Challenge for Educators: Undoubtedly, we all can agree that educating our nation’s greatest resource – our children! – should be a shared responsibility between school officials and their respective communities. Thus, it becomes incumbent upon educators to forge meaningful partnerships with members of their greater community to facilitate teaching and learning in their schools.

Services offered by Taylor & Taylor: A practical and proven Five-Step SHOCK (Select, Host, Outline, Communicate, Keep) Model that is designed to identify and engage key members of a community to foster partnerships to support teaching and learning in schools.

Challenge for Educators: Although America’s schools have continued to become increasingly more culturally and ethnically diverse, the National Center for Education Statistics reported in 2012 that approximately 83% of the teachers in public schools were white. This has resulted in a student-teacher “culture gap” in many schools across our nation.

Services offered by Taylor & Taylor: Practical and proven strategies to:

• improve the cultural competence of educators;
• facilitate the student-teacher classroom engagement that is essential to learning;
• close the “culture gap” between students and teachers; and,
• improve the overall culture climate in school settings.

Challenge for Educators: Per the Wallace Foundation (2016), effective school leadership is second only to classroom teaching as the most important factor in developing high-performing schools. Thus, high-quality leaders are vital to ensure a high-quality education for children, especially in schools that serve disadvantaged students.

Services offered by Taylor & Taylor: Practical and proven strategies to develop the leadership skills of all school and district-level personnel.

Challenge for Educators: Schools and school systems are not static; they are always changing. Thus, professional develop is vital to keep up with change. Amy Vracar (2015), lists three primary reasons why professional learning matters:

• A teacher’s professional learning journey is an ongoing process throughout their teaching career.
• The classroom is continuously changing, and teachers must be prepared to meet the needs of their students.
• It is important for school districts to adopt rich professional learning opportunities for its teachers.​

Services offered by Taylor & Taylor: Workshops, perspectives, interventions, and presentations that are designed to improve effective teaching and learning.

Challenge for Educators: Although African-American students represent 16% of the public-school population, they make up 33% of students suspended once; 42% of those suspended more than once; and 34% of students expelled. Schools are faced with a complex challenge that involves maintaining a safe environment and keeping all students involved in the education process.

Services offered by Taylor & Taylor: Interventions, perspectives, workshops, and presentations that are designed to provide strategies to improve a positive school climate and foster opportunities for all students to be better engaged in the teaching and learning process.

Challenge for Educators: Principals manage the day-to-day activities of public and private elementary, middle and high schools. They oversee faculty and staff; serve as the school’s instructional leader; manage processes; monitor student behavior; and make decisions that impact the overall educational success of the school. Given these demands, it is important for principals to receive periodic, objective analysis of the strengths and weaknesses of their instructional sites (Kokemuller, 2016).

Services offered by Taylor & Taylor: A comprehensive analysis of the instructional and operational framework of a school site to include observations, structured interviews, classroom walk-throughs, and a review of discipline and instructional data.