Say Yes to a Youngster's Future: A Model for Home, School, and Community Partnership

Abstract

Prior to his death in 1988, M. Carl Holman (1985, 1986, 1987), longtime civil rights advocate and president of the National Urban Coalition (NUC), articulated his vision for an extensive collaborative approach to preparing children of color for productive futures in the information age. Holman was deeply concerned by the underrepresentation of African Americans and Hispanics in the quantitative fields. He maintained that the issue of expanding the science and technology talent pool as well as the overriding issue of maximizing the effectiveness of public schools must be addressed in concert by all of the key stakeholders-the schools, parents, communities, business and government sectors, and the media. Furthermore, Holman wrote, such comprehensive prevention/intervention efforts must start very early, well before secondary school. In 1985, under the advice of its Consortium of Urban School Superintendents and its technical advisors and with support from the Carnegie Corporation, the National Urban Coalition (NUC) launched Say YES To A Youngster's Futures'. Through Say YES, NUC has sought out, adapted, developed, and promoted science, mathematics, and technology intervention programs which bring educators, parents, children, and community resources together. Say YES is NUC's education umbrella for advocacy and for specific intervention programs (e.g., Say YES Schools Project, Family Math, Family Science, Cultural Connections, ProblemSolving Science for Pre-Schoolers, Family Learning Centers, etc.). The intent of this article is to summarize the research upon which Say YES is based and to describe one facet of NUC's educational program: the Say YES Schools Project, now in its third year of operation.