The 2012 Chicago School Policy Forum Series, Sweating the Soft Stuff: Qualities Needed for Learning and How to Nurture Them, will conclude with a look at "What Schools Can Do." Camille Farrington, will share highlights of a recent Consortium on Chicago School Research report that challenges the notion hard work and effort are fixed character traits of individual students. Rather, the researchers found these traits can be fostered—or repressed—through instructional and contextual factors in the classroom.
Farrington also will offer fresh insights into why grades are far better predictors than test scores of whether a student will graduate from high school or college. A panel of on-the-ground educators will talk about what they are doing to nurture the required qualities...