 Anonymous individual donors
Café Institute 2013
Report to the Community
Community Assets for Education (Café) Institute is an
Alberta-based not-for-profit society that connects families,
schools and community in support of learning.
The Café Institute is guided by a vision of:
“highly engaged communities
maximizing their educational capacity.”
Café’s asset-based orientation; a belief that ‘the cup is half full’
is fundamental to an approach that focuses on strengths and
possibilities, highlighting unlimited opportunities to support
learning. Café offers a space for parent leaders, schools and
community educators to share their experience and resources
and to explore potential avenues for action in their community
building work. Café also provides a consolidation of research
that highlights the positive impacts on learning and healthy
development when caring, supportive learning communities are
built.
Thank you to our donors!
 Government of Alberta, Culture and Community
Spirit Program
This year you helped Café to:
 Consolidate and share emerging research and
resources in support of community engagement in
education.
 Develop a web-based community portal for community
leaders and educators to share their experience in
engaging parents and community in learning.
 Develop the Parent Café conversation café guides in a
format that is widely accessible to community educators,
teachers and parent leaders.
 Support Calgary’s Early Childhood Mapping (EC Map)
coalition building with community development learning
opportunities and resources.
 Participate in establishing Calgary’s First 2000 Days
Early Childhood Development Network initiative.
 Further develop and share materials to support teachers
and community educators with asset-based, capacitybuilding approaches to leadership and learning.
 Provide resources and support for a number of
community-based organizations and civic institutions
with community engagement and capacity building
initiatives.
 Participate as a member of Calgary’s Community
Development Learning Initiative partner’s group.
educators wishing to facilitate Parent Café conversations with
parents. A facilitator’s guide offers practical support for hosting
effective community conversations.
The following strength-based, community building discussion
topics have been developed to support positive development,
build capacity and impact learning outcomes:
Café’s Virtual Community
Café’s newly launched website is offered as a community space
for parent leaders and educators to share resources, ideas,
stories and research that support the building of community
engagement in education. We encourage open access and
contributions to the portal as a means of sharing the diverse
strengths, experiences and assets of our collective efforts to
support learning. All are welcome to become part of the Café
community: www.cafeinstitute.org
 Literacy Café –The
foundation for learning
*with Calgary Reads
 The parent-school
partnership
 Technology as a
learning asset
 Your child – your
community: engaging all
assets
 Connecting learning at
home with the school
community
 Understanding and
supporting your child’s
individual strengths.
Additional topics currently under development include:
 Supporting numeracy
 Environmental literacy
 Physical health and
wellness
Café for Parents
Our Parent Café resource offers parent leaders and educators a
collection of easy-to follow guides and resources for hosting
conversations along a number of strength-based themes known
to impact learning. The “conversation café” style forum presents
an opportunity for parents and caregivers to build community,
highlight resources and local assets, and share stories and
experiences.
Café is now positioned to provide orientation, mentoring and
accompanying resources for parent and community leaders or
 Early years Parent Café in collaboration with
Ready4Learning, Bowness
coaltion and other EC Map
coalition partners
Thank you to our collaborative partners at
Calgary Reads for resources, expertise and inspiration in the
area of literacy development. Café is also very appreciative of
support received during the 2010-2012 Parent Café pilot
program from community educators at Families Matter and
parent leaders, teachers and administrators from the Calgary
Board of Education.
Café for Communities
Café for Schools
Café provides resources, mentoring and orientation for
community organizations whose educational mandates reflect a
capacity-building approach. Supporting early childhood
development, literacy, parenting, immigrant and adult education
can present highly impactful opportunities that empower people
to engage fully in their own development and in their
community. Emerging research and applied practice in
community development, educational leadership and learning
theory inform an exploratory process for organizations to
explore the integration of these ideas and strategies into
existing goals.
Sharing “what’s working in community engagement” along
with developments in capacity building research, Café’s
consolidation of resources supports the efforts of extended
school communities to be purposeful about community
building. An asset-based approach begins with seeing the
school community full of strengths, gifts and possibilities.
Community development process and strategies can be
engaged to highlight and mobilize untapped assets
and examine all possible avenues for collaboration and
partnerships.
Café values the opportunities to collaborate and support the
efforts of these school and community organizations while
furthering Café’s capacity for asset-based learning and
development:
 First 2000 Days Early
Childhood Development
Network
 Families Matter
 Government of Alberta,
Early Childhood
Development Project
(ECMap) Calgary
 Ready 4 Learning,
Bowness
 Calgary Reads
 City of Calgary, FCSS
 Calgary Board of
Education (select
schools)
 Calgary Family Services
 Alberta Health Services,
Family and Community
Resource Centre
Research reinforces the positive benefits for the learner when
families and communities are given the opportunity to work in
partnership with schools. Café shares stories and quality
resources (both virtually and in-person) that supports the work
of parent leaders, teachers, school administrators and the
broader community adopting an “asset-based leadership in
education (ABLE)” lens. Through an ABLE lens, unique
pathways for a school community to capitalize on learning
opportunities can be examined.
In partnership with Calgary Read’s Literacy-in-a Box initiative,
Café has developed a Literacy Action Team (LAT) module to
support collective efforts to organize around a school-wide goal
of improved literacy. The LAT offers resources, orientation and
process for committed parent leaders or educators wanting to
lead a multi-stakeholder working group focused on maximizing
the unique combination of locally available assets and
resources that can be engaged to support literacy development.
Who is Café?
Café has evolved through the voluntary collective efforts of
these educators and governing board members dedicated to
engaging communities for learning. They bring to Café their
passion, enthusiasm and a vast range of educational and
community building experience in Canada and internationally.
Tim Goddard (founding president), Louise Partridge (president),
Lynda Lyster, Jill Koch, Christa Mascher,
Paul Wright, Alison Mathie (advisor).
Café is a community-based initiative, evolving through the
combined contributions of partner organizations, volunteers and
associates with a wealth of collective experience as parents,
teachers and school administrators, educational researchers,
and community developers.
Café would like to acknowledge the ground-breaking work of
these organizations and their educators whose enthusiasm for
sharing knowledge, resources and professional development
has been inspirational and integral to Café’s approach and
framework.
 The Coady Institute, St. Francis Xavier University, NS.
 The Asset-based Community Development Institute,
Northwestern University, Ill.
 Centre on Family, School, Community Partnerships, Johns
Hopkins University.
 The Tamarack Institute, Ontario.
Join our Café conversation!
Membership in the Café Institute is open to all individuals or
groups who share Café’s vision to support collaborative
learning opportunities. There is no fee associated with Café
membership.
Support Café!
Café is committed to making materials and resources widely
available and accessible for individuals and groups working to
collectively support learning. In return for accessing Café’s
resources, support and contributions are greatly appreciated
through:
 sharing feedback and experiences from using the
information or resources provided.
 documenting and sharing success stories of
community building in education.
 contributing strengths and assets by volunteering.
 building connections and collaborations with Café.
 engaging a Café facilitator for mentorship or
orientation to assist you or your organization in your
work. (A nominal honorarium fee will be assessed to
cover associated costs. Please contact Café for
further information regarding such requests).
Any donations or inquiries of support for the Café Institute will
be received with great appreciation. Tax receipts are available
with any donation. Registered charity: 843110016RR0001
Café Institute
702 Rideau Road SW
Calgary, AB T2G 3Z8
info@cafeinstitute.org
www.cafeinstitute.org
Education for communities.
Communities for education.