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In this article we describe models of academic rigor from the student point of view. Drawing on a campus-wide survey, focus groups, and interviews with students, we found that students explained academic rigor in terms of workload, grading standards, level of difficulty, level of interest, and perceived relevance to future goals. These findings contrast with our previous research about the faculty conception of academic rigor (Draeger et al. 2013) based on active learning, meaningful content, higher-order thinking, and appropriate expectations. Our new research offers the prospect of increasing the level of academic challenge in ways that resonate with student concerns.

School–university partnerships have served as possible solutions for many contemporary educational challenges. As centers for clinical practice, they are potential vehicles for the development and refinement of candidate use of high-leverage practices (HLPs). This article describes our institution’s efforts to utilize our framework for clinically rich preparation to infuse HLPs into programming for undergraduate, dual-certification majors (i.e., general and special education). With the goal of program revision, general and special education faculty mutually agreed on a draft set of HLPs, which were finalized based on extensive feedback from school partners. To assess the viability of these collaboratively crafted HLPs, a subset of HLPs were identified and integrated into course content and clinical experiences during a pilot project. We highlight these learning experiences; discuss organizational, pedagogical, and empirical challenges; and offer general recommendations for next steps.