By Judith Nuss, CASEL Consultant, Collaborating Districts Initiative in Cleveland Metropolitan School District and Austin Independent School District
I have participated in the National School Climate (NSCC) Summer Institute several times. Each time I come away rejuvenated, educated, and inspired with enhanced skills and knowledge to activate positive change in our schools for teachers, students and parents. Probably my most memorable institute experience was my first one in the summer of 2006. At the time, I had just completed my rookie year as Director of Social and Emotional Learning in a distressed urban public school district in a state capital city. I went to the Summer Institute as a true and eager learner – wanting to know all the research and the best practices for promoting social and emotional learning.
That was the summer I first met Dr. Jonathan Cohen, a most personable professor and researcher - down to earth, advanced in social and emotional competence, and always with an appreciative voice that could sooth a raging bull. To date, Jon remains a valued mentor and colleague. I always value effective leadership.
I also first met Mary Utne O’Brien, then Executive Director of CASEL (Collaborative for Academic, Social and Emotional Learning.) After being mesmerized by Mary’s keynote message, I participated in a small break-out session she facilitated. In addition to meeting the learning needs of this session’s group, Mary warmly counseled me, responded enthusiastically and knowledgably to my questions, and greatly inspired me to strenuously climb the uphill challenge I was leading in my district – that of promoting district-wide and explicit social and emotional learning for all K-12 students.
I remember asking myself about this field of social and emotional education. Why does this field of study and practice have such caring, thoughtful, smart, and humanistic people? What is it about this work that allows its leaders to stay so true to their selves – always modeling and promoting calm, intelligent, change agency leadership with a vision of well-being for all?
At this same NSCC Summer Institute, I was also introduced to Facing History and Ourselves, a civic education non-profit that cultivates democratic educational practices while fighting prejudice, racism, and violence. Their representatives informed us with photos, audio, video, media and firsthand accounts of the genocide in Darfur. Talk about raising awareness! My personal mission was immediately expanded!
Less than a year later I had collaborated with others to garner federal character education resources to implement Facing History learning modules in our district’s middle schools. Teachers, students, staff, parents, and community members in the district became uniquely engaged in authentic, rigorous learning around historical case studies of the Civil Rights era and the Holocaust. Many who were involved in this learning continue to “be the change” in their individual lives and networks.
For me, the NSCC Summer Institute has been a refuge of sorts. My husband and I love New York City. His birthday falls on July 11 so he is always pleased to accompany me to NYC to celebrate his birthday while I attend the Institute. He walks the city during the day, watching the people, enjoying the restaurants, and at night, we enjoy at least one Broadway show and have some spectacular dinners.
I learn during the day and I love it! I enjoy watching the teams of people who attend the Institute. I see them grow in relationship and watch them learn together over a few days. As a career educator, it has always been joyful to observe children and youth learn, but I have to say, there is a whole different level of reward to observing adults learn and change in their thinking, assumptions, and skills. I notice “a-ha” moments, ideas generating, understanding growing, and plans being made for the new school year. I see hope in the very people who can lead and make overdue change in our schools. Often, these are the same people who first arrived at the Summer Institute worn out from another challenging school year. By the end of Summer Institute, we are all invigorated with thoughtful plans for positive action and enriched by shared relationship of learning, understanding, and focus!
By Shawn Healy, Civic Learning & Engagement Scholar, Robert R. McCormick Foundation
A positive school climate is essential to a school living its civic mission. I’m admittedly a novice when it comes to school climate, but when I arrived in New York last July to attend the National School Climate Institute’s 2012 Summer Institute, I knew this much, and believed it deeply in my heart.
My expertise lies in civic education and engagement. I taught high school social studies for six years, am a PhD candidate in the field of political socialization, and chair the Illinois Civic Mission Coalition, which advocates for school-based civic learning opportunities across the formal curriculum, in extracurricular activities, and through day-to-day school governance.
My combined experiences in the classroom, as an academic, and as an advocate, taught me that a challenging curriculum incorporating proven civic learning practices is alone insufficient in preparing young people for their roles in our representative democracy. Principals must be a driving force for a school’s civic mission, with specific attention to staff development, from hiring to evaluation to professional development. Schools must also build reciprocal relationships with the surrounding community, where both are resources for one another.
A positive school climate is the glue that holds this all together. I developed a new and ongoing appreciation for this bonding agent during my experiences at the 2012 Summer Institute.
Simply stated, a school’s climate either reinforces or undermines democratic lessons that occur in its classrooms. Schools with positive climates practice democracy through constant attention to relationships among and between administrators, faculty and staff, students, parents, and other community stakeholders. They support civic norms and values through policy and practice, and students graduate with a sense of responsibility and efficacy.
I learned there are many entry points to school climate. Attention to school climate is a powerful prescription for bullying prevention, and an important vehicle for elevating youth voice. Some see it as a means of improving student achievement, and others as a way of better including and celebrating the gifts of special needs students. Similarly, issues of equity among all students rise to the fore, with important implications for my own work in the civic learning space.
The Summer Institute experience broadened my understanding of the scope of school climate work, and allowed me to think about how I can integrate it into my own daily dealings. Upon returning to Chicago, we matched a high school in our Democracy Schools Network with the NSCC for a staff training and introduction to school climate measurement tools. It is our hope that this pilot project will set the stage for further work with other schools throughout Illinois.
We’ve also integrated school climate into our revised Illinois Civic Blueprint (publication pending, with the original document accessible here), which offers a scalable approach to school-based civic learning statewide. School climate has even entered the assessment and application tools we use with prospective Democracy Schools to strengthen their civic learning programs.
I’ll be back in Chelsea in July for the 2013 Summer Institute with a team representing the Illinois Civic Mission Coalition I chair, including a regional superintendent of schools, a coordinator of student leadership and service-learning from a large urban school district, and two classroom teachers. Collectively, we hope to expand our working knowledge of school climate reform, network and learn from fellow advocates across the country, and strategize about how we can implement model school climate policies and processes across multiple layers of the educational landscape in Illinois.
Last year’s Summer Institute experience helped me operationalize my deeply held belief that a school’s attention to building and maintaining a positive climate is in service of its civic mission. I’m confident that the 2013 experience will have a similar galvanizing effect for new and repeat attendees alike, and I truly look forward to learning about your own entry point into the growing movement for school climate reform.
Shawn Healy and the McCormick Foundation can be found on Twitter @McCormick_Fdn.
NSCC introduces its first blog in a series of Summer Institute posts highlighting participant and presenter experiences. Stay connected to us weekly for a unique perspective of Summer Institute offerings, teachings, and benefits.
Educators and their supporters from across the country are calling members of Congress demanding they take immediate action to prevent the loss of some 300,000 educator jobs nationwide today. This effort, being organized by numerous education organizations including our friends at ASCD who seeks to rally educators at the state and district levels and encourage them to make their voices heard as Congress begins work on an emergency supplemental appropriations bill to be voted on in the coming weeks. You can do your part to protect our children from increased class sizes, reduced school hours and days, and eliminated programs and services by following these four simple steps.
Step 1: Call 1-866-608-6355 to contact your members of Congress.
Please continue reading to help support our nation's educators.
Catherine and Count Basie Middle School 72 is offering a financial training series for all parents! Learn how to become your own financial planner, the different types of investments as well as improving your credit! Come join the following companies and experts while they give financial advice for the future.
ING Direct and ING Sharebuilders
Registration is required.
Please Click Here to review the flyer and learn more about these empowering events sponsored by MS 72 in Queens, NY!
Another week has gone by, ushering in the month of March! We at CSEE are busy with exciting new projects, such as ongoing professional development, school climate assessment projects, and the planning of our 13th Annual Summer Institute. Here are some interesting links we've been passing around the office:
As before, I encourage you to share your knowledge and wisdom — leave a comment, start a dialogue, and ask questions. If you are so inclined, you might want to join CSEE's Facebook Pages and Twitter feeds. Until next week!