Interview With The Urban Institute's Education Team Knowles

Tim Knowles Sebring-Lewis is the Director of Urban Education Institute at the University of Chicago. UEI is a program of education that combines innovative charter schools, teacher education and research in their quest to provide the human resources a reliable, good for school children in urban America.

How do you engage with UEI?
I came to UEI as a practitioner. I work as a teacher in Botswana and Boston, the leader of a school in New York City and a leader in the Boston area. Along the way, I started helping some of the non-profit that focuses on leadership in urban schools and Teacher Residency-including Boston, the Boston Institute of Leadership and Teach for America.

I came to the University of Chicago because doing something extraordinary. She wanted to train aspiring, new and veteran teachers and leaders, to Chicago. And he do Research & Development (R & D) in a unique way - in cooperation with the Chicago Public Schools and school practitioners - research and design, new equipment and practices to inform policy and to solve specific problems of practice.

I loved how the research, human capital development and school design that is embedded in the paper significantly. Because I saw in the entire country, I quickly realized how rare for a research institution that will be placed so that the pole is strong in the world of practice. And I do not think that the school of education at the University of Chicago to create the opportunity to recall imagine what the role of higher education possible.

You can explain one of UEI's prominent and successful program that has been achieved with it?
An interesting example of our R & D work is something that we call 6to16. 6to16 grow from the urgent need to find new ways to increase the number of students in urban and successfully received at the university. With support from the Gates Foundation, early 6to16 support students in school through 6th grade graduation - grade 16.

Provide teachers, Counselors non-profits and others with online and classroom-based curriculum to help build the knowledge and skills needed to persist and succeed in school. And provide students, teachers and others with a web-based social network that allows mentors, family, advisers and colleagues as a guide for students to build their expertise and complete milestones tied to college success. Think myspace or facebook with the goal - in this case is the purpose of college readiness and success.