Company Profile
Charles A. Dana Center
Company Overview
Based in the College of Natural Sciences at The University of Texas at Austin, The Charles A. Dana Center works with America’s K–14 education systems to prepare every student for success in postsecondary education and the changing workforce.
The Center was founded at the university in 1991 by Professor Uri Treisman and others in the College of Natural Sciences. It was originally launched to facilitate the dissemination of Professor Treisman’s “mathematics workshop model,” also known as the Emerging Scholars Program. A few years later, the Dana Center widened its scope to support rigorous education for students from kindergarten through college, with a special focus on mathematics and science. We are committed to ensuring that where a child attends school does not limit the academic opportunities he or she can pursue.
Today the Center staff includes about 80 professionals with expertise in mathematics and science education, school administration, coaching and professional development, as well as program evaluation. In addition, we run public service programs that specialize in early literacy and education resources for students in homeless situations. We are nationally recognized for our work in raising student achievement in K–14 math and science, especially in communities that serve low-income populations.
We provide direct services to schools, districts, and institutions of higher education; to local, state, and national education leaders; to professional organizations and nonprofits; and to policymakers and agencies concerned with strengthening American education.
We have worked with nearly all of Texas’s 1,000+ school districts and all 50 of the state’s community college systems. We have also engaged with educators and education systems in more than 20 states and through various national coalitions to strengthen American education at scale.
We largely carry out our work through project-specific teams, ensuring fast delivery of high-quality resources and services. We strive for nimbleness and a balance between evolutionary work—building on what has worked in the past—and revolutionary work—innovating new solutions to emerging issues.
Our current portfolio of work focuses on four areas:
Higher Education Pathways
We seek to reduce barriers to higher education and improve college completion rates by accelerating student progress to and through gateway mathematics courses. This higher education work has three major components: (1) development of research-based math pathways that lead into programs of study; (2) development and delivery of pathways technical assistance for institutions, faculty, and staff; and (3) collaborations to address potential policy barriers to reform and improvement. Through the Dana Center Mathematics Pathways, we work at scale across Texas and the nation to collaborate with practitioners and with organizations to develop strategies for implementation.
K–12 Systems Services
We engage with leaders and staff of states, districts, and schools to assess local strengths and challenges, identify practical tools, and enact effective strategies to improve professional capacity and culture—and student achievement. We provide coherent, connected supports for teachers and leaders that help them align curriculum, instruction, and assessment practices to their chosen education standards.
Working with other organizations, we also convene networks of education leaders to help us together stay current with research and policy developments, learn from one another, and develop strategies for sustainable capacity-building.
Tools for Teaching and Learning
We collaborate with practitioners and experts from across the country to develop instructional tools and resources—including videos of high-quality mathematics classrooms—that are effective, robust, and easy to use. Our instructional tools address not only the content learning critical to academic achievement, but also the habits of mind essential to success in school, work, and life.
In collaboration with our education technology collaborator, Agile Mind, we offer a wide range of mathematics and science course programs serving teachers of grades 6 through 12. Since 2015, we have also managed and continued to expand the respected Inside Mathematics website, which includes more than a hundred free downloadable classroom resources and hours of video clips showing effective teaching and learning.
Public Service Initiatives
Since our work aims to increase equitable access to an excellent education for all, we also manage programs explicitly designed to serve children struggling with reading (Literacy First) and children experiencing homelessness (THEO, the Texas Homeless Education Office). Literacy First trains and deploys annually about 100 tutors in 25 schools, serving each year more than 2,000 struggling readers and K–2 students in the Central Texas region. THEO serves many thousands of students each year by providing services to districts, students, parents, shelters, and other interested parties across Texas, all with the goal of ensuring that all Texas children in homeless situations have the opportunity to enroll in, attend, and succeed in school.
Benefits
https://hr.utexas.edu/current