P-12 Project History

Help build Ohio’s future: this facet of Ohio State's mission as a land-grant university was explicitly addressed in the Academic Plan of 2000 and the Academic Plan Update of 2003. These documents raised the expectations that Ohio State will make a significant, campus-wide contribution to the improvement of Ohio’s schools and to the advancement of cross-institutional partnerships between the university and the public schools. In direct response to this focus, and as evidence of the university’s intent to develop and sustain a significant university-wide preschool-12th grade initiative, the P-12 Project was created, receiving initial funding in the 2000-2001 academic year.

Unlike many other school-university partnership initiatives, the P-12 Project reports to the Office of Academic Affairs. As such, it is a central campus unit, supporting all academic colleges and departments, demonstrating the commitment of the highest levels of leadership and the key importance of relationships with schools to Ohio’s flagship university. Being able to work across disciplines has allowed P-12 to encourage the involvement of the most appropriate and most effective people for a given project.

Throughout its history, the P-12 Project has initiated, incubated, and implemented a variety of programs to fulfill its mission. Some past projects are described on this page, and current initiatives are found in other sections of this website.

Past Initiatives

Ohio Collaborative

The Ohio Collaborative—Research and Policy for Schools, Children, and Families is a statewide collaboration among Ohio’s colleges and universities that was initiated and incubated by the P-12 Project during the 2001-2003 academic years. Today, the Ohio Collaborative resides in its permanent home in the College of Education and Human Ecology. The Ohio Collaborative enlists the strengths of faculty for research, policy analysis, and program evaluation that serves the research and policy needs of the Governor’s office, the Ohio Department of Education, the Ohio Board of Regents, and the Ohio Legislature. The Ohio Collaborative also assists school districts in their research and policy efforts.

The Ohio Project

With the Ohio Collaborative, the P-12 Project co-sponsored a study led by Daryl Siedentop, Professor Emeritus, Sport and Exercise Education, College of Education and Human Ecology, that analyzed state and local efforts to strengthen school programs to combat the overweight/obesity epidemic among children and youth.

The Ohio Project: Progress in Preventing Childhood/Youth Obesity. How Do We Measure Up? Full Report (PDF, 433 KB)

Profile in Success for All Students: The Ohio Project story (PDF, 531 KB)

PIE Project

The Parents Influencing Education (PIE) Project was created through a collaboration between The Ohio State University P-12 Project, The Interprofessional Commission of Ohio (ICO), and the Columbus City Schools. PIE is a multifaceted program that seeks to increase reading comprehension and achievement, develop young leaders and mentors, improve parent involvement in the learning of their children, develop positive school-family-community partnerships, and provide children with books they can take home and have in their homes. The PIE Project pairs first- and second-grade students with fourth- and fifth-grade peer tutors to help them in the area of reading comprehension. Ohio State graduate students serve as mentors to the elementary students, and Ohio State faculty members provide professional development to the parents.

Early Childhood Education

The P-12 Project plays a facilitative role in the “P” part of P-12 education—the years before kindergarten. Some of the examples of our work with early childhood education include:

  • Assisting the College of Education and Human Ecology in the development of a new early childhood education center in the Weinland Park neighborhood. The new Schoenbaum Family Center replaces the 76-year-old facility in Campbell Hall used by the A. Sophie Rogers Laboratory School for child development. Aligned with the program at Weinland Park Elementary School, it serves toddlers through preschoolers.
  • Helping to start Ohio’s first Jumpstart program at OSU. Jumpstart used work-study students to tutor and mentor neighborhood children. In its first year, 40 work-study students were involved.
  • Supporting a policy seminar that served Governor Taft’s Families and Children First initiative. The initiative aimed to examine and reconsider all of the programs and policies of all state agencies that serve Ohio’s children and their families.

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P-12 Project Reports

Success for All Students

The Ohio State University P-12 Project has supported projects focused on important issues in preschool through 12th-grade education. Each project embodied core values of the university by igniting student learning, making discoveries, celebrating diversity, or opening new windows on the world of education. Each project moved us all a few steps closer toward that important goal of increasing students’ success. Success for All Students is a publication celebrating those projects.

Full document (PDF, 3.9 MB)

P-12 Project Four-Year Retrospective (2000-2004)

P-12 4-Year ReportThis document is a report of the P-12 Project’s first 4 years. The report attempts to categorize and consider the effectiveness of P-12 Project activities. It is organized by efforts, impacts, and implementation and describes various ways that the mission of the P-12 Project and the goals of the University’s Academic Plan are met.

4-Year Report (PDF, 1MB)

P-12 Scholars

From 2004-2007, the P-12 Scholars Program provided grants to initiate or advance research leading to increased understanding of and involvement in issues related to P-12 education. See the Scholars page for reports on their work.

Neighborhood Schools Project

As part of the P-12 Project’s mission to assist in improving Ohio’s schools, the Neighborhood Schools project focused on improving the education of children and youth living in the neighborhoods around The Ohio State University. Read more about this project.

  • The Neighborhood Schools Project was profiled in the publication Success for All Students: NSP story (PDF, 392 KB).