Research Projects

Project Description The Durham Children’s Initiative (DCI) (formerly East Durham Children’s Initiative) is a place-based, nonprofit organization that supports children and families from cradle to college or career. Established in 2010, DCI’s vision is that all children in Durham graduate from high school ready for college or career. To achieve this vision, DCI provides children…

The North Carolina Resilience and Learning Project is a partnership with the Public School Forum of North Carolina to promote and support trauma-informed schools across the state. The project team works closely with districts and schools to provide professional learning and ongoing coaching to meet school-specific needs and goals. Our work aims to create systems-level change by shifting the culture and mindset of an entire school so that staff begin to see a child’s behavior in the context of their life experiences, in consideration of possible trauma history or stress response system triggers.

This project seeks to understand whether, for whom, and how the effects of successful early childhood school readiness interventions are sustained across a child’s development.

Project goal is to design, develop, and test an online professional development program called Bridging English Language Learning and Academics (BELLA) for improving teacher and student outcomes for working with English Learners (ELs).

Project Description The North Carolina Community Schools Coalition aims to improve the academic, mental, and physical health of North Carolina students through the development of Full-Service Community Schools across the state. Full-Service Community Schools prioritize partnerships between schools and the community to promote the overall success and well-being of children and families. The community schools model…

This project looks at the impact of rental housing sales on children’s residential mobility, school switches, and school performance.

Project Description In the U.S., food insecurity (FI), or the inconsistent access to food of the quantity or quality needed to fuel a healthy life, is an important source of socioeconomic and racial inequality in youth outcomes. Decades of research finds that FI undermines youths’ physical, socioemotional, and cognitive development, and their academic outcomes as…