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Whole Child Partners

ASCD is proud to join forces with leading education, health, arts, and civic organizations to further the Whole Child Initiative. The organizations below have signed on as partners to support a system of academic achievement and accountability that ensures:

  • Each student enters school healthy and learns about and practices a healthy lifestyle.
  • Each student learns in an intellectually challenging environment that is physically and emotionally safe for students and adults.
  • Each student is actively engaged in learning and is connected to the school and broader community.
  • Each student has access to personalized learning and is supported by qualified, caring adults.
  • Each graduate is challenged by a well-balanced curriculum and is prepared for success in college or further study and for employment in a global environment.

Browse our resources for reports, research, tools, and articles from our partners.

Latest Partner News

The National PTA recently signed on as a Whole Child Partner, joining more than 40 other partner organizations that represent a broad swath of the education, arts, and health and wellness fields. Our partnership with the PTA is significant because the Whole Child Initiative is grounded in the belief that responsibility for educating and supporting the whole child neither starts nor stops at the schoolhouse door. That means businesses, community agencies, policymakers, and families must align with schools to provide conditions that support learning for each student. In short, educators can't do it alone.

Shifting the focus from what schools should do to involve parents to what parents, schools, and communities can do together to support student success, the PTA's National Standards for Family-School Partnerships outline the benefits of parent, family, and community involvement. An assessment guide helps facilitate the implementation of these standards. The guide includes specific goals for each standard, indicators for measuring these goals, and examples for each indicator to show what good practice looks like at different levels of development.

Our Partners