Editor’s Note

The Opportunity Gap Chasm
Frank Shushok, Jr.

One thing that’s clear to me is that unbridled hope finds a sure foundation when it is available to the whole—the whole of our communities and the whole of
our institutions across the whole of our planet.

Feature Articles

A Candid Conversation about Schools, Culture, and the Widening Opportunity Gap in America with Professor Robert D. Putnam
Robert Putnam and Frank Shushok, Jr.

Robert Putnam, Malkin Professor of Public Policy at Harvard University, reports on the ever-widening opportunity gap between rich kids and poor kids in terms of educational success. Though higher education has not caused this gap, Putnam argues that there is much we can do to alleviate it, starting with attracting and recruiting first-generation college students and continuing with helping them develop the “institutional savvy” that is lacking in their homes and families so they can complete a degree and reap the benefit of social mobility that is the promise of higher education.

Common Core and Higher Education: A Professional and Personal Journey
Jacqueline King

Given the confusion and misinformation about Common Core in the media and on the Internet, Jacqueline King takes this opportunity to describe the history of Common Core standards. She notes that they emerged as a response to the need to prepare students more effectively for higher education and the high-performance workplace.

Building Educators’ Capacities to Meet Twenty-First Century Demands
Kari B. Taylor and Marcia B. Baxter Magolda

Kari Taylor and Marcia B. Baxter Magolda build on Baxter Magolda’s recent About Campus article on “Enriching Educators’ Learning Experience” that argued educators need complex developmental capabilities to meet the challenges of student centered learning.

In Practice

Learning to Ask Questions: A Pathway to and Through College for Students in Low-Income Communities
Luz Santana

Luz Santana tells the story of working with parents in a dropout prevention program that illustrated the importance of developing their question-asking skills. Learning how to ask their own questions gave the parents greater self-confidence and improved their ability to advocate for their children and themselves.

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