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The Connection: Schooling, Youth Development, and Community Building– The Futures Academy Case

Date: Jul 26, 2009
Author(s): Linda McGlynn, Henry Louis Taylor, Jr.
Topic(s): Data / Demographics / History: General, Education: General
Type: Report
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Using, as an example, a case study of Futures Academy, a K-8th grade public school in the Fruit Belt, an inner city neighborhood in Buffalo, New York, this essay will demonstrate that universities can play a leading role in remediating the problems of public schooling, youth development and inner city distress. Through the development of authentic, democratically-based partnerships among universities, schools, and communities, young people in distressed neighborhoods can become successful students and engaged citizens who work to improve conditions in their neighborhoods, city and nation. The first section of the paper will provide an overview of the history of university community partnerships and then a review of pedagogical theories will be presented, and in the final segment, we will discuss the pedagogical model used in our work at Futures Academy.

This report at others were written and supported by the UB Center for Urban Studies. 

The goal of the UB Center for Urban Studies research is to produce a knowledge base to guide the building of just and democratic metros that enable residents to realize their full human potential and acquire the larger freedoms. Founded in 1987 by Dr.  Henry Louis Taylor, Jr., the UB Center for Urban Studies is a research, neighborhood planning and community development institute, which focuses on the transformation of vulnerable, underdeveloped and distressed neighborhoods into communities of opportunity. 

You can find this and more of their research on the Center for Urban Studies Research page