Students at Waterfront Elementary School, Futures Academy, East High School, and Buffalo Academy for Visual and Performing Arts are served by the Liberty Partnerships Program (LPP) for the purposes of dropout prevention. Staff have engaged at-risk students in grades 5-12 with research-based interventions, including growth mindset/brainology and student success skills curricula, both designed to bolster students’ soft skills and increase academic achievement. As a result of these multifaceted interventions, overall GPAs and standardized test scores have increased, and students’ levels of risk, in terms of dropout, have also decreased across the board. As a partner with Buffalo Public Schools, LPP has established a pronounced and effective presence in the schools and continues to connect students to resources available at UB.
Archives
Alberti Center for Bullying Abuse Prevention
The Alberti Center for Bullying Abuse Prevention provides resources for parents, educators, students and researchers through presentations in the school and community, its annual conference and colloquium series, and resources on the website.
BAND Against Bullying
The Annual BAND Against Bullying Program is a performing arts competition where students from area high schools combine multiple forms of art to create the most dynamic illustration of dignity awareness to prevent bullying. Each final act performs at the University at Buffalo Center for the Arts.
GEAR UP Buffalo
In the spring of 2015, researchers from the Graduate School of Education partnered with Say Yes to Education Buffalo and Buffalo Public Schools to apply for a Gaining Early Awareness and Readiness for Undergraduate Programs (GEAR UP) grant to serve 15 schools in the city of Buffalo. These schools have all been identified as having more than 50 percent of students eligible for free or reduced lunch. We were granted the resources (six years, $2.34 million) to begin work with a cohort of seventh grade students and to follow them through high school graduation and entry into college. GEAR UP is run by the U.S. Department of Education and this grant flows through the higher education services corporation in New York State. In middle school we will work with students and parents to choose high schools, think about college and career, and provide mentoring and opportunities to visit college campuses. In high school, we will expand the college success center model to eight high schools and add an academic enrichment component.
Kindergarten Readiness Camp
Children entering kindergarten attended a one-week program to help them get ready for a structured classroom setting in August 2014.
Father Involvement in Preschools
In this activity, we developed after-school soccer programs to engage parents in a school-based activity to strengthen parenting, school engagement and attachment.
VIABLE-II Project: Assessment of Social Behaviors in Schools
This project partnered with school districts to develop a behavioral screening approach to help identify students who would benefit from positive behavioral supports and interventions.