California Safe and Supportive Schools

Essential Conditions for Advancing and Sustaining Cross-Sector Collaboration A Reflection Guide for Child-, Youth-, and Family- Serving Agencies

Practice Guide/Tool

Essential Conditions for Advancing and Sustaining Cross-Sector Collaboration A Reflection Guide for Child-, Youth-, and Family- Serving Agencies

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The work toward cross-sector collaboration has never been more urgent. Through a global pandemic, an increasingly polarized society, intensified violence locally and abroad, societal reckoning with injustices, and a surge in adolescent mental health challenges, many child-, youth-, and family-serving agencies have invested greater resources in supporting systems improvement.

This guide from shares strategies for creating and sustaining seven essential conditions for effective cross-sector collaboration to improve equitable access, experiences, and outcomes for young people, families, and communities:

  1. Collaborative Leadership Capacity
  2. Diverse and Inclusive Representation
  3. Relational Trust
  4. Collective Vision and Purpose
  5. Clear Structures and Approaches to Teamwork
  6. Continuous Improvement Routines and Infrastructure
  7. Adequate Resources and Abundance Mindsets

 

For each condition, the guide describes indicators of implementation that leaders and cross-sector teams can use to identify strengths, gaps, and opportunities in the design and implementation of their own collaboration efforts. The guide also offers tips for how to begin or strengthen each condition and points readers to further resources.

Practical Guide for Financing Social, Emotional, and Mental Health in Schools

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The California Children’s Trust and Breaking Barriers have developed this guide for education leaders on partnering and accessing Medi-Cal (i.e., Medicaid) funding to support the social, emotional, and mental health needs of students. The guide provides:

  • An overview of what school leaders need to know about Medi-Cal
  • Five different models with examples of how California districts integrate Medi-Cal-funded mental health services into school settings
  • Five actions school district leaders can take now to access and reinvest Medi-Cal funding to support the needs of students
  • Step-by-step guidance on how to integrate Medi-Cal into a coordinated system of supports
  • Additional resources on accessing MediCal to expand billable mental health services for students

To Create Safe and Healthy Schools During a Pandemic, Prioritize Educator Wellbeing

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Educator wellbeing provides the foundation for the overall wellness of educators, students, and the school community. In this brief, we describe how educator wellbeing is impacted by school climate and culture, educators’ own social and emotional competencies and self-care strategies, and individual histories of trauma and crisis. The brief focuses on a wide range of strategies for educators and school leaders to promote and support educator wellbeing, provides examples of successful implementation of educator wellbeing practices in California school districts, and includes resources to bolster supports for educators.

Management Factors for Successful Program Implementation

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The team tasked with evaluating the California Safe and Supportive Schools (S3) Grant created this brief document to outline what is known from research about management factors that contribute to a program’s success. Activities and mindsets that contribute to successful program implementation are organized into 4 key areas:

  • Day-to-day project management
  • Administrative-level support
  • Training
  • At-risk student referral systems

While this document was intended to guide implementation of school climate improvement programs, the key tenants can be applied to other school-based program implementation scenarios.