The IBM Learning Village is available to all middle schools in Durham Public Schools through the IBM Reinventing Education Grants. Teachers, staff members, and developers from IBM work together to continually enhance the IBM Learning Village for the classroom. Photography is a medium of communication particularly accessible to children. The students photograph scenes from their lives, then learn to develop and print film in the school darkroom. These images become the catalyst for subsequent written investigations of self, community, family and dreams.
Students represent themselves with photographs and words while increasing their means of expression.
The goal of Reading Recovery is to help children become independent readers equipped with solid reading skills who will continue to succeed in school. Stars is a summer program that works with children who have had little or no preschool experiences. The program seeks to bring the children to the appropriate level in both academic and social skills. It also enables the parents of these children to participate in work sessions to learn how to work on academic and social skills with their children and how to actively engage in their child's education. Middle and high school students volunteer as clerks of court, bailiffs, defense attorneys, prosecutors and jurors.