Chapter 13: Never Give Up: The Power of a Sustained Partnership Built on Vision and Trust

This chapter discusses the sustained partnership between North Carolina State University and Centennial Campus Magnet Middle School, a public school conceived and built through a collaboration of the university and the local school system. The critical elements of this partnership center on mutual respect, collaboration, and communication. These elements are demonstrated in the 2-decades long teacher preparation modules presented in this chapter: the WolfPack Writing Project and The Outsiders Project. These projects are at the pedagogical heart of the partnership and build the teacher candidates’ understanding of young adolescents, developmental theory, content and pedagogical skills, and praxis (theory into practice). By pairing teacher candidates directly with middle school students, these projects build a new paradigm in teacher preparation, one that reinforces the value of teacher candidates learning the essential elements of teaching and learning from the very students they seek to teach.