients them to, Building Effective School-Business Partnerships and Advisory Councils, the School to Work Alliance's partnership building workbook and prepares them to facilitate planning groups at their schools.

Throughout the workshops, participants look at ways to break down the daunting project of building and managing school-business partnerships and apply tools for an effective step-by-step process. Using the workbook as a guide, they practice identifying potential partnerships, planning partnership activities that support school goals, and formulating a pitch to present to businesses. Participants have already started to bring these good habits and activities to their schools.

Graduates of the program, which with this latest class will number 73, are invited to participate in follow up sessions. The first one of the fall will feature a panel of business people who have experience working with schools and will discuss partnership building from their perspective.

People who are interested in getting information about the spring workshop series should contact the School to Work Alliance at 212.803.3334. The School to Work Alliance thanks Con Edison and the JP Morgan Chase Foundation for their generous underwriting of the workshops. Get information and register for the Winter series.