Heather L Fox

This report presents highlights from research on subsidized guardianship, one rarely used but promising permanency option that might help both increase permanency rates and reduce racial disparity. In subsidized guardianship, a family member such as a grandmother or aunt typically becomes the child’s permanent caregiver, but the child’s birthparents retain many of their parental rights. Specifically, this report presents results from interviews with 40 Illinois professionals doing permanency work, including caseworkers, casework supervisors, DCFS attorneys, guardians ad litem, and judges. The interviews examine professionals’ experience with, and opinions about, subsidized guardianship and their perceptions regarding the role of race in permanency work.

This research brief presents highlights from research on subsidized guardianship, one rarely used but promising permanency option that might help both increase permanency rates and reduce racial disparity. In subsidized guardianship, a family member such as a grandmother or aunt typically becomes the child’s permanent caregiver, but the child’s birthparents retain many of their parental rights. Specifically, the brief highlights findings from our interview and survey reports,  featuring the perceptions of permanency professionals on subsidized guardianship and the role of race in permanency work.

The Reverse Transfer Illinois project was an exploratory study of the implementation of reverse transfer in the state of Illinois. This article serves as an executive summary for the study, highlighting the primary findings from the study. These findings draw on interview and survey data from 2-and 4-year postsecondary institutions engaged in reverse transfer throughout Illinois. Building on what was learned through Credit When It's Due (CWID), the Office of Community College Research and Leadership (OCCRL) investigated how and to what extent reverse transfer has been implemented in Illinois, a state that did not receive funding as part of the CWID project. The goal of this project is to bridge research and practice to improve transfer processes and promote positive outcomes for students. The study's guiding framework was informed by the results of Project Win Win (PWW) and CWID. The framework incorporates themes integrated from existing research and practice related to reverse transfer processes, including: a) engaging potential students, b) conducting audits and communicating results, c) guiding and supporting students near completion, and d) awarding credentials. The Reverse Transfer Process Overall, reflections on the implementation of reverse transfer from survey and interview respondents revealed the following barriers, areas of strength, and areas for improvement.

Roughly one-fifth of all undergraduates attend minority-serving institutions (MSIs), including large proportions of underrepresented minoritized students of color who otherwise may not enroll in postsecondary education (Aragon & Zamani, 2002; Gasman & Nguyen, 2014; Núñez, Hurtado, & Galdeano, 2015). Institutions are designated as MSIs based on either their primary mission or origin or the percentage of minoritized undergraduate students of color enrolled at the institution. In total, there
are seven categories of MSIs recognized by the U. S. Department of Education National Center for Education Statistics, 2007). Status as Historically Black Colleges and Universities or Tribal Colleges and Universities was granted legislatively as part of the Higher Education Act of 1965 and the Equity in Education Land-Grant Status Act of 1994 to institutions based on the primary mission and origin of these institutions. Status as Historically Black Colleges and Universities was designated by Congress
to accredited institutions founded prior to 1964 whose primary mission was the education of African Americans. Similarly, Tribal Colleges and Universities are institutions designated by Congress that serve predominantly American Indian and Alaska Native students. Outside of Historically Black Colleges and Universities and Tribal Colleges and Universities, the definitions and titling of each designation of MSIs
can vary across federal agencies, funding opportunities, and research.

Group work projects are common components of graduate course curricula. Instructors often try to mitigate the benefits of group work projects for students while avoiding negative effects. Informal learning and participatory culture practices like video logs can enhance learning environments. Video logs that promote both informal learning and participa-tory culture practices have captured the interest of researchers as a popular way to disclose observations, reflections and thoughts about people's lives and experiences. This study provides insight on how graduate students may respond to participation in a Collaborative Video Logs (CVL) in lieu of group work projects or asynchronous text-based discussion boards. A CVL is a series of videos created by a small group of students addressing a topic and engages students through asynchronous video conversation while promoting ownership , reflection, and academic and social outcomes. This study summarizes students' past experiences and perceptions of group work projects, technological readiness, and affective responses to participating in a CVL as a course assignment.

Career pathways, comprised of stackable credentials and a coherently
aligned sequence of programmes of study, are being hailed as an
effective means for promoting postsecondary attainment and upward
mobility, particularly for low-income and low-skilled adult workers.
However, concerns have been raised regarding whether this strategy
accomplishes its intention or instead reinforces stratification by
channelling under-represented students into short-term programmes
with questionable value. The purpose of this study was to investigate
the impact of stackable credentials as they were implemented by a
consortium of community colleges in the United States that were part
of the Health Professions Pathway (H2P) initiative. The results show
that many students who completed short or very short programmes
went on to earn longer credentials or maintained their enrollment,
but there were noticeable racial disparities in the credentials students
earned. Additionally, many of the short-term credentials had limited
labour market value. The findings call for a closer analysis of the
impact of short-term programmes and stackable credentials on
student outcomes.

Group work has been a popular pedagogical practice because of its potential to integrate collaboration and learning. However, there are pitfalls to group-work projects such as disproportionate workload, appropriate assessment, and intergroup drama. This paper looks at the pedagogical application of the collaborative video log as group work through an illustrative case study. The collaborative video log is a learning model designed to engage groups of students around a topic that promotes ownership, reflection, and academic and social outcomes. A case study was conducted on a collaborative video log which consisted of five graduate student vloggers who together produced 36 videos for a technology and education course. Analysis of observation and interview data showed the CVL has a unique design which lends itself to ownership, academic outcomes, and social outcomes. The most common themes of ownership included technological ownership, ownership of the CVL structure, and ownership of personal learning. Prominent academic outcomes were building a learning community, realizing potential, and developing technological literacy. The three themes present in social outcomes were presenting personal information, embracing differences, and expanding relationships beyond the classroom. Though experienced drawbacks were few, potential drawbacks were suggested by the participants.