California Safe and Supportive Schools

Beyond Heroes and Holidays: Expanding Understanding and Practices of Culturally Responsive and Sustaining Approaches

Behavior and Intervention Specialists

Beyond Heroes and Holidays: Expanding Understanding and Practices of Culturally Responsive and Sustaining Approaches

by

Research shows that culturally responsive and sustaining practices (CRSP) strengthen students’ social and academic well-being. What’s more, the impact doesn’t end there—CRSP offer similar benefits for adults’ well-being and performance when the practices are woven into the culture of the school district and school community. Although the importance of belonging and connection is widely known, there is often a disconnect in how these states of mind are actualized through practices and behaviors and how they are experienced by students and staff of color. The absence of feeling valued and heard is one of the primary reasons students feel unsupported and staff of color choose to leave the education field. Join us to learn more about CRSP. We will explore and discuss asset-based approaches—both at the individual and system levels—that contribute powerfully to a school community in which everyone feels valued, connected, and successful. Resources and tools to support CRSP implementation will be shared with attendees.

Watch the recorded webinar

View the transcript

Download the slides (pdf)

Highlighted Resources:

Presenters

Erin Browder (she/her) is a Senior Program Associate with WestEd’s Talent Development and Diversity content area. She provides technical assistance and project design for K–12 initiatives related to trauma-informed topics, school improvement, leadership development, social-emotional learning, and culturally responsive and equity-centered approaches that foster safe and supportive schools. Erin brings a diverse skill set to her work, helping schools, districts, and state systems create sustainable change and positive outcomes for students, families, and staff members. She has demonstrated success as an educator and nonprofit leader, creating funding and partnership opportunities among education agencies, healthcare systems, community organizations, and nonprofits across the country.

Erin Browder

Alexis Patterson Williams, PhD, is an associate professor in science education at the University of California, Davis, School of Education, who is focused on the intersection of equity studies, social psychology, social justice, and science education. Previously, she worked as an assistant director of an after-school program, a middle school science teacher, and an intervention instructor at an elementary school in Oakland Unified School District. Alexis is passionate about supporting teachers in creating equitable and just classroom and school environments in order to eliminate the disparate experiences students have as well as to reduce the harm students experience at school.

 

 

The Role of Restorative Practices in School Transformation: Centering Relationships and Connection

by

Restorative practices hold significant promise for school transformation. These practices are characterized by proactive relationships, connection, and community transformation. As such, effective implementation of restorative practices rests not merely on getting the technical aspects right, but far more on attending to the often overlooked adaptive and relational elements that are necessary to achieve authentic, meaningful, and sustainable implementation. This interactive webinar will provide educators, school leaders, and district administrators with the strategies, tools, and structures they need to successfully implement restorative practices. We will focus on mindsets, values, social capital, and structural supports that bind and hold together restorative practices and that transform schools into strong communities.

Watch the recorded webinar

View the transcript

Download the slides (pdf)

Highlighted Resource:

Presenters

Lauren Trout (she/they) is a Program Associate in WestEd’s Resilient and Healthy Schools and Communities content area. Lauren works with schools, communities, and larger education and justice systems to provide training, coaching, and technical support around equity, climate and culture, conflict resolution, and harm prevention. A restorative justice practitioner by profession, Lauren uses restorative theory to shift trauma-informed practice, social-emotional well-being, and relationship-centered learning from being siloed programs into being paradigms, collective values, and guiding principles that inform and are embedded in structures and organizational culture. Lauren specializes in using a restorative justice paradigm to transform systems of power, helping to create climates that are inclusive, safe, and anti-oppressive.

Lauren Trout

Sandra Azevedo, MA, PPS, is a Coordinator of Continuous Improvement for Butte County Office of Education. She has worked in education for over 25 years supporting special education, Multi-Tiered System of Supports (MTSS), Social & Emotional Learning (SEL), equity efforts, and a leadership network. Sandra has contributed to a number of guides and publications, including Social and Emotional Learning in CA: A Guide to Resources Wiki Wisdom/Beyond Differences report, Advancing SEL Amid a Pandemic and National Awakening to Systemic Racism and the Guidebook for Thrive’s Children’s Resilience Initiative. Sandra is a trainer for Restorative Practices after receiving training through the International Institute of Restorative Practices (IIRP), and she is a steering committee member for her local healing center, ACEs Collaborative, as well as for a multi-county regional ACEs Collaborative.

Sandra Azevedo

Toby Espley (she/her) is the Restorative Practices Coordinator at the Orange County Department of Education in Learning Support Services. The focus of her work consists of Restorative Practices, Social Emotional Learning (SEL), Early Childhood Education, and Positive Behavioral Interventions and Supports (PBIS) within the California Multi-Tiered System of Supports (CAMTSS). With over twenty years of experience in education, Toby continues to bring current research and best practices to support professional development for the PK–12 continuum. She holds a master‘s degree in education and a bachelor’s degree in child development.

Toby Espley

Building a Strong Foundation for Family-School Partnerships: A Story About Growth and Human Connections

by

This session will take you through a 3-year journey of one preschool working to improve relationships and collaboration with families. You will hear from a school team that set out to meaningfully engage families in student learning by using data to create a system in which best practices can grow and be sustained, and giving families concrete opportunities for learning and contributing to their child’s educational and personal development. The stories and lessons shared by the school team will help participants design their own strong family engagement practices that start in early childhood and last through elementary school and beyond. Join us and be inspired to incorporate lessons that can be applied at any grade level to build community within and around schools.

Watch the recorded webinar


View the transcript

Download the slides (pdf)

Highlighted Resources:

Presenters

Annabel Lee (she/her) is a Family Engagement Facilitator in WestEd’s Quality Schools and Districts content area. She is currently a trainer and coach for Academic Parent-Teacher Teams (APTT), through which she supports and builds the capacity of teachers and leaders from preK through high school to implement effective family engagement practices. Annabel has worked with teachers and leaders on developing reading and math curricula, designing assessments, and conducting instructional rounds, and she has served as a teacher and principal.
Annabel Lee
Maria Paredes (she/her) is a Senior Engagement Manager in WestEd’s Quality Schools and Districts content area. Maria developed Academic Parent-Teacher Teams (APTT), a strengths-based model of family engagement designed to strengthen the capacity of teachers and families to transform family participation in their children’s education. She has partnered with state departments, districts, and schools to support needs assessment, program development, professional learning, and integration of effective family engagement practices into all areas of school improvement.
Maria Paredes

Street Data: Student Centered Approaches to School Transformation

by

About the Webinar: The Center to Improve Social and Emotional Learning and School Safety, the Equity Accelerator Fellowship, and the California Center for School Climate are delighted to invite you to a keynote address with Shane Safir and Jamila Dugan, authors of widely acclaimed Street Data. The goals of the session are to: examine the roots of our contemporary education and data systems, explore a next-generation model for school transformation, and identify one next step you’ll take to center voices from the margins.

About Street Data: Education can be transformed if we eradicate our fixation on big data like standardized test scores as the supreme measure of equity and learning. Instead of the focus being on “fixing” and “filling” academic gaps, we must envision and rebuild the system from the student up―with classrooms, schools, and systems built around students’ brilliance, cultural wealth, and intellectual potential. Street data reminds us that what is measurable is not the same as what is valuable and that data can be humanizing, liberatory, and healing. By breaking down street data fundamentals: what it is, how to gather it, and how it can complement other forms of data to guide a school or district’s equity journey, Safir and Dugan offer an actionable framework for school transformation.

10 Ways to Gather Street Data tool

Using School Climate Data to Meet the Moment

by

Available school climate data abounds, but how might we approach it with more intention and in a way that is less overwhelming? While there are many challenges facing education in the ongoing COVID-19 pandemic, local data can help shine a light on the most salient school climate issues facing your school or district. In this session, we will explore how to align your school climate questions with data sources currently being used by your school or district, as well as other data sources you have not yet utilized, to develop a better understanding of school climate issues in your context.

Watch the recorded webinar

View the transcript

Download slides (pdf)

View the highlighted resource.

Spring 2022 CCSC Monthly Peer Learning Exchanges

by