IEL was established in the 1960s to help identify, prepare, and support a new cadre of leaders in education. Through its Washington Internships in Education (WIE) program, IEL facilitated the newly expanding federal role in education and ensured greater diversity in leadership. IEL also created opportunities to promote bipartisan decision making in Congress to shape and strengthen implementation of Elementary and Secondary Education Act.

In the 1970s, WIE became the Education Policy Fellowship Program (EPFP) and emerged as a state-based, mid-career leadership development program. With power shifting to the states, IEL developed the State Education Policy Seminars, creating venues for policy deliberation and collaboration in 40 state capitals.

To meet the demands of the Education for All Handicapped Children Act of 1975 (the precursor to the Individuals with Disabilities Education Act), IEL worked to develop two generations of special education policy leaders.

During its second decade, IEL pioneered the Family Impact Seminar, adapting lessons from environmental impact studies to explore how to leverage federal policy to support families, and launched a journalism fellowship program and a nationally syndicated radio show on NPR.

In the 1980s, IEL launched a series of path-breaking studies to help leaders begin to understand pending demographic trends that have since transformed our nation. All One System and The Same Client argued that our education system should be “a seamless web” from pre-K through graduate school, and that schools and agencies that serve the same children and families need to better coordinate their efforts.

IEL also focused in the 1980s on the long-ignored role that local school boards could play in their communities and education reform. Over time, it incubated important, nationally influential organizations and policy initiatives, including The Hispanic Policy Development Project, Jobs for the Future, the American Youth Policy Forum, and the Center on Education Policy.

In the 1990s, IEL launched the Center for Workforce Development, which helps leaders and stakeholders promote career-readiness and successful transitions to adulthood with a special focus on youth with disabilities and other disconnected youth. IEL also established Superintendents Prepared to help create a larger and more diverse group of superintendents, and it began to focus on school-family-community partnerships, introducing the Together We Can Initiative, aimed at helping education and human services systems work together to develop pro-family policies and practices.

As national priorities have shifted through the years, IEL has remained steadfast in its focus. The organization has withstood the test of time by continuing to anticipate and tackle burning issues, to catalyze new ideas and networks, and to keep a laser-like focus on leadership development and equity.

At the start of this century, IEL applied its core values and strategies to focus on three pillars of success to buttress families and help young people thrive.

IEL sparked the nation’s efforts to return schools to their significant role as centers of their communities. The Coalition for Community Schools helps ensure that students and their families have access to coordinated academic, youth development, health, and social services connected to their public schools. The Coalition is made up of over 1,000 partners across the country, and is supporting existing or developing Community School State Coalitions in 40 states and territories. Its peer-learning and action networks build local capacity to improve the learning and development of young people and support their families.

IEL has improved the capacity of policymakers, program administrators, and youth service professionals to provide comprehensive, coordinated transition services for all youth, including those with disabilities. Its work distilling research into innovative strategies such as the Guideposts for Success and our previous Youth Services Professionals’ Knowledge, Skills & Abilities Initiative has influenced policy and practice about successful transitions to adulthood. IEL has used research to design programs such as High School/High Tech, The Ready to Achieve Mentoring Program, and Right Turn, which leverage the expertise of local businesses, community organizations, and schools to create new career pathways for disabled, disengaged, and disadvantaged youth.

IEL’s Education Policy Fellowship Program (EPFP), our national, cohort-based certificate program, continues to focus on building policy, leadership, and networking capacities for a wide range of professionals in the early childhood, K-12, and higher education policy fields. As the founding program of the IEL, it has for 60 years developed a diverse and collaborative community of over 12,000 strategic leaders to promote equitable education policy. Our emphasis on developing the leadership and coalition-building skills of people working with parents, families, and school leaders extends IEL’s leadership development role deep into grassroots efforts strengthening schools and communities.

IEL continues to catalyze new ideas and approaches as it looks to its next 60 years. IEL will amplify its work by building and supporting broad-based networks of cross-sector leaders so that best practices can be brought to scale, supported by responsive state and federal policy.