This collection includes resources for strengthening school climate, and improving health, safety, connectedness, and student engagement. Readers are encouraged to explore related links for further information. See also http://bit.ly/PreventDataHarms, http://bit.ly/edpsychtech, and http://bit.ly/screen_time. [Note: Views presented on this page are re-shared from external websites. The content may not necessarily represent the views nor official position of the curator nor employer of the curator.]
"An anonymous donor seeking to improve Oakland is investing in education. Nearly a quarter of the donor’s $34 million gift made this week to city organizations is targeted to school discipline reform, trauma care for students and early education teacher training and materials.
The donor reportedly cold-called the San Francisco Foundation earlier this year to float the idea of the gift and to ask Fred Blackwell, chief executive of the philanthropic foundation, to help disperse the funds. The focus of the grants is on “scaling proven solutions” to academic and economic obstacles faced by Oakland residents, according to a news release from the foundation, which donates grant money to nonprofits throughout the Bay Area.
The upshot is an $8 million gift to Oakland schools for what the foundation described as “a preK-12 system of support.” The donor requested that the money be put to work this summer.
“We have a chance to have a very direct, immediate and positive impact on Oakland schools and families,” said Troy Flint, spokesman for the Oakland Unified School District.
“We have a chance to have a very direct, immediate and positive impact on Oakland schools and families starting this school year and continuing for quite some time,” said Troy Flint, spokesman for the Oakland Unified School District.
The Oakland Public Education Fund, the district’s fundraising and grant management arm, received $6 million to fund early childhood education teacher training, restorative justice programs, the expansion of the African American Student Achievement program, and community school coordinators.
The California School-Based Health Alliance, a statewide organization, received $2 million to support trauma-informed care in 15 school-based health centers in Oakland, including centers at Oakland Technical High School, Elmhurst/Alliance Middle School and Castlemont High School.
The work will include schoolwide screenings, support groups and support for teachers to help students cope with the effects of severe trauma, according to the Alliance.
According to the San Francisco Foundation and Oakland Unified, the funding means that:
15 middle and high schools will gain new clinic staff and programs dedicated to addressing the impact of trauma;
Eight schools will launch restorative justice programs to reduce suspensions and expulsions;
an African American Female Achievement program will be created to complement the existing African American Male Achievement program, which works to improve academic performance and graduation rates of African American boys, and
All early childhood classrooms will receive teacher training, new curriculum and literacy materials
Oakland schools also will benefit indirectly from the donor’s new grants to nonprofit organizations that serve youth, Flint said. Those grants include $1.3 million to the Destiny Arts Center, $1 million to the East Oakland Youth Development Center and $2.5 million to Youth Uprising, a community center for health services, arts programs and education support."...
A recent report found that African-American girls were suspended at much higher rates than their white peers, a phenomenon that leads to lower earnings and educational attainment in the long run.
Trauma-Sensitive Schools and Safe and Supportive Schools benefit all children. TLPI embraces a whole-school approach that enables all children to achieve.
"As a parent and an educator, this topic is near and dear to my heart. Every week that passes, the social media landscape changes, and keeping up with it can be a nightmare. I ask that if you find value in this article please share with others so that we may spread the word about keeping our children safe online.
If you’re a parent, you have to keep up with it. You have to be “savvy” enough to know what social networks your kids are using. You can’t use the excuse “I don’t understand this stuff!” (for example: Snapchat, Instagram, Twitter, Vine, Google+, Ask.fm, and Tumblr) <– If you don’t know what I’m talking about, it’s time to start doing some research. You don’t have to be an expert, but you should know how these networks operate. These are the platforms your teenagers or soon to be teenagers are probably using right now."...
Childhood trauma isn’t something you just get over as you grow up. Pediatrician Nadine Burke Harris explains that the repeated stress of abuse, neglect and parents struggling with mental health or substance abuse issues has real, tangible effects on the development of the brain. This unfolds across a lifetime, to the point where those who’ve experienced high levels of trauma are at triple the risk for heart disease and lung cancer. An impassioned plea for pediatric medicine to confront the prevention and treatment of trauma, head-on.
"The U.S. Departments of Education and Justice are hosting teams of superintendents, principals, and teachers from across the country today for "Rethink Discipline," a day-long conference at the White House on creating positive school climates and implementing effective discipline practices. The conference seeks to advance the national conversation about reducing the overuse of unnecessary out of school suspensions and expulsions and replacing these practices with positive alternatives that keep students in school and engaged in learning, but also ensure accountability.
"Creating and sustaining safe, supportive schools is absolutely essential to ensuring students can engage in the rich learning experiences they need for success in college, work and life—that's why rethinking school discipline is critical to boosting student achievement and improving school outcomes. Today's conference shows that there are leaders across the country who are committed to doing this work. We are proud to stand as partners with these educators to say that we have to continue to do better for all of our students," said U.S. Secretary of Education Arne Duncan.
According to data from the Civil Rights Data Collection (CRDC), the number of students losing critical learning time due to out of school suspensions and expulsions is staggering. Over 3 million students are suspended or expelled every year.
At the event, the Department of Education will release new maps based on the CRDC data illustrating out-of-school suspensions across the country to help educators and communities understand the extent of this practice. The maps highlight how southeastern school districts have the highest rates of out of school suspension in the nation. The maps also clearly demonstrate the widespread and frequent use of out-of-school suspension among students with disabilities. The following maps are being released today:
Percent of all students who have received one or more out-of-school suspensions by district Map and Data Table
Percent of students with disabilities who have received one or more out-of-school suspensions by district Map and Data Table
The impact of out of school suspensions and expulsions on students is devastating—suspended students are less likely to graduate on time, and more likely to repeat a grade, drop out of school, and enter the juvenile justice system.
School Districts across the country have already made progress in transforming policies and school climate to support student learning including the following districts attending the conference: Oakland, Los Angeles and Vallejo City, (CA); Baltimore (MD); Broward County (FL); and Syracuse and Buffalo (NY). For instance:
Baltimore City Schools, with help from the Council of State Governments' Discipline Consensus Project, revamped their code of student conduct for a more rehabilitative approach to misbehavior. The State Board of Education is implementing new discipline regulations—from giving school systems more flexibility in managing cases, to requiring that students suspended for short periods are able to complete schoolwork they've missed.
LA Unified was the first district, in 2013, to ban suspensions for willful defiance—which disproportionately impacted African-American students, and includes actions like refusing to turn off a cellphone or failing to wear a school uniform—in favor of alternative discipline.
Syracuse has adopted a new code of discipline, established training for staff in alternative approaches, and hired an independent monitor to oversee progress.
As part of the conference, new resources and initiatives are being announced today to assist school leaders in their efforts to reduce suspensions and expulsions and provide school environments that are safe, supportive, and conducive to teaching and learning.
Addressing the Root Causes of Disciplinary Disparities: An Educator's Action Planning Guide: This new resource from the Department's National Center on Safe Supportive Learning Environments provides a guide to assist schools and districts in identifying the root causes of disparities in the outcomes of school discipline through an analysis of student-level discipline data.Addressing the Root Cause of School Discipline Disparities provides a practical, action-oriented method for schools and districts to develop an action plan to address the roots causes of discipline disparities. The Guide includes a Disciplinary Disparities Risk Assessment Tool to aid in data gathering and analysis, templates to help plan and facilitate communication among stakeholders, real world examples from schools and districts already experiencing success and much more tools and information.
Rethink School Discipline: Resource Guide for Superintendent Action: This Resource Guide offers a set of seven potential action items to help school leaders implement safe, supportive school climate and discipline by engaging stakeholders, assessing the results and history of existing school climate and discipline systems and practices; implementing reform; and monitoring progress. Also included in the Resource Guide are links to federal guidance and resources as well as postcard templates that districts may use to support local educator and parent and family engagement in the district's school discipline reform efforts.
Support for State and Local Educational Leaders and Partners from Other Systems: On July 27, the U.S. Department of Justice is launching the National Resource Center for School Justice Partnerships to advance school discipline reform efforts across the nation. In addition to serving as a dynamic resource hub, the center will also serve as a training and technical assistance portal for juvenile courts, schools, law enforcement agencies, and others to support school discipline reform efforts at the local level. Among its many responsibilities, the Center will support the Supportive School Discipline Training and Technical Assistance Collaborative, an effort by the U.S. Departments of Justice, Education, and Health and Human Services to coordinate resources and provide strategic support to schools and school communities in areas such as building safe and supportive learning environments and addressing disparities in discipline for students of color and students with disabilities.
#RethinkDiscipline Public Awareness Campaign: In the weeks and months following the conference, the U.S. Department of Education will continue to use social media events, blogs, and other approaches to engage the field about new tools and resources to help school communities to improve school climate and discipline.
The White House Rethink Discipline conference builds on the work of the President's My Brother's Keeper Initiative (MBK), the White House Council on Women and Girls, and the Supportive School Discipline Initiative—a collaboration between the U.S. Departments of Education and Justice launched in 2011 to support the use of school discipline practices that foster safe, supportive, and productive learning environments while keeping students in school. Highlights from the Initiative's work this past year include:
Education and Justice jointly released a School Climate and Discipline Guidance Package to provide schools with a roadmap to reduce the usage of exclusionary discipline practice and clarify schools' civil rights obligation to not discriminate on the basis of race, color, or national origin in the administration of school discipline.
Educators at the conference have already started to implement the School Climate and Discipline Guidance and will share challenges they have faced and best practices they have identified. Additionally, participants in the conference have committed to improving school climate with the goals of ultimately, avoiding disruptions in instructional time and boosting student achievement. At the end of the conference, they will identify next steps for action on school discipline so as to deepen implementation of the School Climate and Discipline Guidance.
Education released the results of the 2011-2012 Civil Rights Data Collection, which includes school discipline data from most every school in the country and certain juvenile justice facilities.
For more information about the Administration's work on school climate and discipline go to www.ed.gov/rethinkdiscipline."
"My school just wrapped up its first successful Field Day (May Day to you old folks) for the first time in three years. Staff members have shared many different stories about prior Field Day events, but the long and short of it is that for one reason or another they weren’t successful. Now, as I’ve written in the past, I work at an inner city school and unfortunately that usually means that a culture of low expectations for students’ academic performance as well as their behavior tends to infiltrate the hearts and minds of some of the people charged with creating an environment that is not only conducive for learning, but one that feels inclusive, safe, and enjoyable. I believe that past Field Days may have been failures because members of the staff had low expectations of our students and their parents and these low expectations prevented them from putting in the work needed to ensure that an undertaking the size of Field Day was a success. I’m speculating, of course, but lots of signs pointed me in the direction of my previously mentioned conclusion.
I worked on the planning committee for this event with the intention of working with the team to create an event fit for my own children. This meant that Field Day needed to be safe, orderly, highly structured, and that the planning team had to consider, and plan for, a number of different contingencies. I’m happy to say that all went as planned yesterday and that the kids had a great time. 9 people successfully managed fun and games for approximately 600 people…on a shoestring budget. At the end of the day I felt like we were the 2004 Detroit Pistons, a rag tag collection of role players who put numbers on the boards for our team; the learning community at Margaret Fain Elementary School.
A rather welcome, but unforeseen, consequence of the day was that our parents, who up until yesterday seemed to me to be rather disengaged from the school, came out in droves to help work with the staff to make sure that the day was a success. I spoke with a number of these parents who expressed their pleasure in being able to come to the school to support their children. Some shared with me that they felt welcome at the school for the first time in years. Others expressed a desire to participate in more events at the school."...
"Our primary mission at the Cyberbullying Research Center is to translate the research we and others do into something that is meaningful and interpretable to teens, parents, educators, and others dedicated to preventing and responding more effectively to cyberbullying. When we first launched this website (10 years ago!), there wasn’t much research being done, and so it was easy to keep up. These days, however, many scholars are putting cyberbullying under the microscope, which is a very good thing. It is important to recognize, though, that not all studies are created equal. In this post I’d like to discuss one particular problem: small sample sizes. And, to be more specific, I am most concerned with the way some media reports portray results from these studies to be definitive.
For illustration purposes, I’d like to highlight two recently-published papers that gained some measure of attention by the media in the last few weeks. I think they attracted this interest, in part, because their findings speak to the conventional wisdom regarding cyberbullying (that is, that traditional bullying is worse than cyberbullying, and that no one really wants to intervene when they see it happen). I’m all for using data to help validate or refute commonly-held beliefs about cyberbullying. Many of the media reports about these papers, however, make broad, seemingly conclusive generalized statements based on the perspectives or experiences of a very small group of students."...
This link includes curricula and resources for Bullying Prevention from the Positive Behavior Intervention & Supports Training and Technical Assistance Center http://www.pbis.org/school/bully-prevention
"Connections Between Bullying and Other Types of Violence"
Family Violence, Sexual Harassment, and Dating Violence Thursday, March 26, 2015 12:00:00 PM PDT - 01:00:00 PM PDT
The Children’s Safety Network invites you to the first in a series of webinars on the issue of bullying awareness, response, and prevention based on the “Building Capacity to Reduce Bullying and Its Impact on Youth Across the Lifecourse” workshop convened by the Institute of Medicine (IOM) and National Research Council (NRC) in April 2014.
This first webinar in our series is entitled “The Connections between Bullying and Family Violence, Sexual Harassment, and Dating Violence” and explores youth aggression and bullying, sexual harassment, and dating violence which are widespread public health concerns. During the webinar, Dr. Dorothy Espelage will describe the longitudinal study she and her colleagues conducted, which examined the impact of family abuse and conflict, anger, self-reported delinquency, alcohol use, and peer delinquency on the development of bullying perpetration, sexual harassment perpetration, and teen dating violence perpetration among a large sample of early adolescents.
Dr. Espelage will discuss the findings from this study, drawing out important overlaps between bullying, family violence, sexual harassment, and dating violence, and the implications these overlaps have for designing and implementing interventions.
Learning Objectives:
• Explore the ways in which bullying and family violence, sexual harassment, and dating violence interrelate
• Understand other predictors and risk factors for bullying and how it varies by age group, gender, and race/ethnicity
• Clarify the factors that must be taken into consideration in designing and implementing effective bullying prevention interventions
This webinar series is being conducted in conjunction with a series of blogs that will appear on the StopBullying.gov website. To read the blogs, visit: http://www.stopbullying.gov/blog.
By Jill Tucker "Mouthing off in class or failing to follow a teacher’s instructions will no longer lead to suspension in Oakland schools, a ban that will be phased in and be fully in effect just over a year from now, the school board unanimously decided Wednesday night. Oakland Unified will become one of a handful of California school districts that restrict suspensions to more serious offenses and eliminate the punishment for willful defiance — a broad category of misbehavior that includes minor offenses such as refusing to take a hat off or ignoring teacher requests to stop texting and more severe incidents like swearing at a teacher or storming out of class
Oakland has been criticized for the disproportionate suspensions, leading to an investigation by the U.S. Department of Education’s Office of Civil Rights and a 2012 voluntary agreement that required the district to employ a range of practices that reduced suspensions. Among them are the district’s Manhood Development classes for African American males as well as restorative justice, which requires victims and offenders to talk about the behavior and ways to address it. Willful defiance suspensions for African American students in Oakland declined from 1,050 incidents in 2011 to 630 in 2014, according to district officials. Community activists from the Black Organizing Project, Public Counsel and Californians for Justice, among others, applauded the school board vote, but said more was needed to address the needs of disadvantaged students in the district. Members of those organizations urged the district to pour at least $2.3 million into alternative discipline programs, including Manhood Development and restorative justice, which Superintendent Antwan Wilson vowed to include in his budget for the 2015-16 school year."...
"Research suggests that approximately 25% of American children will experience at least one traumatic event by the age of 16. A child's reactions to trauma can interfere considerably with learning and/or behavior at school. However, schools also serve as a critical system of support for children who have experienced trauma.
Administrators, teachers, and staff can help reduce the impact of trauma on children by recognizing trauma responses, accommodating and responding to traumatized students within the classroom setting, and referring children to outside professionals when necessary. The National Child Traumatic Stress Network has developed tools and materials to help educators understand and respond to the specific needs of traumatized children."
Every day our juvenile justice system locks up girls who are victims of sexual violence, and physical and emotional abuse. In fact, we often incarcerate victimized girls in a misguided effort to provide them with services and to "protect" t...
"We spend so much time listening to the things people are saying that we rarely pay attention to the things they don't," says slam poet and teacher Clint Smith."
"Every day, you see how cyberbullying hurts students, disrupts classrooms, and impacts your school's culture. So how should you handle it? What are the right things to do and say? What can you do today that will help your students avoid this pitfall of our digital world? We created this free toolkit to help you take on those questions and take an effective stand against cyberbullying. So start here. Use it now. Rely on it to start your year off right." Common Sense Media
"Chicago’s school discipline policies have unintended consequences. Is there a better way? Young filmmakers from Free Spirit Media explore causes and solutions to Chicago's school-to-prison-pipeline.
Are CPS policies on discipline effective? Share your comments below or at www.schoolprojectfilm.com. Please subscribe for more & follow the discussion at: https://facebook.com/theschoolproject https://twitter.com/theschoolpr (#TheSchoolProject)"...
"The CASEL Guide provides a systematic framework for evaluating the quality of social and emotional programs and applies this framework to identify and rate well-designed, evidence-based SEL programs with potential for broad dissemination to schools across the United States. The Guide also shares best-practice guidelines for district and school teams on how to select and implement SEL programs. Finally, it offers recommendations for future priorities to advance SEL research and practice."....
"Fix School Discipline is a comprehensive resource for school superintendents, principals, teachers, parents, students, community leaders and organizations and anyone who is interested in learning about how to eliminate harsh, push-out discipline practices and put in place solutions that work for all students. Here, you can find the latest data and news about the impacts that suspensions and expulsion have on students and school climate.
You can also use our step-by-step tools to help you implement or advocate for supportive, inclusive discipline policies that hold students accountable and improve school climate and safety for all members of the school community."...
"There are often expectations for a new superintendent to make an immediate impact in his or her district. That was the case when I became superintendent at Standard School District in Bakersfield in November 2013, just as the new Local Control Accountability Plan (LCAP) was unfolding.
Being new to the district and the area, the needs assessment required by the LCAP served me well as an educational leader. It didn’t take long to identify the areas of need or to come to agreement on how to address them.
One area of need in our K-8 district with nearly 3,000 students was to reduce the number of suspensions. In 2013, the number of student suspensions at our middle school was extremely high – over three times the state suspension rate. Budget cuts over several years had reduced the middle school administrative team and, with over 900 students in 6th to 8th grades, it was clear that the team was operating in survival mode. We needed to provide more support for students and staff and find a program that offered a long-term solution to address student misbehavior as well as guide future behavior.
In addition to suspending students and sending them home for violating school rules, the middle school was using an in-house suspension program called Opportunity Class, or “Op,” as it was called by the students and staff. Op was basically a holding tank where misbehaving students were sent for a day or several days as a consequence for disrupting the school environment. Op was punitive in nature, and the students were expected to remain quiet and do their schoolwork. For the Op teacher, the focus was on managing the class and there was little time available for any type of intervention. The Op program had no real impact on changing or improving student behavior, and as a result many students were repeat offenders or “frequent flyers.”
In January 2014, our director of student services Denita Maughan heard about a promising program. While attending the ACSA Pupil Services Academy, she met two administrators, Barbara Perez and Barry Tyler, from Oceanside Unified School District, north of San Diego. They shared their strategy to reduce suspensions, which was based on the principles of restorative practices. Following that meeting, Dr. Maughan visited the continuation school in Oceanside where the program was being implemented. She was convinced that it could be adapted to work at the middle school level. Our contacts at Oceanside agreed to help us implement a similar program, and we drew up a consulting contract with them to help us do so.
Thanks to increased state funding as a result of the Local Control Funding Formula, we were able to improve our student support services by providing a full-time school psychologist to each of our schools. We formed a middle school “Alternative to Suspension” team consisting of the site administration (principal and two assistant principals), a campus supervisor, school counselor, school psychologist, social work intern and the ATS teacher (formally the Op teacher). Each staff member plays an important role.
In addition to providing counseling, our school counselor and school psychologist play a vital role by teaching students how to acknowledge and own their behavior and to make amends with those individuals they have harmed both directly and indirectly. In order to prepare the apology, they conduct role-playing scenarios so students have the confidence to make a sincere attempt to repair relationships that were impacted by their behavior.
Alternative to Suspension is based on restorative practices that originated in the criminal justice system as an alternative to punishment and incarceration. Adapted for use in schools, restorative practices are used as an alternative to suspension by using a set of principles and strategies to encourage students to accept responsibility for their behavior and repair any harm caused by their actions. The foundation of restorative practices is based on the core values of respect, inclusion, responsibility, empathy, honesty, openness and accountability."...
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