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The Public Education Network has just released its "Civic Index for Quality Education," a tool to assess and improve community support for excellent public education. According to the good people at PEN, the Civic Index "identifies and measures the level of involvement across 10 sectors of the community...:

• Education leadership of local elected officials
• Commitment to the values of tolerance and inclusiveness
• Active parents
• Strong civic organizations (parent, philanthropic, civic/religious organizations)
• Utilization of school performance data to improve school quality
• Youth involvement
• Partnerships with higher education
• Knowledge o, and voting for, the school board
• An active business community
• Media coverage

"These [indices] reflect 10 key conditions that must exist outside of schools--and complement those conditions we know from Standards Based Reform must be present inside schools--to ensure student success."

The Index amplifies the central theme of the "Broader, Bolder Approach to Education" recently advanced by a task force of 60 distinguished education though leaders:  namely, that schools are essential but insufficient contributors to student success.  Yet the Civic Index goes a step further, offering communities, schools, policymakers and the media a common framework for determining how well they are working together to promote student learning.

Be sure to take a closer look.