The high school tech department of RSU 22, located along the Penobscot River near Bangor, Maine, offers traditional programming, such as woodworking and shop, as well as a bringing variety of engineering tech tools and an extremely well-equipped makerspace secured through grant funds. However, through a series of community partnerships and funding opportunities, it was able to launch its Higher Vision Drone Program.

“One of the things that appealed to me is that we already have nine community partners, which represent a range of businesses and organizations,” says Jennifer Nickerson, the district’s Director of Curriculum, who saw an opportunity to add drones to its career pathways. “A little local blueberry farmer in one of our four towns uses the drone to inspect her crops and plan what she needs to do for work that day. The Maine Forest Service visited, sharing stories about their advanced, expensive drones. But they use the same skills our kids are learning to use the drones to find missing people or protect forests and Maine’s natural beauty.”

ESSER funds enabled the school to create an esports lab, tech which served perfectly to accommodate the drone program’s flight simulators. Nickerson worked with Charlie Huff, a technology teacher at Hampden Academy and the department head, Todd Moore, to implement the Higher Vision Drone Program. Title II funds secured out-of-state training for the pair to get certified to teach the young prospective pilots.

“Each certified instructor can have eight kids fly under their license,” says Nickerson. “The first year, they co-taught the intro class together with 16 kids in the program for the fall semester. Of the 16, 14 continued on to take the Commercial Drone course for the spring semester. We have 11 students scheduled for their FAA Part 107 tests, with two passing this week.”

And from there, the program has taken flight.

“Now other students are seeing all this hard work pay off and next year's course enrollments have jumped up,” says Nickerson. “To be fair, some of it is probably because when you are sitting on the second floor in your English class and you see a drone fly by outside, it’s pretty good advertisement."

For this and other efforts, Nickerson was recently honored with a Tech & Learning Innovative Leader Award. She shares her “Higher Vision Drone Program” implementation successes and tips for those interested in creating a similar program in their district.

Enrollment, Enlistment, Employment

RSU 22 dates back to 1803, and Nickerson’s family has long been a part of it.

“We like to say, ‘We’re rooted in tradition, but focused on the future,’” says Nickerson. “My kiddos are fifth-generation Broncos, I joke that I bleed purple. The success of RSU 22 is really personal to me and my family and to the four towns in our district. One of which is more affluent than the other three, which can cause issues with programming. However, it was also an inspiration to seek out the Teach with Tech grant from the Maine DOE, which includes a requirement to support underserved students.”

Nickerson saw it as a real way to level opportunities within her district.

”We have tons of AP classes in our high school, Hampden Academy, and we add to them every year,” she says. “But we wanted exciting opportunities for kids who don't fit in that AP niche. I went to a conference which leaned heavily on the concept of three paths for kids, all being equally valuable. Enrollment, enlistment, employment — we need to honor those kids by supporting them with a clear path to success. This was a great motivation to create our drone program.

One very exciting opportunity has presented itself from Cianbro, a nationwide construction company.

“They learned about our program and told me, ‘If you get kids to take and pass the FAA Part 107 test to earn their drone license, we will hire them the day of graduation,’” says Nickerson. “We want those opportunities for our students, because not everyone is going to go to college.”

The Importance of Community Partnerships

A distinctive feature of Hampden Academy’s drone program is its collaboration with nine community partners who share their expertise directly with students. These partnerships include:

• Hampden Public Safety: Demonstrating emergency response applications and public safety uses for drone technology.
• Cianbro: Showcasing industrial applications in construction and infrastructure development.
• News Center 2: Illustrating journalistic and media applications of drone photography and videography.
• Haley Ward Civil Engineering: Providing insights on surveying, mapping, and engineering applications.
• American Forestry Management: Highlighting environmental monitoring and forestry management techniques.
• Matt Thomas Media Productions: Sharing expertise in commercial drone photography and cinematography.
• Allan Gordon Jr Surveying: Demonstrating precision mapping and land surveying applications.
• United States Military: Offering perspectives on drone operations and career opportunities in defense.
• Maine Forest Service: Showcasing thermal imaging and precision aerial surveillance in public safety and natural resource management.

These partnerships provide students with real-world context for their learning and exposure to potential career pathways within their own communities.

“You can't just do it alone,” says Nickerson. “When your community gets behind you to share their expertise and open kids’ eyes to possibility, that culture can be one of your greatest resources even in small, rural, less affluent parts of the world. That’s one way this drone program will be sustainable for the future.”

Ultimately, Nickerson’s goal is just to do the right things for her students by securing the best tools for success.

“No one wants to build a house with a hammer that doesn't have a handle,” Nickerson says. “We need to have the best tools to do the best by our kids. Fortunately, this district has always put technology at the top of their priorities. We have a really supportive superintendent and assistant superintendent who believe in thinking outside the box. It’s just really great, because we need to prepare them. They are going to leave us one day, so we need to help them learn how to fly.”

4 Tips When Starting a New Tech Initiative

Nickerson offers advice to others who might be interested in launching a similar initiative:

• Don’t let lack of funds stop you. Think outside of the box and be creative and you will find the support.
• When securing grants, read the fine print. Some funds require specific choices in tech, such as drones that need to be made in the USA.
• Find your North Star and stay true to it. Think about what is most valuable to you and persevere. Don’t let setbacks stop you.
• Lean on your community. Resources don't have to be financial, expertise is invaluable.

Tools They Use

• Parrot ANAFI Drones
• Claude
• MagicSchool
• Google Suite
• Kibo Robots (Kinderlab)
• zSpace
• edWeb
• Chalk
• Smore
• SWIS/PBIS Apps
• Canva

If districts want to strengthen trust, improve engagement, and protect their reputation, communication strategy can’t start in the central office — it has to start in the classroom.

In district communications, it’s tempting to focus on what the central office sends: board updates, emergency alerts, strategic initiatives, press releases, policy changes. These messages matter. They shape public perception and provide essential information to families and staff.

But ask most parents how they actually experience their school district, and the answer is far simpler: through their child’s teacher.

For many families, their perception of a district begins and ends with classroom communication. They may never speak with the superintendent or interact with district administrators. Trust is built — or eroded — through the daily interactions between teachers and families.

Start With the Base Layer

Communications leaders across the country consistently describe the same challenge: keeping a pulse on what’s happening across schools. Major events are easy to track, such as athletic championships, large theatre or concert performances, board recognitions, and grant awards. But the daily classroom wins that quietly build trust are harder to surface–and those small moments matter!

When teachers regularly share classroom successes such as a creative writing project, a science experiment, a milestone achievement, or even a joyful themed dress-up day, they create consistency, demonstrate transparency, and reinforce partnership. Over time, those seemingly small updates build a reservoir of trust that becomes critical when more serious or complex conversations arise.

From a communications perspective, these moments also provide the most authentic storytelling opportunities. These reflect culture in action and humanize the district in ways that top-down announcements cannot.

Seeing What Families See

One of the most promising developments in district communication tools has been the ability to virtually “walk the halls.” With a tool such as ClassDojo for Districts, I have a real-time view of classroom activity across our schools—without requiring additional reports, extra submissions, or new workflows for teachers.

I can see all those little moments as they unfold. I’ve watched a student-written novel project take shape chapter by chapter. I’ve seen transitional kindergarteners celebrate the 101st day of school dressed as Dalmatians. I’ve spotted creative science experiments, collaborative art displays, and the everyday interactions that define the heart of a school community.

Instead of waiting for a principal to forward a story idea, I can see classroom learning and engagement in real time. Instead of missing a joyful milestone quietly happening in one grade level, I can elevate it while enthusiasm is high. Instead of relying solely on formal submissions, I gain organic insight into the daily experiences shaping our district’s culture.

For a geographically large district like ours, that virtual presence is especially powerful. I can stay connected to multiple campuses without physically traveling between them. The result is more timely storytelling, stronger relationships with our school sites, and a greater sense of cohesion across the district—because we’re not just sharing the big wins. We’re celebrating the small moments that truly matter.

Balancing the Narrative

Another overlooked benefit of classroom-level visibility is equity in storytelling.

High schools naturally generate attention through athletics, performances, and large-scale events. Elementary classrooms often have fewer headline-making moments, even though extraordinary learning happens there every day. Without intentional effort, district communications can unintentionally skew toward the most visible campuses and programs.

A districtwide classroom feed allows communications leaders to intentionally balance representation, across grade levels, across schools, and across student groups. It ensures that the joy of a transitional kindergarten celebration receives as much attention as a varsity championship.

From Duplication to Alignment

Many districts face communication fatigue, not because they communicate too much, but because they communicate across too many disconnected platforms–teachers use one tool, the district uses another, and emergency alerts are on yet another. Freestanding websites and social media just add more layers. Families are asked to download multiple apps and monitor multiple streams of information.

When district announcements are aligned with platforms families already check daily, engagement improves naturally. Leaders report stronger read rates and more immediate responses when communications build on existing habits rather than trying to create new ones.

Trust in a Complex Media Landscape

Today’s communications environment is increasingly complex. Social media policies continue to evolve, privacy expectations are heightened, and misinformation can spread quickly in public forums.

Closed-loop communication environments offer a compelling alternative for everyday updates. Families experience a familiar, feed-based interface, but one that is limited to their school community. Teachers benefit from appropriate oversight and documented communication histories. District leaders gain visibility without intrusion.

The goal becomes smarter communication, rooted in relationships that already exist.

Bottom-Up Strategy Is Sustainable Strategy

For communications leaders rethinking their approach, the most important shift may be philosophical. Instead of beginning with the question, “What should the district office send this week?” consider asking, “How are families already receiving communication every day?

”Strengthen that foundation first: support teacher-family communication; increase visibility into classroom moments; and use those authentic stories to inform broader district messaging. Then layer strategic announcements on top of that established trust.

When communication starts in the classroom and scales outward, it feels cohesive rather than imposed and relational rather than transactional. And in K–12 education, in which trust shapes everything from engagement to attendance to community support, that distinction matters.

District communication is most powerful when it reflects what families already see and experience daily. Sometimes, the most strategic move a central office can make is simply to walk the halls.

As educators, we frequently encounter challenging situations, often involving aggressive or defensive responses that feel like a verbal assault.

I learned this firsthand as a new administrator when a student was seated in the office for detention and another child walked up, knocked on the window, and made fun of him. I redirected the heckler, and later that night I was stunned at what happened: the parent of the heckler wrote a letter to the superintendent, complaining that I had verbally assaulted his son and demanded I be fired; I was clearly unfit to work with children.

After thousands of encounters with difficult people, I developed microstrategies, which are quick, practical, and immediately impactful solutions that educators and leaders can use to manage daily interactions and challenges, saving time and keeping the focus on students.

The ability to adapt and successfully navigate hostile people demands recognizing how to manage and understand them. The key is to never match a difficult person’s aggressiveness, no matter how wrong they are, or how defensive you feel. Instead, always keep a steady eye on objectivity.

Understanding and Countering Blame Displacement

Blame displacement happens when people deflect responsibility for problems or failures onto others, resulting in avoidance rather than accountability. This deflection often stems from ego, which Ryan Holiday characterizes in Ego Is the Enemy, as a deep-seated desire to protect self-image and avoid the discomfort of perceived shortcomings. This ego-driven defensiveness manifests as subtle manipulations to offload responsibilities and maintain a perception of blamelessness and accusations.

To counter this, educators should deploy methods such as Todd Whitaker's approach on Shifting the Monkey. Effective leaders must consistently and respectfully deflect "monkeys" (responsibilities, problems, and complaints) back to their rightful owners to protect good employees and kids, and maintain an organization’s focus on student success.

For example, when a parent attempts to displace blame for their child's struggles on educators trying to help, strategic responses to recognize this transfer allows us to skillfully return the monkey back to where it belongs, through skillful redirection. A strategic redirection might be: “I've provided the resources and guidance and now I'd like to hear what strategies you believe would be most effective in helping your child meet these goals.”

Displacing blame perpetuates confusion and misunderstanding for children and that’s when kids lose. School leaders have to manage the monkeys, so students don't have to and win.

The 90/10 Rule

While educators experience disproportionate and aggressive responses, it's important to maintain perspective. Most families I encounter have a trusting and reasonable response to our management system for student conduct and development, which I refer to as the 90/10 Rule (or "rule of nines"): 90% of people are decent, understanding, and reasonable in our shared encounters, yet the difficult and exasperating 10% approach concerns with aggression, defensiveness, and insult and and occupy an inordinate majority of time and resources.

This small, significant minority makes themselves well known, having made the cashier at Target cry, insulted the security officer, etc. While challenging and even hostile, they are often doing the best that they can. We must implement strategies to manage our responses to them, not to avoid them.

Strategy Shifting and Taking the Higher Ground

Effectively countering blame displacement requires both a procedural approach to shift ownership and a conscious, objective alternative redirection to the ego-driven narrative fueling it. We must always take the higher ground, keeping in mind our most important role: how we are helping their child develop and thrive, serving as a role model for our students and them.

When a difficult person attacks, accountability is confronted by recentering the dialogue and reminding them that civility comes first for the sake of the child. A powerful redirection I use is: “I will never speak to you or your child like that and I expect the same in return.” This often shocks parents back into reality.

Clearly communicate expectations, focus on collaborative problem-solving that includes the difficult person’s role, and consistently reinforce that while the school plays a vital part, the parent's collaboration is crucial in student success. By refusing to accept displaced blame, educators protect their time and energy, allowing them to focus on supporting students in ways that are truly within our professional landscape.

The parent who demanded I be fired long ago eventually came to me (three years later), thanking me for my patience and understanding. He acknowledged his own shortcomings, realizing that I was not "after" his son, as he instinctively assumed. This was a strangely liberating and unexpected turnaround.

While most blame-displacers will not come around as he did, some will and that is the promise I offer. It has remained my true reward, because a child can see the other side, not a combative educator validating their parent’s irrational reaction, but a civil even-handed approach to their success.

There is no better place to apply the proverb “It takes a village” than in education, yet many school districts often work in silos, missing out on the wealth of knowledge in their communities.

Springfield Public Schools, the largest school district in Missouri, is changing that mindset with two innovative programs—the "Unity Tea" and "Principal for a Day"—to build lasting relationships with their community.

Under the passionate leadership of Superintendent Dr. Grenita Lathan, these initiatives have not only garnered local praise but have also earned national recognition. The district serves 24,000 students across 55 sites in the state.

Lathan and Jessica Blake, Coordinator of Community Relations at Springfield Public Schools, presented these initiatives at the recent LeaderHERship Network Summit.

The Unity Tea: Mentoring the Next Generation of Female Leaders

The "Unity Tea," now in its third year, is an annual event designed to foster mentorship for young women in the district. It was the brainchild of Lathan, who had a similar program in a previous district. The event connects successful women leaders from the community with 100 high school students for an afternoon of conversations and connections.

“Dr. Lathan is passionate about engagement with our community and empowering students to be their best,” said Blake. “She wanted to create an event that fosters mentorship for young ladies throughout the district.”

The selection process for both students and mentors is meticulous. Students are identified by school champions based on their potential to benefit from such an experience. As Blake explained, the goal is to reach young women who have "never been able to experience something like this before and who could use additional connections to strong leaders in our community."

On the other side, community leaders are carefully chosen to ensure a diverse representation of industries, including banking, law, non-profit, and civic engagement.

“The district curates a list of strong business leaders who are active in the community and are interested in becoming mentors for students,” Blake said.

The invitation comes directly from Lathan, a "dynamo" who Blake says makes people "jump on the opportunity really quickly" because they are excited to "build up our next generation of female leaders."

The district partners with local organizations to support the Unity Tea. One of their community partners, Care to Learn–an organization that supports our district with health, hunger, and hygiene–donates a $100 gift card to each student to purchase new clothes for the event. “We want them to feel confident and comfortable when coming into a room with business leaders and their peers,” said Blake.

The success stories are a testament to the program's impact. One standout example involves a young entrepreneur who makes cake pops and chocolate-covered strawberries. She was seated with the CEO of a credit union who was so impressed by the student's confidence and business acumen that she hired her to cater the credit union's annual banquet. The student's business cards were displayed, and her work was praised for its "amazing" presentation and professionalism. This story, Blake noted, is a perfect example of “the power of just building women up and letting them showcase the work that they're doing."

For other districts hoping to replicate this success, Blake advised starting with an internal committee of women leaders who can brainstorm and tailor a program to their specific community's needs. She also highlighted the importance of collaboration, noting that sponsors such as Care to Learn and Launch Virtual Learning, who supplies journals for attendees, create a special experience for the participants.

Principal for a Day: A Look Inside the School System

The "Principal for a Day" program is another cornerstone of SPS's community engagement strategy. Its purpose is to open the doors of schools to local business and civic leaders, allowing them to experience a day in the life of a school principal.

“Dr. Lathan really believes in engaging the community and giving people the opportunity to see the great work that we're doing and see the amazing things that are happening across our school district,” said Blake.

The program is structured to be accessible to busy professionals. Participants commit to just a half-day, from 9:00 a.m. to 1:00 p.m. The experience includes a two-hour shadowing session at a school, followed by a luncheon and debriefing with a panel discussion.

“We work closely with the local Chamber of Commerce to recruit a diverse group of participants,” Blake noted. “Dr. Lathan sends out personal invitations that provide all the details. Interested participants fill out a registration form”

The program has drawn high-profile participants, including both the outgoing and new mayors, a county commissioner, and several city council members. Blake shared a story about a councilwoman who formed such a strong bond with a student that she now volunteers as a mentor at that school.

Since its pilot in 2023, the program has grown exponentially. It's now held twice a year, and there is already a waitlist for the next event, which is set for February 2026. Part of the program's success can be attributed to the enthusiastic social media engagement from participants. As Blake explained, they often post live updates or post-event reflections, bragging about the "amazing things" they witnessed. This organic promotion has led to a ripple effect, with others in the community reaching out to inquire about how they can participate.

For other districts interested in starting a similar program, Blake stressed the importance of over-communication with principals and staff. While some administrators may be hesitant to have an outsider in their building, clear guidelines and the flexibility to personalize the day's agenda make the process smoother. The district provides a suggested agenda, including a tour and highlighting a specific program, but allows principals to "make it their own," Blake said.

The program also received national recognition by the National School Public Relations Association, who awarded it with their prestigious Gold Medallion Award.

The Future of Community Engagement

Both the Unity Tea and Principal for a Day are funded through SPS's community relations fund, which supports engagement events. The success of these programs, however, goes far beyond financial metrics. They have created tangible, meaningful connections that benefit students and strengthen the community as a whole.

“We’re really proud of the work that we've done around this and it's been a neat way for us to open our doors for our community to see our leadership teams doing good things,” Blake said.

These initiatives are a clear example of how schools can be active, visible hubs of their communities. By intentionally building relationships with local leaders and empowering students, Springfield Public Schools is not just educating the next generation—it's building a stronger, more connected community for everyone.

Being a school leader comes with challenges. As I reflect on a 20+ year school leadership journey, the level of trust in leadership has decreased. Many reasons are responsible for this, and I won’t delve into the political polarization or social media impact.

Instead, I offer a refreshing glimpse into practical ways learned through research and experience to rebuild and solidify trust. The reasons for pursuing this are many, most importantly, the reality that when children learn in a trusting environment, they shine.

And trust starts at the top.

Building Trust From The Top

Effective school leadership, particularly by principals, is closely linked to student achievement, and trust positively influences student achievement. This relationship may seem obvious but where trust has been tested, we must remind ourselves to work on, rebuild, and sustain it. Trust is part of a set of soft skills that continuously surface as significant, even when we are too busy to put in the time as we face the onslaught of other challenges in our schools.

Trust is built through competence, reliability, honesty, transparency, openness, and awareness of vulnerability. So where do we begin in an untrusting, conspiracy-theory world? The most fundamental methods involve analog approaches. Consider: have you ever been wrapped up in an email war, a vicious cycle of back-and-forth antagonism and insults? I am betting you have, and this is my leadership strategy . . . .

I received an email from a concerned parent about an alleged case of lice. You can imagine the misinformation running rampant online. He was genuinely concerned and asking for information, but I couldn’t reveal specifics due to FERPA protections of minors, and my reply conveyed this. He responded with the fear that I wasn’t being transparent and covering up something. I hadn’t interacted with him before and this reaction, even today, surprises me.

Leaders frequently make the mistake of doubling down at this stage, or worse, ignoring the request altogether. This perpetuates mistrust more than anything. Instead, I called him, something that often surprises parents–a fundamental problem in itself. Too often leaders hide behind keyboards, thinking the buffer will protect us when, in fact, it makes things worse.

I’ve written about the online disinhibition effect: the tendency to dehumanize a person on the other side of digital communication. This is how bad online behavior metastasizes, like cancer. The most effective cure is to get the person offline. On the phone, he got to hear my voice, the sound of sincerity and reason. This works 90% of the time–not a bad batting average!

Understand that I wasn’t just calling him; I was calling the 10 parents he followed up with, and the ones they subsequently connected with, echoing even further. The conversation flipped from distrust to respect. I’m not looking for admiration, unless it helps kids win, and kids win when trust happens.

Consequently, this issue was over in one phone call–not a single additional parent followed up, and the social media echo chamber died. You’ve seen the reverse: people go haywire, a hyperactive hive mind starts with a bad seed and snowballs into chaos. Ignore it, as many do, and you’ll regret it. So stop these disproportionate reactions before any take root -- this is the leader's choice.

Toe Dipping: Risk or Reward?

Having the advantage of being in hundreds of schools for various reasons over my career, I’ve learned that each has its own unique persona. You feel it when entering the building, and that’s what makes each school community so special.

Yet one consistent theme across schools are the whispers you hear at the corner of a hallway, or side entrance of the school. Whispers can be good, helpful, and even offer free advertising. Or they can fester and magnify inaccurate details. That’s because absent facts, it is human nature to fill in the gaps, and the brain has a tendency to do so with negative and often gross inaccuracies.

Our choice as school leaders is to reconstruct these whispers. We can’t stop them, nor should we. Instead, we should enter into them in subtle, strategic ways. We should toe dip and share valuable, real information at a time and place where needed. Toe dipping is simply an injection of authentic facts that migrate into the school mindset.

Remember, if you don’t tell the school’s story, someone else will and you don’t want their version.

On the topic of risk with these conversations, it is important to share what you can, do so with candor and thought, and limit what you can’t with frank audacity. Your informal school leaders will respect this approach.

Greasing the Wheels

Change is hard for anyone, and many teachers are type-A personalities, effective at organization and structure, not so much at facing disruptions, such as cutbacks when realigning staff. It can be a dramatic shift.

Proactively sharing ideas with your faculty about ways to adapt, or “greasing the wheels,” helps the change process. You can gain a sense of willingness, and at the same time, toe dip, letting others know what challenges you face, all while monitoring the vibe.

By doing this, you gain ideas from others that you may not have considered. Greasing the wheels with informal powers in your school also makes you willing to hear and adjust. Even if the change isn’t exactly what they had hoped for, there is little that is as powerful as people feeling heard.

Form Feedback: 90% Agreed

Schools take years to undo distrustful us-against-them mantras. For example, in a prior school leadership assignment, I faced a union-heavy environment. This was a difficult transition for me at first. I am not the school leader who points to a contract; I focus on humane leadership decisions, such as letting someone leave 15 minutes early to get to their sick child, without making them give up needed sick time.

In this school, I was asked to add a holiday performance assembly to an already busy instructional schedule. I let the faculty decide, having them complete a survey, and 90% endorsed having the assembly, so we scheduled it.

Later, a union-minded teacher came to me saying that she never would have guessed that so many wanted this assembly, absent the survey. The monkey was off my back! Too many leaders make decisions such as this one without checking with stakeholders. When you do, you can point to the results of the silent majority in a safe harbor.

Trust in leadership is increasingly fragile. School leaders must prioritize rebuilding and maintaining trust to provide a positive learning environment. By engaging in open communication, embracing vulnerability, and actively involving stakeholders in decision-making, leaders can transform whispers of doubt into a chorus of trustful support.

• 6 Ways For School Leaders to Address “Whispers”
• School Leadership: How to Make Lemonade

Since generative AI is still a relatively new technology, when schools start using it, there can be internal debate and, sometimes, questions from parents.

Explaining AI use in schools to parents doesn’t have to be difficult, says Alana Winnick, Educational Technology Director at Pocantico Hills Central School District in New York and author of The Generative Age: Artificial Intelligence and the Future of Education.

Winnick, a Tech & Learning Innovative Award Winner, shares some guiding questions and advice for approaching AI in the classroom that have worked in her experience, though she stresses that every educational setting is different and teachers and school leaders tend to already know what’s best in their classrooms and schools.

Decide Whether AI Use Needs To Be Addressed With Parents?

The first step in discussing AI use in schools with parents is deciding whether or not that discussion even needs to happen, Winnick says.

Winnick asks rhetorically if teachers generally tell parents about every time they use a different technology tool. Since the answer is no, her follow-up question is: “Would you tell parents that you were using a calculator? So then would you have to disclose that you're using AI?”

In some settings, educators may want to explain AI tools being used in the classroom to parents, but it’s not always necessary, especially since a school with good vetting procedures for tech tools will already be taking student safety and privacy into account when approving any tech tool.

Educate Students and Their Parents By Teaching AI Literacy

Winnick has not heard of any parents worried about AI use in her district, but if such concerns do come up, she says the key to answering questions that might arise is to thoroughly educate students about their interactions with AI.

“It's about educating the students on AI literacy, so that way, if the parent asks them, 'Why are you doing that?' or 'Why are you using that?' the child can very confidently and eloquently say, ‘Oh, this is a tool, I use to help me with my writing; let me show you. I put my writing and I get feedback,' and the child understands it because we educated them," she says. "Then hopefully, that child will alleviate any of those fears or concerns with their parents. So the answer to most questions all comes back to education and educating the students and the teachers, and the parents.”

Always Answer Questions That Arise

Sometimes educating a student on AI literacy isn’t enough, and parents have questions about the technology and how its being used with their children.

“If a parent does come to a teacher or to the principal or the district and expresses concern, as with anything else, whether it's technology or something else, it's always important to address parents concerns,” Winnick says.

In this case, she notes that one strategy might be to remind parents that they and their children are likely interacting with a form of AI already. “At home, a lot of kids have Siri or Alexa right, and they’ll ask Siri or Alexa questions, so what's the difference if they're in class?” Winnick says.

Remind Parents of The Power of AI As A Tutor

Of course, another way you can explain AI use at schools to parents is by explaining the potential power of the technology as a tutor.

“In a public school, we are unable to provide every child with a one-on-one tutor-- it’s not possible,” Winnick says. “But with AI at least they can get all their questions answered. The AI can provide more challenging questions, or if they don't understand, it can break it down, and start providing more support than any other teacher would ever be able to do on their own. And it's also taking the data from that chatbot and providing it to the teacher, so the teacher knows who was struggling, or not struggling.”

AI can also personalize answers it uses to connect with student interests. For instance, if a student likes baseball, the AI might be able to frame an explanation using an analogy to that sport, Winnick says.

Share AI Success

For Winnick, AI’s efficacy in the classroom isn’t hypothetical; she’s witnessed it help many students.

​​”It's transformational for my English as a new language students,” she says.

Winnick adds that while AI tools that work with middle and high school students are often the focus, she says AI can work wonders with younger students as well.

“As a former early childhood educator, I spent my last year in a kindergarten classroom; those kids have so many questions, and a teacher does not have infinite patience to deal with the thousand questions they are getting all the time, but AI does," she says. "So when that child is super curious, you don’t want to burst that creativity; you really want to enable that. With AI, they can ask as many questions as they want.”

• 10 Free AI Trainings and Certifications for Educators
• GPT-4.5: What Educators Need To Know About The New ChatGPT Model

Lessons from a Social Media Experiment

In an era during which online interactions often devolve into toxic exchanges, a recent social media experiment I tested offers a glimpse of hope for civil discourse.

Inspired by the desire to test the waters of online debate, I posted a hot topic on my social media feed, curious to see how my friends and family—who hold diverse views—would respond.

The Experiment

The post was simple, yet pointed: "I believe in science, not in those untethered to the truth."

This triggered a variety of responses, from affirmations on the importance of facts over feelings to humorous remarks about university rivalries. Notably, the conversation remained respectful and constructive, showcasing a hopeful beacon of online civility.

Reactions, Reflections, and Connections

Some participants emphasized the importance of facts guiding feelings, while others expressed frustration with misinformation maintaining a focus on facts. The dialogue highlighted that even in disagreement, respect persevered.

One comment that stood was "MATH DOESN'T LIE," underscoring the reliability of numbers in personal and professional contexts. This sentiment resonated with many, reinforcing the value of objective truth. One respondent amplified this by suggesting math is factual, science is not. Disagreements remained kind and thoughtful.

Ultimately, this experiment connects to my broader educational goals. Schools and our communities can teach us to think critically and to engage respectfully. Encouraging civil discourse matters when developing informed citizens capable of navigating contestable issues. As one commenter noted, everyone has the right to think independently, and discussions should aim to understand rather than change minds. As my daughter says, “FACTS!”

This social media experiment offered a refreshing perspective into the window of online disagreements. In contrast with the caustic approach of keyboard warriors, this group showed maturity, intelligence and respect. Rather than devolving into primal fight, flight or run reactions, they approached the subject with openness and respect.

The Educational Benefits: Critical Thinking, Empathy, and More

Several studies and discussions suggest civility in online interactions can foster environments conducive to learning and intellectual growth. Consider how literally critical this is in schools, where we want our community to thrive through learning.

The effect is profound: individuals can engage more effectively in discourse on important topics, such as moral and political issues, by providing norms for respectful and constructive dialogue. The development of civility as a virtue involves internalizing norms through practice and structured interactions, which can enhance one’s ability to evaluate beliefs and contentious issues critically. I refer to this as disrupting dumbed-down dysfunction.

And there’s more–civil online discussions are considered more informative and persuasive than uncivil ones. In a study examining the effects of synchronicity and civility on perceptions of online political discussions, civil interactions were found to be more credible and engaging. Civil discourse encourages participation and deliberation, which are essential for developing critical thinking skills.

This reveals to me as an educational leader what I could have only hoped for–that online platforms can foster meaningful exchanges, not toxic, destructiveness. It serves as a reminder that our role as educators and school leaders includes promoting critical thinking and empathy, and that this is more significant than ever in the amplified online world.

By embracing these principles, we can transform digital spaces into arenas for thoughtful dialogue and mutual understanding. That, my friend, is hope.

• 7 Things School Leaders Can Do To Promote Digital Citizenship in the Community
• 6 Ways For School Leaders to Address “Whispers”

TalkingPoints is a communication tool that works between school and home. More than that, this is also a multi-lingual translation tool making that communication, across languages, far easier.

The company behind this app has shown research that suggests its use has decreased absenteeism rates by 24% in Tulsa Public Schools. And that's just one positive outcome from its many uses.

The system also was shown to improve math test scores as well as overall academics, with outsized results for underserved students in particular.

This guide aims to explain all you need to know about TalkingPoints to see if it could work in your place of study.

What is TalkingPoints?

TalkingPoints is an app-based system for facilitating communication between schools and homes. This works teacher-to-parent but also scales to district-wide uptake that's well-supported, making it easy to use.

Currently in use by two in three U.S. schools and one in two districts, it's a well-proven success and reaches over five million families and educators across the states.

The tool is focused on family engagement with an AI-assisted translation service that helps make that possible across language barriers.

The provider focuses on data security and safety to ensure it can be used without concern by both parents and teachers alike. It is FERPA-, CSPC-, and AICPA-certified, making it federal and state standards compliant.

How does TalkingPoints work?

TalkingPoints can be setup at teacher, school, or district levels with plenty of controls. Ultimately, it gets teachers and parents or guardians connected on the app. Once this is done, the platform can then be used to communicate directly, within the app.

Thanks to push notifications, this appears like any other messaging app, allowing for near live communication between schools and homes.

Teachers are able to send messages in their native tongue and it will appear on the devices of parents in the language they have set as theirs. So a teacher could send a message in English and it would appear in Spanish, for example. The parent replies in Spanish and the teacher gets it appearing in English. A seamless back and forth that's helped by AI-assisted translation smarts.

What are the best TalkingPoints features?

TalkingPoints offers a really powerful translation feature, which means communications are accurate across any language barriers. The platform translates a massive 150 languages.

While most translations use machine translation, with human support there too, there are a few more niche languages that still use human-translated templates. A school-focused glossary ensures educational context words are used to avoid confusion and make the most sense.

The ease of use makes this a really appealing option as it is just like sending a text message. It's not only easy to have teachers up and running right away, but also for all parents and guardians to engage with the app with very little assistance needed. And with tutorial videos on the company website, uptake can be a simple process, too.

Translation goes beyond messages alone as teachers can now upload videos and parents can select the "help me understand" option to get captions in their own language overlaid.

How much does TalkingPoints cost?

TalkingPoints works on a priced system that must be paid for to have access to the app. These are charged on a school or district level with bespoke pricing that varies to suit the scale of the needs. For this reason, investing at a district scale may work out as a more economically viable option.

TalkingPoints best tips and tricks

Practice in school
Use the app in school between teachers to practice, initially, so as to work out any kinks before it's rolled out to families.

Encourage follow-up
If there is any confusion it's important to encourage a face-to-face meeting, with human translation, so as to avoid any miscommunication digitally.

Broadcast out
Use groups and classes to broadcast messages that reach many families to save teacher time while keeping families in the loop.

• New Teacher Starter Kit
• Best Tools for Teachers

I love writing about my lived experiences as an educational leader because I know that people who face the same circumstances, or will eventually, can learn from it. As school leaders, we often think about the obvious factors that impact a school’s culture: curriculum, instruction, discipline policies, and our school’s mission statement. Yet, there’s another powerful force that flies under the radar: whispers.

These "whispers" come in the form of informal conversations, rumors, and negative talk circulating among school community members. While seemingly small and insignificant, whispers have the loudest echoes that can be harmful to the school environment if we don’t act strategically.

Whispers, much like a virus, spread rapidly and uncontrollably, often mutating and infecting the school with misinformation and misunderstanding. As a principal, I’ve learned that these hushed, quiet comments often hold a disproportionate amount of power and volume, especially if I don’t redirect any.

Managing whispers is critical to disrupting negative energy and shifting to a positive, trusting school culture. Consider addressing whispers in ways that stop full-blown issues while also potentially turning any to your advantage, like I do.

Start here:

1. Addressing Whispers: Promote Transparency and Open Communication

When information is unclear or withheld, people fill in the blanks. This is often when whispers and rumors inaccurately distort. This is human nature. Our brains need to conceptualize reality, which is why a school leader has to deliberately share with transparency.

Regularly updating goals and challenges reduces assumptions. Remember, if you don't tell your story, someone else will, filling in the holes and creating their own version. That whispered version is often wrong and destructive.

For instance, leaders often encounter an unexpected challenge in the school. When it happens, proactively seek feedback and focus on ways to improve the situation while involving stakeholders in the conversation, to ensure everyone is on the same page. Meetings, newsletters, and casual conversations are opportunities to build trust and prevent whispers from gaining disproportionate momentum.

2. Address Issues Early and Directly

One of the fastest ways I combat the ripple effects of harmful whispers is to address concerns head-on. If I catch wind of a rumor spreading, I take it as a signal to engage in direct, honest communication. Acknowledging the issue is always the approach; ignoring it is not. Don’t crawl under a rock, stand on it!

When I notice unease among teachers about a change, I interrupt the rumor mill, organizing informal discussions to address concerns, clarify misunderstandings, and explore possible solutions. When people feel heard and valued, the undermining current fades fast.

3. Model Positive, Productive Dialogue

Whispers often emerge from a place of frustration, confusion, and assumptions. As a school leader, I must model how to channel these feelings into productive conversations. I encourage staff to speak openly about challenges and frustrations in a purposeful manner. When they see their leader maintaining professionalism, even in the face of adversity, it sets the tone for how difficult conversations can be constructively approached.

During interactions big and small, I frame issues in a solution-oriented way. Rather than letting a whisper linger, I invite staff to share best practices, strategies, and new ideas to address common challenges, and I “close the loop” by leveraging these as concrete solutions. This way I usher the conversation toward growth, rather than allowing negative echoes to spread further and louder.

4. Foster a Culture of Trust

When trust is set as a foundation, whispers hold less weight. School community members are less likely to believe or spread rumors. Building trust takes time but is crucial for long-term cultural growth. Open-door policies, regular feedback opportunities, and being visible throughout the school day go a long way in building rapport with stakeholders.

I make it a point to spend time in classrooms, hallways, and the lunchroom, talking with students and teachers. By being accessible and approachable, I reduce the likelihood that concerns are discussed in hushed tones, behind closed doors.

A zone of indifference fits well here: principals who are available and proactively confront rumors can prevent misunderstandings and assumptions from running rampant. This helps staff view leadership as honest, reasonable and legitimate, thus maintaining trust and cooperation.

5. Create Spaces for Constructive Venting

Sometimes, whispers emerge because people simply need to vent. It’s human nature to feel frustrated or dissatisfied, and individuals should feel they have a safe space to express feelings.

Instead of allowing those emotions to build up and create a negative undercurrent, I create opportunities for staff to share feedback in a structured, comfortable way. By providing outlets, you can keep emotions from turning into dangerous, festering whispers.

6. Recognize the Power of Positive Whispers

Whispers don’t always have to be negative. In fact, fostering a culture of positive chatter can lead to significant opportunities for encouragement, success, and community pride. Celebrate wins—whether it’s a teacher’s creative lesson, a student achievement, or a school-wide success. When people are exposed to positive encouragement, they’re more likely to feel valued and pay it forward, creating a ripple effect of positivity throughout the school.

The whispers that echo in a school can either tear it down or build up its culture. This matters. As a school leader, it is my responsibility to ensure whispers don’t resonate as damaging, loud distortions. By promoting transparency, addressing issues directly, fostering trust, and modeling constructive communication, we can guide our school community away from rumor-driven negativity and toward a culture of positive dialogue and growth.

• Why I Ignore Social Media (Mostly): Advice for School Leaders
• How to Quiet the Hyperactive Hive Mind in Schools

Keeping lines of communication open between teachers and families is important. To support that, Lacey Merrifield, Director of Technology at Bosqueville ISD in Texas, created a communication app to achieve transparency in the community. Here we talk about how the app came to be, what it accomplishes, and how it helps mitigate over-communication.

Staying in consistent contact with your child’s teacher can keep you up to date with what’s going on in your child’s class, help you better understand a teacher’s way of teaching, and provide an answer when you need it the most. However, for many schools, keeping connected with what’s going on at a school has been left to the likes of Facebook. Lacey Merrifield thought of a better way to keep families connected with teachers without forcing them to be exposed to social media.

“We’re a really tiny district,” Merrifield says of her 750-student school community. “The main way they were communicating and getting information out was Facebook. At the end of every year we do a parent survey, a staff survey, a student survey, and one of the biggest things on the parent survey was that they had to actually get on social media when a lot of them avoid social media. I’d already wanted to redesign the school website and add communication to it. Our website was really outdated…and adding the app came from parents wanting to be able to avoid getting on social media [to stay connected].”

The Bosqueville ISD app acts as an extension of the updated website, which can also help keep parents connected if they find themselves without their phones or tablets.

For this effort and other work, Merrifield was recently honored with a Tech & Learning Innovative Leader Award for Innovative Director of Technology during a recent Tech & Learning Regional Leadership Summit.

Making Safety a Priority

Parents today now have higher levels of access to teachers through emails and text messages. Pushing that communication through a single platform can help organize the messages that a teacher can receive regularly, and allows for communication without sacrificing privacy and security.

“We don’t want our teachers texting,” Merrifield says. “This is on the app. That way our teachers aren’t giving out their numbers. They don’t have to get a Google number. They can still use their phone, but their privacy is protected. We’re still communicating, but it’s not intruding on personal boundaries.”

What if a teacher does not want the app on their own personal device?

“The cool part about this is that if a teacher doesn’t want to put the app on their phone, they don’t have to,” she says. “It’s a web-based app as well so they can do it all from their school computer.”

This can help to separate the working world from a personal life for teachers who feel the two may blend together too often. Keeping school-related apps and tools strictly on school devices (or separate devices if they are not school-issued) can create peace of mind for a teacher while also allowing for full focus when sending information to families or responding to an inquiry from a parent.

6 Steps To Put Together a Communication App

With the idea and the execution of the communication service running smoothly, it might seem like the Bosqueville ISD app was a walk in the park to make. However, it took strong collaboration with programmers and designers, as well as vocal opinions from the community itself, to help get this innovative moment off the ground.

“The number one thing was getting a needs assessment that came through our staff, student, and parent surveys,” Merrifield says. “Then we collaborated with Edlio, telling them what we wanted from [the service]. We had to test, and there were some glitches. Our Google Sign On didn’t work as it should have, things like that. Then we had launching and training. I think getting those in the right order [is important], because if you launch it and it doesn’t work, nobody wants to go back to it.”

Merrifield shares the step-by-step process that ensured the app achieved the proper goals and met the needs of her school community effectively.

Needs Assessment: “We began by gathering input from stakeholders, including teachers, parents, and students, to identify their communication needs and preferences,” Merrifield says. “This feedback guided our overall vision for the app.”

Collaboration with Edlio: “After defining our goals, we collaborated closely with Edlio's development team. They provided us with insights into the features and functionalities that could be incorporated, ensuring the app would align with our communication strategy.”

Design and Development: “Together with Edlio, we worked on the app's design, focusing on user-friendly navigation and an appealing interface. Edlio's team helped customize the app to reflect our school’s branding and unique needs.”

Testing and Feedback: “Before launching, we conducted thorough testing of the app with a small group of staff who were also parent users to gather feedback on functionality and usability. This step was crucial to identify any issues and make necessary adjustments.”

Launch and Training: “Once the app was finalized, we launched it to the staff first, then the rest of the community. We also provided training sessions for staff and parents to ensure they were comfortable using the app effectively.”

Ongoing Support and Updates: “After the launch, we established a system for ongoing support and periodic updates, ensuring that the app continues to meet the evolving needs of our community.”

The Hidden Ways A Communication App Helps a School

The main focus of the communication app is to keep teachers and families connected, but having that service can also have other benefits that are more uncommon but just as important.

“There are so many apps,” Merrifield says. “When I started here, we had a different company for door access, a different company for cameras, a different company for guest services. We’re also in the process of changing that. That’s been my thing coming in. I’ve tweaked a few things. Our guest services, cameras, and door access are all going to one company now.”

Combining multiple services into one convenient spot can save time, effort, and money. Doing so with the Bosqueville ISD app had a profound effect on other aspects of school life, not only influencing community communication, but also the consolidation of multiple school tools and functions into better managed situations.

• Innovative Leader Award
• Regional Leadership Summit

Ensuring students’ safety and responsibility online must be a priority for schools. While educators often focus on teaching students about digital citizenship and literacy within the classroom, it is important to engage parents and the entire school community. School leaders play a critical role in fostering this.

Digital citizenship reinforces the norms of appropriate, responsible technology use. Etiquette, security, and the ethical use of digital resources serve as the framework to use digital tools safely and effectively. Understanding these concepts is crucial for students' success and safety while engaging in their digital orbit.

Digital and social engagement offers major advantages and at the same time the potential risk for significant negative impacts on children and families. We see this online, everyday. Shifting to the positives of supportive networks and messaging online, rather than admonishing the detrimental impacts, is the road to success for school communities. Educators owe it to families to teach how to interact in constructive online engagement.

First, Understand the Trouble Spots

Recently, I heard a quote: “A lie can travel halfway around the world while the truth is still putting on its shoes.” Some debate exists about where this originated but it appears to be centuries old, and could be a derivative of the Jonathan Swift saying from 1710: “Falsehood flies, and truth comes limping after it.”

My point? All the noise about misinformation online is something that has always existed in other formats. We used to call it propaganda. We likewise have age-old methods for righting the digital citizenship ship in our schools.

A study conducted by Twitter (now X) demonstrated that false news travels six times faster and farther than the truth. Sound familiar? Maybe Swift foresaw, or little has changed. Either way, it reinforces the significance of helping our school communities to foster a constructive approach to good, honest digital citizenship, with some age-old wisdom, as well as develop new techniques to leverage the very technology that disrupts a positive experience for online users.

Social media also creates other landmines, such as the online disinhibition effect, about which I’ve written. When misinformation spreads rapidly online, the school community is affected by the "hyperactive hive mind," a sort of destructive gang mentality which leads to toxic groupthink. This has no place in schools, where children should find sanctuary in learning and development.

7 Things School Leaders Can Do To Promote Digital Citizenship in the Community

1. Disrupt negative interactions such as the hyperactive hive mind by promoting positive online interactions through the benign disinhibition effect. This method cleverly flips the script, by which supportive and monitored online groups can provide healthier engagement alternatives for students. People feel liberated in this safe zone, more comfortable sharing personal information, feelings, and vulnerabilities online than in real life, where they fear judgment and the danger of social ostracism.

People can provide compliments, defend others, and donate to charitable organizations when anonymous online, since they fear being judged by others disagreeing with them less. Kindness, support, and generosity fosters a network of prosocial contexts, and these happen everyday online for digital citizens. Informing families of these safe spaces can be the catalyst for altering online engagement to constructive interactions.

2. Promote critical thinking by questioning the credibility of sources and recognizing misinformation. By providing tools and strategies for identifying reliable content, it fosters a culture of skepticism and inquiry.

3. Emphasize the importance of adults modeling responsible digital citizenship. Children often mimic the behaviors they observe, so it is crucial for parents and educators to demonstrate ethical online conduct.

4. Avoid rabbit holes. “Reply only twice” is a method that encourages us to limit our responses to two online exchanges to foster clarity and efficiency, while preventing prolonged threads of back and forth.

When digital communication with the school community becomes inefficient and unclear, redirect the conversation to direct dialogue, such as a phone call or meeting. This shift allows for real-time clarification and a more personal interaction, reducing the risk of misinterpretation and enhancing understanding. Additionally, this provides the experience so many new generations need, to learn to interact in person, during which empathy and understanding always have the edge.

5. Encourage open conversations at home, and even help structure it. In communications with parents, provide them with conversation starters and strategies for talking to their children about digital citizenship. For example, ask them to discuss the consequences of sharing personal information online or the impact of digital footprints on future opportunities. This open dialogue builds a foundation for mutual trust and accountability. It is also helpful to schedule homework or other family activities around the student to help further family interactions about digital citizenship.

6. Partner with local organizations. Partner with local organizations and law enforcement agencies who specialize in digital safety. These partnerships can provide valuable resources and additional expertise for your school community.

For example, inviting a local cybersecurity expert to speak at a parent night or coordinating with a nearby community center to host a joint event can expand your reach and reinforce your school’s commitment to digital citizenship. This was one of the most profound experiences we had in our school community, because parents got to see firsthand examples of how significant these interchanges can be, for better or worse, and much depends on how the adults steer this.

7. Celebrate good citizenship. When you see students practicing responsible digital citizenship, acknowledge their efforts publicly. Share these stories in your newsletters or on your school’s social media channels. Recognizing these positive behaviors not only reinforces the message but also encourages others to follow suit.

Ultimately, It is essential to ensure that students, parents, and educators understand the significance of responsible and informed use of digital technologies.

By prioritizing digital citizenship and literacy, we can prepare our students, families and school staff to navigate the digital world responsibly and safely. It is a collective effort that requires the involvement of each of these stakeholders. Through open communication, education, and modeling responsible behavior, we can cultivate a school community that values and practices digital citizenship, ensuring a positive and productive digital future for our students.

• Best Free Digital Citizenship Sites, Lessons and Activities
• 9 Digital Etiquette Tips

Having a five-day work week has long been common for many, sharing commonality with schools. Creating a more flexible schedule that offers students time to explore offsite learning opportunities or remote learning from home, however, can lead to a variety of benefits, including giving students and their families the power of flexibility in the educational space.

Dr. Betsy Fowler, Head of Schools at ASU Preparatory Academy in Tempe, Arizona, and recent winner of Tech & Learning Innovative Leader Award for Chief Academic Officer during the recent Denver Regional Summit, discusses her school’s Family Choice Friday, which lets her district “go big.”

“ASU Prep is a large organization in the perspective of we’re more than just full-time schools” says Fowler, adding it offers a full K-12 digital program and a globally developed curriculum. “We have amazing assets to offer our students and families, so being boxed into a traditional five-day week felt so outdated to us. There’s so much we can offer our students that are beyond our walls. So, this past year, we accepted the challenge to create a few sites piloting Family Choice Friday. Now it’s going network wide for our campuses to offer more flexible and fluid learning environments for all of our students.”

What Is Family Choice Friday?

Each Friday, ASU prep students can choose between working from home or spending a half-day program directly on the institution’s campuses engaged in special programming. On-campus sessions include academic interventions, enrichment activities, college-going experiences and coursework support, and special field trips, all designed to complement and augment the standard curriculum.

Students also have a menu of choices of other academic opportunities.

“One example is our partnership with ASU,” says Fowler. “Our kids get to go on Fridays and learn with faculty who are experts in their field. It’s not a formal learning experience. It’s like opening the doors to learning that is possible. But if we were stuck with a regular, five-day, traditional school week, it would be nearly impossible for our students to have the time they needed to be able to have this unique learning experience.”

Being able to work with professional experts can provide life-changing opportunities. It can help students learn more about subjects they find interesting, while also getting real-world experience in how those subjects are being applied to a working environment. With the leeway of having a full day to engage with this level of educational interactivity, students also find they are not restricted with time constraints holding them back.

How Important is the Idea of Choice in Education?

As a student, what you can learn may feel very limited. Oftentimes choice is not a luxury students or parents are granted when it comes to education.

“I think there’s a huge motivation that comes when we give more authority to our learners and their families,” says Fowler. “We still want to be the curators of high expectations. We make ourselves so busy as a society and having enough rest and having those well-being parts of our lives shouldn’t be underrated either. But we’re driving home the point that [students] have the most incredible opportunities to take advantage of something that would not normally be available to you if you were just going to traditional school.”

How can we make sure students see the benefits of Family Choice Friday instead of thinking about it as just another day off?

“We’ve seen that [students] rise to the occasion when we give them the choice to see it for what it is,” says Fowler. “Our hope is that even if they take some opportunities for a little more flexibility, which might mean just accounting for wellbeing, we know that each one of our students at the high school level will take advantage of these sorts of power moments to really invest in themselves with incredible opportunities.”

These types of educational opportunities provide students with invaluable moments early in their lives. Chances to build a resume, to work with professionals, and to discover their life calling. Fowler has recognized how critical this time in a student’s life is, and has found a way to maximize its impact.

Related:

• Innovative Leader Awards
• Building CTE Pathways Between Schools and Local Businesses

Shortly after Tom Burton was hired as superintendent of Princeton City Schools in Ohio, the district hosted a business partnership breakfast. Only 38 people showed up, a number that left Burton embarrassed given the many opportunities for partnerships with businesses in the community. 

“Literally mid-script I stopped and apologized and said, ‘Listen we’ve been doing this wrong for a long time,'” he recalls. “'We’ve been asking the businesses to support us and help, and give us things, instead of that, what do you need?’ So I changed the question and that changed everything.” 

Today the district has more than 500 business partners and qualified graduates are guaranteed interviews with any of them. For leading these and other efforts to connect his district to the larger community, Burton was honored with the Innovative Superintendent Award at a recent Tech & Learning Regional Leadership Summit in Maryland. 

Burton shares tips for fostering deeper connections and productive relationships between students and local businesses. 

Create A Pathway For Success  

Princeton City Schools runs a Work Ethic Certificate program. Students who complete that program are automatically granted interviews for any position they qualify for at any of the 500-plus local businesses with which the district partners. The program prioritizes the skills that are needed in today’s world, including collaboration, flexible thinking, and creativity. 

In addition, students have to be actively involved in the business breakfasts and maintain professionalism in their scholastic careers. “Obviously, they're not getting suspended or not tardy all the time,” Burton says. “Punctuality matters in the world of work, right?”  

To date, the program has helped place more than 500 high school graduates directly into the workforce. 

Focus On Skills Students Need  

Students who are involved in the Work Ethic Certificate program learn basic skills that any employer is seeking in a worker. “People get fired because of their inability to work with others. They get fired because they're not on time. They get fired because they're not creative and innovative and self-starters,” Burton says. “So the new worker needs to be all those things and not be afraid to take calculated risks.” 

Business leaders also value quick learners and flexible thinkers, Burton adds. And that’s all in addition to the specific skills needed for each individual field. 

Keep Assessing  

Despite the district’s successes so far, its work readiness programs continue to evolve. 

The district also has a Work Ethic Advisory committee that consists of students, business leaders, and district staff members. The group regularly meets to evaluate and discuss what the program is doing well and how it can improve. This process includes assessments to make sure the program is meeting its goal of helping kids prepare to enter the workforce with durable and desirable skills. 

Be Open to Different Paths Post High School 

After graduation students can go to college, join the military, or enter the workforce, Burton says. At Princeton City Schools, educators work hard to support students no matter which pathway they choose. 

When Burton presents to other school districts, he says he sometimes sees reluctance from school leaders to talk about students going directly into the workforce. He believes thinking should change and educators need to do whatever they can for students regardless of their intended post-high school career. 

“You have to have an unrelenting dedication to make sure that we're going to get kids on those pathways,” he says. “Know the pathways, know the kids, not only just by name, but their story and their strengths and interests, and make sure you can get them on the right pathway for them to be able to be successful.” 

• Using Virtual Reality for Career Training
• The Future of CTE: What Educators Need to Know

Typically the month of January is dedicated to resolutions for the new year. Many people focus on personal goals, while organizations usually establish budgets aligned with missions and visions. 

In education, January represents the beginning of the end of the school year. During this month and February, we adjust budgets and review data to decide if we need to make different decisions around spending. Notes are taken around items that should be considered at the end of the school year in preparation for improving the next school year. 

Reflecting on the journey public education has endured over these past several years, one could ponder if the field of education is in its January season. Is the profession at the beginning of the end? Perhaps there is a need for a resolution for education. The many synonyms for the word resolution could serve as guidance for this winter season of education. 

Let’s take a look at a few:

Intention - Often, the decisions we make around education are knee-jerk. Even when we plan extensively, the day-to-day process of leading a school or district requires on-the-spot decisions. Developing a habit of intention is more challenging than it would seem. In philosophy, intentionality is “the power of minds and mental states to be about, represent, or stand for, things, properties, and states of affairs.” Every effort should be made to make decisions in education with intentionality. By doing so, we can improve the institution of education and the lives of the staff and students the institution serves. 

Aspiration - Dr. Susan Enfield stated in a recent address to her Washoe School Board that the nation would look to Washoe Schools for what a community in partnership with its public school system can achieve for its children. The district aspires to reach this expectation under the direction of this incredible leader. Superintendents have a thankless position in the community for the most part. Still, business leaders, government leaders, and local community activists should consider the district superintendent a key role in the community and work to help them be successful. A district can soar to the top through partnerships like the ones Dr. Enfield seeks. 

Willpower - The challenging aspect of leading a school or district is the fact you are leading a microcosm of the community that few have perspectives about. Other microcosms are self-selected – for example, churches, grocery stores, and banking are communities of people who decided to join. Schools are created by every family in the community having a child under 18. It takes willpower to lead these microcosms because everyone doesn’t come from similar backgrounds or values, and sometimes families don’t appreciate the differences in the people of a community. Judgment and negativity present themselves. Willpower is essential for a district's teachers, principals, and other education leaders. The amount they need will vary each day, but they will need a healthy dose of it every day. 

Inflexibility - If we’ve learned anything through the pandemic, we’ve learned flexibility. As we return to post-normal in our classrooms, schools, and districts, let’s not throw the baby out with the bathwater. Flexibility is good for students and staff. Allowing everyone to exercise flexibility can be one of the best decisions you make this year. 

Boldness - Recently, Seattle Public Schools filed a lawsuit against social media companies based on social media's impact on children’s mental health. That’s bold! And it is exactly what districts should do for the community of children they serve and protect. If every district assumed this boldness in their respective neighborhoods, where could education be in this country? 

Pluck - Throughout the years, schools and districts have adopted practices that have seen their prime, and these practices need to be plucked. Some should just go away, and others should be replaced with updated and relevant practices that are more efficient and have opportunities for better outcomes. This doesn’t only apply to instructional practices; plenty of organizational practices need plucking. 

If we are entering the winter of education, these resolutions might be just the ticket to rejuvenating for a spring. There is no time like now to turn around education and make it what it is meant to be for every community: a way for children to learn the principles and values of our community and develop the necessary skills to become productive and contributing citizens. This is our goal as educators, and this is our year to shine! 

Happy New Year!

• What Is Measured Learning Measuring?
• Fight or Flight: How to Respond to Educational Leadership Changes

Before the COVID-19 pandemic started, the Bronx was known to be home to some of New York City’s largest digital deserts, neighborhoods where many people do not have internet access at home. 

As the Bronx Community Foundation reports: 

• The Bronx has the lowest broadband adoption rates of any borough and the disparities are even more pronounced at the neighborhood level, with 38% of The Bronx not having access to broadband.
• Nearly 1 in 5 teens cannot finish their homework because of the digital divide.
• Roughly one-third of households with children ages 6-17 and whose annual income falls below $30,000 a year do not have a high-speed Internet connection at home.

These already-significant problems were amplified during the early days of the pandemic. 

“Students couldn't learn from home, people couldn't do remote work,” says Desmon Lewis, co-founder of The Bronx Community Foundation. 

Desmon Lewis and his brother, Derrick Lewis, launched The Bronx Community Foundation in 2017. The siblings grew up in affordable housing in the South Bronx and formed the organization as a way to help support the many nonprofits already doing important work in that community by fostering more collaboration and organization between them. The foundation was designed to be flexible to the community's needs. In the aftermath of the devastating Bronx fire that killed 17 people, the organization set up a page for donations. 

Back in the Spring of 2020, the organization shifted its focus to COVID relief, as the borough was particularly hard hit by the virus with New York City’s highest rates of hospitalizations and deaths. 

“We launched something called the Bronx Community Relief Effort,” Desmon Lewis says. 

Irrigating Digital Deserts  

The Bronx Community Relief Effort’s response to COVID included efforts to help facilitate internet access for more students. “We galvanized a group of about 20 organizations from all areas of the community, education institutions, nonprofits, digital equity organizations, health institutions, libraries,” Lewis says. “The Foundation brought all them together under the umbrella of the Bronx Community Relief Effort. And we started hosting these meetings every Wednesday morning, and we would all get on a call and we would share the challenges that we were facing, and most importantly, try to come up with solutions.” 

These meetings helped community members realize just how significant the challenges posed by digital deserts were and also helped various stakeholders work together to find solutions and provide technology to students who needed it. 

“We've distributed and acquired over 3,000-plus, laptops, Chromebooks and MiFi devices. And then we also paid for internet to keep students learning,” Desmon Lewis says. “We worked with public schools, and local private schools in the Bronx, to really get technology into hands.”

Attendance at the weekly meeting grew from representatives of 20 organizations to representatives from more than 60 organizations and the work the group did and continues to do was formalized into the Bronx Digital Equity Coalition. 

Overcoming the Digital Desert: Next Steps  

Desmon Lewis says that digital deserts in the Bronx are primarily formed by three factors, lack of availability, lack of affordability, and lack of training to use digital devices. 

Many efforts were made by schools throughout the pandemic to address the first two problems and get students without access to internet-ready devices. While those problems persist, going forward a major concern of Lewis is making sure the training element is in place. “Getting students comfortable and having learning about these technologies be a part the standard curriculum, and to teach students the benefits of learning these skills and where that can take them – I think that's still a major gap,” he says.

He adds part of overcoming this digital learning gap will be fostering better connections between institutions of higher education and K-12 schools in the Bronx so that younger students know about the college majors and jobs that are available and the skills they need to develop to pursue those careers. The Bronx Community Foundation has a new president and CEO, Dr. Meisha Ross Porter, former New York City Schools Chancellor. 

“Having led the largest school system in the country,  she brings a wealth of knowledge and experience to the table to help us hone in on the needs of our students,” Lewis says. “So we're extremely excited about what that could bring for the community in 2022.” 

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Everybody has their own ideas about how to respond in a crisis, says K20Connect Senior Consultant Arati Nagaraj, and it’s important for a school board not only to provide forums where community members can air their concerns, but also to listen well. Nagaraj, who has been a Trustee of the Saratoga (CA) Union School District Board since 2010 and has served as Board President for two years, shared from her experience in her session “Community Engagement During a Crisis” at Tech & Learning’s Future-Proofing Your District Plan conference. 

Open communication builds a strong foundation of trust and also enables school board members to engage positively and correct any misperceptions, Nagaraj says. Part of a board’s responsibility is to have the big picture in view while the community sees only a sliver of that picture, but assuming positive intent on everyone’s part is key. “Our priority is the students and their learning, and we all want what’s best for them,” Nagaray said. 

Maintaining constructive and honest channels of communication with the community starts with A, B, C: Acknowledge, Bridge, and Convert. When someone states an opinion, for example, a board member can acknowledge it by using active listening and summarizing: “I heard you say that these old textbooks will never be replaced.” The next step is to bridge, by sharing the facts: “But the fact is, we’re in the midst of looking at options for replacement.” And finally, convert, by helping the person see a different point of view so they will join you on the journey: “Would you like to be part of the working group looking at this issue?” 

Nagaraj suggests five ways to solicit community input. The success of each of these methods depends on assuming positive intent and implementing this A, B, C approach as appropriate.

1. Forums 

Forums can be educational and informative; having a skilled moderator and a set agenda is key. Nagaraj suggests soliciting questions on notecards, which avoids rambling assertion of opinions and helps people to think through and frame their questions. Cards can then be sorted and given to the best person for each answer. Cards can also be kept as a helpful record of community concerns and to inform future district communication.

2. Board office hours

Regular open-door meetings build trust, Nagaraj says, and this approach has been successful in her district. “Community members may be intimidated by speaking at board meetings,” she said. “Constructive dialogue can happen during office hours, and sometimes issues can be solved before they even come up. No decisions are made—it’s a conversation, a time to share thoughts. It’s a very positive method of interaction and building trust.” 

Remember to send reminders including the date, time, location, and names of the board members who will be present. In Nagaraj’s district, these office hours are often on-site at a school. Having someone on hand in case crowd control is needed is a good precaution. 

Saratoga Union School District has developed this protocol to establish clear guidelines and expectations to avoid common pitfalls.

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3. Study groups and committees

During a crisis, these groups will be task-focused, and after the crisis is over, it’s important to evaluate, monitor, and plan—taking what’s been learned into consideration in order to be better prepared going forward.

4. Surveys 

Surveys are a great way of getting lots of information, Nagaraj says. Surveys can be used at different points during a crisis to get a “pulse check” on the community. 

5. Social media

“Social media is both a friend and a foe,” said Nagaraj. It’s imperative for school board members to be vigilant when it comes to social media, and not to engage in discussions. 

“Board members are the eyes and ears in the community, but it’s critical that they let the district be the disseminator of information,” Nagaraj said. When a board member becomes aware of inaccurate information being broadcast on social media, their role is to inform the superintendent so the district can respond properly with the facts. Board members then can share messages from the district—without personal comment.

Evaluation

Don’t overlook the evaluation of your engagement techniques, particularly after a crisis, to make sure you’re prepared as well as you can be for the future. Consider whether all voices are being heard, and if there’s a group that has not been engaged by your methods. 

A lot depends on your local situation, Nagaraj says, and different methods of engagement will work well in different communities and even with different constituencies within a community. Sharing community feedback and input at board meetings helps to ensure transparency and sends the clear message that community input is important and valued. 

“Community engagement is very important but can be very difficult to manage, and I’ve developed a thick skin over my ten years as a school board member,” Nagaraj said. “Respecting the community’s role in the system is absolutely essential to providing the best learning environment possible for our students.”

“My background has traversed from working with our earliest learners to heading innovative coaching teams performing impressive turnarounds at K-12 districts to my current position as Urban Leadership Director preparing the next generation of superintendents,” said Professor Frances Gipson of Claremont University in her presentation during Tech & Learning’s recent “Future-Proofing Your District” virtual conference. “But above all, I am Team Kid. If it helps kids learn, I am all about it. One of the things I have stayed keenly aware of throughout my different roles is that the school is really the heart of the community.” 

So what happens when that very heart of the community faces unprecedented challenges and suddenly skips a beat? Or when newly formed robust learning centers and support systems holding together precarious educator-learner relationships are broken and forced into a new remote reality? 

“This is where we can think beyond the brick and mortar,” said Gipson. “When you think of the concept of community, with the right technical supports, it can really morph into a wraparound offering connectivity, becoming a more dynamic system that can truly support our learners as they become the next group of leaders in our country.” 

Here are five steps for district leaders preparing for community schooling, and what that means moving forward:

1. Move from Existing State to Desired State

When forging a modern learning system, a futuristic leader is not afraid of breaking through the walls of the past. They need to become a change agent and create disruptive learning opportunities, and opt for a catalytic way of reflecting, resourcing, and developing the knowledge, skills, and dispositions for a learning system. Adaptivity and flexibility are at the core mindset for these leaders, and essential for their learners’ mindsets.

One way leaders create inclusive and collaborative spaces is by increasing voice and agency. Agency helps learners to meaningfully change conditions in their lives and community. It provides purposeful initiative. Schools can serve as models of equity to assure that every student will have a positive and empowering learning environment. Both capacity and conviction for “living in the system” and “disturbing the system” are critical to ensure that our communities are at the center of all decisions.

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2. Advocate and Propel Policies with Personalizing Features for the Learning Environment

Future ready education leaders will find ways to provide a personalized learning experience for students at every age. These leaders will do the same for all stakeholders in education, providing customized training and learning opportunities. They’ll also do the same thing for themselves. Using research and promising practices, they will invite curiosity and create rigorous learning environments suited to the authentic interests of students. 

These leaders need to become equity champions. They should take active steps to dismantle the deeply ingrained structure of inequitable schooling, keeping a mind to elements of access and opportunities for acceleration. We must attend to the nuances of learning and leading, and be prepared to be nimble in meeting the needs of today’s learners in a rapidly changing knowledge economy.

3. Connect, Design, and Lead

One can’t underestimate the importance of adaptivity and leading with love when it comes to creating the ideal modern learning system. Complex problems don’t offer simple solutions, so polarity management is key to meeting and adjusting. Connecting with the community in order to design a learning setting for success is crucial. 

With ever-evolving innovations in edtech, our system has become more data rich than ever—a natural edge in designing a personalized modern learning system. Precision and resourcing is more readily available than ever before so we can better differentiate to address the needs of the “whole.” Schools and communities can be informed by voice, as well as by accompanying “big data” systems that merge sources for data-influenced action. Breaking predictable patterns and relying on personalized innovation can keep a “Team Kid” approach with students firmly at the center of the design.

4. Invite Innovation, Curiosity, and Creativity

Lead with instruction, lead with equity—it’s not just about leading with a tool. ISTE Standards, Linda Darling-Hammond’s Deeper Learning, and Quaglia’s Voice and Aspirations Framework offer resources and practices to include in a modern holistic learning system. 

Technology’s role in this change is to equalize the playing field in the classroom, giving every learner the opportunity to access individualized learning. Technology is an accelerator, therefore we must first lead with the best instruction. 

ISTE offers a roadmap for education with standards that are organized to rethink teaching and learning with a strong sense of agency for the learner.

5. Schools as the Heart of the Community

We must be beacons of academic optimism, integrating community-aimed systems of support that include wellness and are trauma-informed. These systems should also offer multitiered accelerations and mastery-learning options, include social-emotional learning for everyone in the nested learning community, and have a goal of economic connectivity for families, caretakers, and community partners. 

The forward-thinking community school serves academic needs, with hubs for both learning and wellness—a model of schooling that address the whole child.  

Frances Marie Gipson is a clinical associate professor of education in the School of Educational Studies at Claremont Graduate University, and also serves as director of the Urban Leadership program. Most recently, Gipson served as the Chief Academic Officer (CAO) for the second-largest school district in the nation, Los Angeles Unified School District (LAUSD). As a leader of leaders, she oversaw the instructional plan and capacity building for more than 600,000 students in preschool through adult school programs – across over 20 departments.

Frances Gipson has amassed a laundry list of roles and impressive positions during her education career, though perhaps most meaningful to her is “Champion for Team Kid.” 

“It’s about putting students at the center and backwards planning from their needs,” says Gipson. “If ever there was a time to really think about those efforts, now is that time. I believe in Love-Soaked Leadership. It’s important to lead with love and be unapologetic about it. One way is to get grounded in our supports around students.”

Why SEL? And when. 

True integration isn’t about focusing on SEL 15 minutes and then moving to 45 minutes of Academic focus, it’s more about unpacking a character’s motivations and inner dialogue during a reading lesson, for example. Work that comes out of CASEL helps us think about best practices and intentionality in bringing SEL into the classroom. 

Here are three important questions teachers and students can ask themselves as they consider their social emotional wellbeing: 

1. Self Awareness— What do you know about yourself? How do you bring this monitoring and enlightenment to who you are in this space? How do you self manage? 
2. Cognitive Coaching— How do we think about responsible decision making? How do we think about relationship skills? 
3. Context of Culture — What’s your social awareness? It’s so important to put this in the context of culture — this looks different in different places, it’s not a one size fits all. Know your environment.

The Polarity of Non-Congnitive and Academic Emphasis

During the recent “Future-Proofing Your District Plan” Tech & Learning conference, Gipson asked attendees to stop and take a deep breath, and then recognize the body’s natural need to exhale. This nature-inspired example of polarity highlighted the “both/and.” Breathing in and breathing out, breathing out and breathing in — it’s not either or, it’s both/and. 

“A polarity is not a problem. Problems are things you can put on a checklist and mark off as you complete it. It requires different ways of thinking— if you are a polarity manager, you manage. If you’re a problem solver, you check it off a list. It’s that difference between technical and adaptive thinking. As you think about stability and change, you can’t say, ‘in this environment I’m not going to attend to students’ Social Emotional needs, just academic needs’— it’s both/and. 

“As leaders traversing Social Emotional Learning, if you want to stand on that balance ball at the gym, you oscillate a little bit back and forth to stay balanced, rather than seesaw,” says Gipson. “Think about the remote environment and restart environment—how might you help folks stay on the balance ball with this work rather than seesaw?”

Framework for Success in Changing Times

CASEL Framework: The CASEL Framework is depicted through a wheel that identifies five competencies (self-awareness, self-management, social awareness, relationship skills, responsible decision-making) across various settings. 

Positive Youth Development (PYD): The five C’s of PYD (competence, confidence, connection, character and caring/compassion) is a research-informed model with specific applications for after-school programs. 

The Deeper Learning and 21st Century Skills Frameworks: Illustrates the cognitive, social and interpersonal skills that help young people success in 21st century jobs and civic life. 

Sanford Harmony: A free curriculum resource, which includes access to Inspire (teacher aimed) and Institute for Philanthropy. Curated resources on Diversity Inclusion, Problem Solving, Empathy and Critical Thinking. It includes two Learning Pathways — Building Teaching Practices and Developing SEL Capacity. 

Another important resource —“From a Nation at Risk to a Nation at Hope” is a landmark report and two-year collaboration using the input of over 200 scientists, psychologists, researchers, educators, youth/parent groups, and policy makers. It demonstrates that social, emotional and academic development are inextricably linked and that investments in Social Emotional programs generate broad social benefits. Positive adult influences must begin early and continue during a child’s entire school career in this effort to educated the “whole learner”.

The Plan Forward

“What shifts or connections are you making?” asks Gipson. “Think about the existing state and the desired state— if we were doing this well, what would it look like and sound like and how would it be resourced? Using that ‘both/and’ polarity mindset, it’s important to recognize that there are good things from your existing state. What do you want to carry over from the existing state and what elements can help in the transformation to the desired state? There are positive things teachers have naturally done, but we haven’t always labeled them. Once we do that, awareness is heightened and we can teach and model it for each other.” 

Gipson suggests focusing on how to likewise support the ‘whole educator’ and to remember that part of your teaching team is also your students and parents. 

“We’re learning in very new ways now. What might it look like to personalize and connect through relationships? If you are going to lead with love-soaked leadership and put students at the center, the folks that teach you most about yourself is your community.”

Relationships between school board members, the superintendent, and staff need to be clearly defined so that during a crisis everyone can do their part to help keep students safe and focus on learning. 

Focusing on three main areas can help school boards to achieve this.

1. Direction 

Setting direction for the district is the essential task of a school board, according to K20Connect Senior Consultant Arati Nagaraj. “It’s the ‘what’ that needs to get done,” said Nagaraj, a Trustee of the Saratoga (CA) Union School District Board since 2010 who has served as board president for two years. She fleshed out the distinct role of board members during her “The Role of the Board and Relationship to Staff During a Crisis” presentation at Tech & Learning’s “Future-Proofing Your District” virtual conference. 

One metaphor that Nagaraj finds helpful is that of a news helicopter: Those on the news helicopter (the board) survey the scene from above and share what they see with the newscasters in the studio. The newscasters (the staff) then sift through all of the information and report on what’s important. 

The board has to keep the bigger picture in view. But that can be impossible if they’re also trying to carry out tasks themselves. “It’s very important for board members who are tempted to do the work themselves to exercise restraint and to leave the ‘how’ to the superintendent and staff,” said Nagaraj. This is where trust comes in.

2. Trust 

Trust is a two-way street and requires listening, honesty, vulnerability, and unconditional positive regard for your colleagues, Nagaraj says. It’s important to listen and respect the challenges others voice in the moment—even if they don’t align with your own priorities. 

“The superintendent has the pulse of what’s important, especially during a crisis, and the board does not,” Nagaraj said. The board therefore needs to trust the superintendent and give him or her the power to make emergency decisions. 

“At the moment of crisis, trusting the superintendent to make informed decisions is the key to everything,” she said. If these decisions can’t be made, nothing can be implemented effectively.

3. Implement

“It’s kind of like a pecking order,” Nagaraj said. “The board sets the direction, the superintendent formulates the plan with the staff to implement the work that needs to get done, and then the superintendent reports back to the board. The worst thing that a board member could do is to direct staff to do something. Not only does this violate trust, but it sends mixed messages and throws off the entire system and process.” Nagaraj also notes that it’s very difficult for a staff member to say no to a board member. 

Words and notes of encouragement from board members to staff, however, are always welcome—and especially during a crisis when staff are often spending more time with students and team members than with their own families.

All of these structures are particularly important during the pandemic when there are so many unknowns and the situation is so fluid, Nagaraj says. “Everybody is building the plane as we’re flying,” she said, and in these anxious moments board members have a responsibility and opportunity to be the leaders and role models who set the tone for the district.

Contact Nagaraj at arati@k20connect.net

The Institute for Emerging Issues (IEI) at NC State University today announced formation of Building a New Digital Economy in NC (BAND-NC), a new support program designed to make the state “first in digital inclusion.” 

BAND-NC, which  launched with initial support from Roanoke Electric Cooperative and the North Carolina’s Electric Cooperatives, in partnership with the NC Broadband Infrastructure Office (BIO), will provide grants to counties to develop plans to increase the percentage of their residents that adopt and are able to use broadband services. BAND-NC seeks to help North Carolina become the first state in the nation where every county has a digital inclusion plan by the end of 2022. 

Digital inclusion plans will include strategies to increase access to devices and make broadband affordable to more people. They also aim to equip a range of stakeholders with knowledge of how to utilize broadband: enabling young learners to do homework online and older learners to retrain online, expanding job possibilities through telework, improving access to telehealth services, expanding business markets, improving crop yields and adding efficiency to farm operations. 

Data from the NC Broadband Infrastructure Office show disparities in adoption of broadband services, with both a rural-urban and an income divide. Rural households subscribe at lower rates than urban households (as low as 49.7% in Graham County and as high as 89.7% in Wake County). Households making under $20,000 a year subscribe at a 51.2% rate compared to 93.8% of those making $75,000 or more a year. 

As part of BAND-NC, the state Broadband Office and IEI will host a series of meetings to assist community leaders in developing and implementing county-level digital inclusion plans. Roanoke Electric’s work will support development of plans in Bertie, Halifax, Hertford, Northampton, Gates, Perquimans and Chowan counties, while North Carolina’s Electric Cooperatives will fund three selected county plans from among its 93-county service area. 

Over the next few months, the Institute for Emerging Issues is seeking other investors in BAND-NC, with the goal of making $5,000 grants available across the state to counties developing digital inclusion plans.  Interested counties would submit plans August 6 for review on a competitive basis, with selected plans receiving grants to begin implementing their initial strategies. 

To see a full listing of North Carolina broadband adoption rates, by county and income level, go to iei.ncsu.edu/band-nc-data/

Edlio has partnered with Livingtree to add a family engagement solution, currently available to Edlio clients, to its suite of tools connecting schools with communities. 

For nearly two decades, Edlio has been focused on making it easy for educators to connect with families through websites and streamlined payment tools. With the addition of Edlio Engage powered by Livingtree, Edlio is a one-stop shop for schools and districts looking to strengthen relationships with their communities. 

As a result of the partnership, Edlio Engage will offer two-way conversations, enabling families to engage with schools. Other features of Edlio Engage include:

• Translation into more than 100 languages
• FES (Family Efficacy Score)
• Direct messages
• Photo, video, and file sharing
• Email and mobile push notifications
• SIS integration
• School engagement reports
• District-wide engagement reports
• District-level visibility and access
• Family engagement and platform tracking

Catalyst, a global community for education leaders, concluded its launch event series across four continents last week, finding that education leaders around the world share similar challenges and concerns about prevalent nonacademic topics that impact student learning. 

Event gatherings were held in Sydney, Johannesburg, London, and Washington, D.C., attracting education leaders from the national, district, and school levels. Since its launch in October, Catalyst has attracted 400 participant members across 18 countries in four continents. 

Regardless of locale, education culture, and school structure, four consistent challenges emerged:

1. Implementing social and emotional learning programs to meet the needs of all students. 
2. Creating a culture of equity and building student agency.
3. Future-proofing technology purchases to support emerging instructional trends, including personalization and differentiation. 
4. Creating immersive learning spaces that improve student learning.

“Action and outcomes, rather than solely knowledge sharing, are at the heart of our Catalyst community,” said professor and researcher Stephen Heppell, cofounder of Catalyst. “We see too often that educators are isolated — in their own states, provinces, or countries. They’re facing largely the same challenges but working independently to solve them. Catalyst provides a home for problem-solvers to work together, developing and sharing effective, pragmatic, and tested solutions.” 

Through in-person meetings and an online hub, Catalyst links education innovators with experts and each other to jointly create, implement, and refine new approaches to tackling some of the most complex challenges in the sector. The next series of Catalyst events will take place in the beginning of 2020 at major conferences worldwide — bett, FETC, TCEA, didacta, and SXSW EDU — where attending educators can easily participate and contribute to the conversation around these pressing education issues. 

Catalyst’s international roster of founding partners includes Jaime Goldstein, Director of Strategic Projects and Innovation Grants, the Harvard Initiative for Learning & Teaching; Nancy Conrad, founder of The Conrad Foundation; professor and researcher Stephen Heppell; education strategist Ken Shelton; SMART Technologies; and Learnit World Limited. 

Education leaders and those interested in driving change in education globally are invited to join the Catalyst community for free at www.educatalyst.com 

Students can make a difference in their communities by joining 6 million other young people trying to change the world for the better. As part of Do Something, they can home in on their interests, use the resources available, and share their expertise to create positive change. 

Brought to you by Knovation, powered by ACT  

“If you talk to a man in a language he understands, that goes to his head. If you talk to him in his language, that goes to his heart.” – Nelson Mandela

Each week I communicate with the parents of my 200+ students in multiple languages and this has made such a profound impact on student outcomes and relationships! In this post I explain how to use the free Google Sheets add-on,  Form Mule,  to send a personalized email to 100s of parents in multiple languages. Check out my guest post for ESL-Library, Digital Ways to Effectively Communicate with Parents in Multiple Languages, to discover more tips and several recommended free tools for ongoing effective parent communication in multiple languages.

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Form Mule For Emails in Multiple Languages

Form Mule is such an incredible Google Sheets email merge add-on that allows you to send personalized emails using a spreadsheet and email template. See my visual below for a general idea of how this works.

It may look complicated, but once you set up Form Mule sending 100s and 1000s of parents (if you have a GSuite Edu account) a personalized email in multiple languages takes minutes! To get started you will need the following:

• a Google account
• a Google Sheet with the following information in columns with headings- students’ first and last names, parents’ first and last names, the parents’ email addresses, and anything else you want to share in your email that would be different for each student, such as comments, class codes, urls, dates, the home language, grade level, and so forth
• the Form Mule add-on installed for free on your Google Sheet
• an email template you want to send to the parents
• optional– the email template in HTML, because Form Mule is HTML friendly so you can add italics, clickable links, and other customizations
• optional– the Google Translate language code to send the email in English and another language. For example, I add “es” to the “Lang:” field to translate my email in Spanish. Click here for other language codes.

The following tutorials are super helpful if you experience any difficulties along the way!

• Click here for the G Suite Marketplace’s gif tutorial and to download.
• Click here for Edtech Creative’s step by step visual tutorial on how to use Forms, Sheets, and Form Mule to send student grade checks.

Tip for sending in multiple languages! Form Mule allows you to send different email templates for each worksheet created in your spreadsheet. To send the email in more than one other language (ex. Spanish, French, and Korean) you can create a worksheet for each language. Then add “ko” or “fr”to the “Lang:” field for that specific worksheet’s email template.

Challenge: Try Form Mule to send parents or students personalized emails or newsletters in multiple languages!

cross posted at teacherrebootcamp.com

Shelly Terrell is a Technology and Computer teacher, education consultant, and author of books including Hacking Digital Learning Strategies: 10 Ways to Launch EdTech Missions in Your Classroom. Read more at teacherrebootcamp.com.

Education crowdfunding nonprofit DonorsChoose.org today announced a new app to help merchants that utilize the CloverⓇ point-of-sale (POS) platform support public schools in their local communities. The Round Up for Schools app, available in the Clover App Market, offers customers the option to round up their purchases and donate the change to nearby schools chosen by the business owner. When customers choose to round up, their change is automatically applied to a classroom project request on DonorsChoose.org. To celebrate the launch, donations made through the Round Up for Schools app will be matched by the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation.

The Clover point-of-sale platform functions as a complete business-management platform enabling merchants to maximize their operating efficiencies and grow, while allowing customers to pay using a debit/credit card, in addition to mobile payment options such as Apple Pay, Google Pay and Samsung Pay. The Clover App Market gives merchants that use Clover the ability to download apps that help them run their business directly onto their Clover devices.

The Round Up for Schools app is the first Clover app that allows merchants to run a POS campaign to support schools in their local communities.

To download the app on a Clover device, select “More Tools” from the main menu, and click the “Round Up for Schools” app in the “New and Noteworthy” section. Once a merchant downloads the app, they will be able to select a nearby school to support when a customer rounds up their purchase. The matching donation from the Gates Foundation will happen automatically, while funds last.

To learn more about the Round Up for Schools app visit http://www.roundupforschools.org.

As part of its Spring Cleaning giveaway, Bloomz, the parent-teacher communication app, is offering $10,000 to the winning school’s parent-teacher association.

The Bloomz parent-teacher communication app consolidates communication, coordination, and classroom management tools in one platform, offering parent-teacher instant messaging and photo-sharing capabilities, calendar and signup forms, behavior tracking, and student portfolios.

To enter, school leaders schedule a call with Bloomz to set up a free 30-day trial of Bloomz Premium—with additional features such as unlimited cloud storage and an engagement dashboard—then get as many of their teachers to use the app as possible during the trial period. 

Every activity, whether it's a message, post, or photo shared in their Bloomz community, counts as another entry in a random drawing. At the end of the contest on August 31, the winner of the drawing will be awarded $10,000 for their PTA or PTO to fund school projects. 

Teachers can also win $500 to use in their classroom. To enter, teachers propose a professional development session at their school (they can use the company’s PD resources) to demonstrate the benefits of Bloomz to their colleagues. Next, they can take pictures and share them on social media with the hashtag #SpringCleanCommunication. After that, each teacher they get to join Bloomz for free using their personal invitation code will give them another chance to win $500 for their classroom.

You’re right. Most New Year’s resolutions are made closer to the actual New Year. But it’s [almost] still January . . . so I’m good, right?

And it’s never too late to make a few 2019 social studies resolutions. Best place to start? Asking questions about our current practice, especially during this middle of the year period: What’s working? What’s not? What do my students need? What resource needs to be phased out? How can I get better?

The middle of the school year is a perfect time to think about these sorts of questions. In that spirit, here are five New Year’s resolutions every social studies teacher should make:

1. Focus more on problems and process

I talked about this just a few days ago and I’ve been harping on this for years. But we all need to hear it – especially in January and February when it might seem easier to just lecture and give kids some questions to answer.

Kids need problems to solve. They need evidence to solve them. They need to develop the skills needed to mess with that evidence. They need to work with others to create solutions. And they need the opportunity to share their solutions. Content will always be important. But we need to be intentional about finding a good balance of content and historical thinking skills.

And after a lengthy conversation this morning with Steve Wyckoff around the idea of using badges as a way to focus on social studies competencies, I’m reminded again of the importance of teaching process skills.

Need some examples? 

• Stanford History Education Group lessons
• Read.Inquire.Write
• DocsTeach lessons
• National Archives: Teaching with Documents
• CaseMaker and DB Quest (New Library of Congress inquiry model tools)
• Library of Congress Teacher Page 

2. Apply for summer professional learning opportunities

We should never stop learning, never stop honing our craft. The cool thing is that there are a ton of groups out there who are dying to provide free professional learning. Some of my faves? Gilder Lehrman. Ford’s Theater. Goethe Transatlantic Outreach.

Need some more?

• Professional Learning Opportunities  (Massive spreadsheet compiled by Stefanie Wagner from the Iowa Department of Education.)
• Goethe Transatlantic Outreach
• National Endowment for the Humanities (NEH) summer programs
• Gilder Lehrman summer programs
• Ford’s Theater summer programs
• Foundation for Teaching Economics summer program
• National Geographic professional learning resources 

3. More intentional civic engagement

Ok. Most of us have probably dropped the ball on this one. Seriously. Twenty to twenty five percent of Americans can’t name the three branches of government. We have the lowest voter turnout of any modern democracy while at the same time voting rights are being curtailed across the country. And we seem to believe just about anything some 18 year-old Russian kid posts on our social media feed.

It’s not completely our fault. But . . . it’s a little our fault. We need to be much more intentional about finding ways to support both the content and process of Civics – whether we teach Civics or not.

Try these tools:

• Stanford History Education Group civic literacy lessons
• iCivics
• Generation Citizen
• EagleEye Citizen
• Kid Citizen
• Engaging Congress
• Voting Rights, Women’s Equality Day, & Constitution Day
• Civic Action Project 

4. Use social media to grow your PLN

We can all use a hand now and again. A question answered. A resource shared. A strategy explained. And we all have a Personal Learning Network. But social media has the power to expand that network exponentially. (That’s a math term meaning “a lot” or “a bunch.”)

So explore Twitter or Pinterest or even something like GoodReads. Because the more people that we can connect with, the smarter we get.

Need a kickstart? 

• Twitter chats are your best friend. So why are you ignoring them?
• Twitter Chat Basics 

5. Try something scary

As the K-12 education system morphs into one more focused on process, problem solving, college and career readiness, and truly preparing students for their future, we need to change as well. And that can be scary. It might mean changing lessons or adapting resources. It could mean integrating more technology into your instruction. And I guarantee that it means shifting control of learning over to your students.

This semester? Try something new. Something different. Something that you’re not quite sure how it’s going to turn out. One teacher said:

Need a few ideas?

• Google Expeditions
• Use more fiction
• Boy Scout Badges
• Greet kids at the door 

cross posted at glennwiebe.org

Glenn Wiebe is an education and technology consultant with 15 years' experience teaching history and social studies. He is a curriculum consultant forESSDACK, an educational service center in Hutchinson, Kansas, blogs frequently at History Tech and maintains Social Studies Central, a repository of resources targeted at K-12 educators. Visit glennwiebe.org to learn more about his speaking and presentation on education technology, innovative instruction and social studies.

A few weeks ago I sent my first parent newsletter to 400+ parents. The newsletter (a link and pdf) was emailed to every parent with a Spanish version as well! Next time I might try Turkish and other languages. You might think sending this monthly newsletter is time-consuming, but with Google Slides, Formmule, and Templates I’ve got this down to under 30 minutes. I’m going to share all my templates (free to copy) and tips with you below so your parent communication can be consistent, efficient, and quick! If you aren’t familiar with using Google then this might take some time investment at the beginning, but trust me learning to use Google Suites and Apps is the best teacher time and sanity saver!

Quick List of Templates

Above are snapshots of my class newsletter. Read on for instructions on how to create your own! Below is a quicklist of the free templates I’ve provided for you to copy and edit.

Newsletter Templates

• Google Slides Newsletter Template by Shelly Sanchez Terrell
• Google Slides Newsletter/Magazine Template by Art is Good
• Buncee Newsletter/Template

Other Templates

• Parent Contact and Information Google Form
• Parent Email Formmule Template

• Option 1: Collect this information in a Google Form. You can copy and edit my template here. I’ve included instructions for parents in Spanish.
• Option 2 (Fastest option): Download your class student roster from your school’s Learning Management System (ex. Canvas, Skyward, Google Classroom, etc.). Download as a spreadsheet or CSV file then upload to Google Drive, right click, and Open as a Spreadsheet. This is the option I chose this year, because it was super quick and easy. This way I didn’t have to wait for parents to submit the information or risk some not giving me the information. Most schools have already collected this information and will provide it to you if you ask. From here you just fix the Spreadsheet to include the information you want, such as Student First Name, Parent First Name, Parent Last Name, Parent Email, etc.

Open your Google Spreadsheet and add the Formmule add-on to create a parent email template which Formmule with personalize according to your column titles and information. Formmule uses HTML so you can add links to your Newsletter. Feel free to copy and edit my Parent Formmule Email Template. The video below by Daniel Kaufman shows a tutorial for using Formmule.

If you like these ideas, take one of my courses or check out my books. Ask me about training your teachers, ShellyTerrell@gmail.com!

Challenge: Communicate with parents regularly! Use the tips above to help you provide quick and effective parent communication.

cross posted at teacherrebootcamp.com

Shelly Terrell is a Technology and Computer teacher, education consultant, and author of books including Hacking Digital Learning Strategies: 10 Ways to Launch EdTech Missions in Your Classroom. Read more at teacherrebootcamp.com.

The start of a school year is exciting but a big shift from summer's freedom and lack of structure to the measured routines of school. This is a great time to set the tone for your classroom climate as a space for students to thrive and create.

What follows are strategies for teachers and school leaders to create an environment the supports innovation from the first day of school.

No More “All About Me” Bags

Let your students show their personalities by making a photo collage about themselves. A great tool for students is “beFunky.” Students can choose what photos will fit the topic of the driving question and how many photos they want to add to their collage. They can select specific photos of more importance to them by making them larger than others and can even add text.

Designing the Room

Why not ask students for classroom design ideas? A tool call “Classroom Architect” allows your students to create their "ideal classroom." When students visit the website they see a blank background that looks like a blank blueprint with shapes to move around. They use the tools at the top to design and label a layout they think would be most effective. One roadblock to note: the only way to save is to print straight from the site or take a screenshot of their classroom design. One idea you can do with this limitation is have students paste their screenshot into a document and provide a description of how and why they designed their classroom. This option will incorporate writing and creative thinking into their work.

Create a QR Code Wall

There are many free QR code generators. You could have students link QR codes to a Google photo slideshow or other collaborative documents where students write about themselves and share their stories with their peers.

Share Ideas

Mentimeter is a tool that lets you engage and interact with your colleagues in real-time. Users simply votes via mobile phones, tablets, or computers to a question or poll. It is easy to use, enabling you to turn your opinions or ideas into a word cloud or other options. On opening day, consider posing the question “What are the skills you want students to have when they finish the year in your classroom?” Create a word cloud with the answers that can be used as motivation and even posted in classrooms and school hallways. Share your ideas with a larger audience here but going to menti.com, typing in the code “84 79 2” and let us know how you might use this tool. We will update the word cloud weekly to share answers.

Share Your Message with Video

Schools can create promotional videos using an engaging animation video website like Powtoon. When it’s finished, push out the new video on social media outlets to get your community ready for a good year! Looking for an example of how it is done? Check out this example: Click Here.

Innovative Communication with Families

It’s often challenging to focus on students’ needs if family comments, questions, or concerns take up the majority of your valuable time. The key to avoiding this situation? Be proactive not reactive! Don’t wait for families to get concerned or confused. Instead, get ahead of the curve and prep communication and information for those stakeholders.

• Create a Classroom Website: A Teacher Website can be a quick and easy resource for families with Internet access to find announcements, assignments, important resources, phone numbers, emails, curriculum guides, and more. Depending on your access to classroom technology, a website may be able to serve multiple purposes within your classroom.
• Embed Google Docs into Web Tools: A website can be a wonderful tool, but how can you keep it updated without spending time uploading and deleting old content? Using the embed option to embed a Google Doc into a website. This will not give a visitor access to edit your file. Rather, this option allows you to change a document and automatically update it on your website. This could be used to update families on daily announcements or homework assignments – anything that may change day to day or week by week.
• Utilize Scheduled Text & Email Updates: Utilizing tools such as Remind 101 or email scheduling software, you can send updates to your families immediately or when it is most convenient for you. In addition, using tools to support your communication allows families to receive updates using an outlet they are comfortable with. Don’t challenge families to step out of their comfort zone to get updates on their own children. Meet families halfway to make the partnership a success!

These are just a few ideas to start the year by getting students excited, involving all stakeholders, and growing your professional learning network. How are you planning to innovate this year? Share your ideas using the hashtag #Jitters2Innovation.

ABOUT THE AUTHORS

Dr. Matthew X. Joseph (@MatthewXJoseph) is currently Director of Digital Learning and Innovation for Milford Public School, Milford, Ma. Before Milford, he was a building principal for 11 years in Massachusetts. Other professional roles include: classroom teacher, PD specialist, and other district roles supporting technology instruction. Dr. Joseph holds licenses in general education, school administration, and MA superintendent. His master's degree is in SPED and he holds an Ed.D. in Educational Leadership from Boston College.

Rae Hughart (@RaeHughart) is a Middle Level Math Educator in Illinois and the Director of Training & Development for Progressive Mastery Learning, LLC. Rae created and continues to trained educators on how to partner with local businesses to design dynamic, impactful, effective, and connected content by designing themed units dedicated to community engagement. In 2017, Rae was inducted into The Illinois State University Hall of Fame for her innovative educational impact through the Teach Further Model. Additionally, Rae serves on several Educational Boards including the Association of Illinois Middle Schools (AIMS). Rae holds degrees in Middle Level Education and a masters degree in Curriculum and Instruction from Illinois State University.

A recent survey of 1,000 U.S. teachers found that the state of parent-teacher engagement still has room for improvement. The survey, conducted by ClassTag, found that 65% of teachers reported adequate parent engagement, but 35% of parents had no interaction with their classrooms last school year.

In the survey, which was conducted between June 23 and July 22, 2018, teachers cited parent-teacher engagement, alongside home life and classroom climate, as the critical factors in student success, far ahead of even student aptitude.

[21 Things Every 21st Century Educator Should Try This Year (2018 Version)]

To reach out-of-touch parents, teachers turn to a array of tactics, the survey found. One teacher holds open conference nights at an apartment complex where many of their students’ families live. Other teachers meet with parents at their places of work. Still others enlist the help of siblings and grandparents to open channels of communication.

To help further spur parent-teacher engagement, ClassTag recently announced it was making more than $3 million in free supplies and exclusive discounts available to classrooms that earn ClassTag coins as a reward for parent engagement behaviors such as volunteering, attending conferences or simply reading teachers’ messages.

Today, the parent communication app Bloomz announced the addition of student user accounts. Starting in August, teachers can invite students to sign up for a free Bloomz account and receive communication from their teachers and school administrators through the app.

With Bloomz, teachers and school administrators will be able to share important class-related content and learning resources with students. For example, teachers can share assignment updates, test reminders, and other class files with students through the app—at the same time as they send daily updates, photos, and videos to parents. Sharing will be streamlined for educators, as they will be able to share to both parents and/or students, to the whole school, or a specific classroom with one simple post.

[What’s New: New Tools for Schools]

Bloomz is also partnering with Clever to participate in its recently announced Library, a way for teachers to discover and sign up for instructional technology. As part of this program, teachers will be able to discover the communication app through the portal, then use their Clever credentials to sign up for a free account and import their classrooms and students with one click.

At the ISTE conference on June 25–27, Bloomz will be demonstrating its Clever integration and providing more details in booth #685.

This is the time of year when the tests are behind students and the fun begins. Teachers are free to liberate their student’s genius and allow them to Choose2Matter by engaging in work that is worthy of the world. Angela Maiers says that learners who believe they have unique abilities early on will be more likely than others to:

• Harness their talents more quickly
• Develop self-confidence and a belief that they can succeed
• Maintain their optimism and confidence under stress
• Learn to rely on themselves more than others to get what they need in life
• Live a productive and fulfilled life

"Genius Matters: A Framework for Epic Transformation is a free book with 20 lessons that teachers can implement with students to find their unique abilities and do work that matters such as volunteering.

Setting Up A Volunteering Campaign

Now there is extra support for those students who Choose2Matter by volunteering their time and talents. WE Volunteer Now helps teachers help students organize volunteer activities to address issues and raise awareness about a cause they find important.

You can sign up for WE Volunteer Now to learn more about how to start a volunteer campaign at your school. You’ll also get access to grade-specific lessons you can use right away. Plus, 500 schools will receive a $250 grant to use towards their volunteer project.

The grants will be distributed on a first-come, first-served basis to all eligible schools/groups, to be used towards supporting your volunteer project! The eligible school or youth organization must:

• Complete this application
• Be based in the U.S.
• Use the funds by October 2018
• Include youth in grades K-12
• Participate in the WE Volunteer Now Campaign

[Apple, Google, & Microsoft... Oh My! Which is Best for Your School?]

Get AP Credit

The We Volunteer Now kit contains ideas for teachers and students to brainstorm and helps students set goals. The kit also includes teacher checklists to help teachers keep students and themselves on track. There are lessons for all grade levels that easily align with your current curriculum. For high school AP teachers there is an AP® with WE Service Course that allows teachers the opportunity to incorporate service learning into their existing AP courses. This gives students real world experiences with AP content that traditionally has a reputation of being rather dry and tedious.

Showcasing Student Volunteer Efforts Helps Schools Stand Out

There are many reasons to join WE Schools. Showcasing the wonderful ways your students are making the world a better place is a fantastic way to help your school stand out from the rest and garner community support. You can do this when students projects are finished educators have a great opportunity to celebrate and share the work on the school’s Facebook page, Twitter, Instagram, website and other spaces.You can also share your results with We Volunteer Now for a chance to earn your way to WE Day. It’s a stadium-sized event (there are 6 held annually in select cities across the country!) that brings together amazing speakers and performers. And YOU and YOUR students could be honored, or students can tune in and watch them live! You can see what this looks like below.

Read more.

Lisa Nielsen writes for and speaks to audiences across the globe about learning innovatively and is frequently covered by local and national media for her views on “Passion (not data) Driven Learning,” "Thinking Outside the Ban" to harness the power of technology for learning, and using the power of social media to provide a voice to educators and students. Ms. Nielsen has worked for more than a decade in various capacities to support learning in real and innovative ways that will prepare students for success. In addition to her award-winning blog, The Innovative Educator, Ms. Nielsen’s writing is featured in places such as Huffington Post, Tech & Learning, ISTE Connects, ASCD Wholechild, MindShift, Leading & Learning, The Unplugged Mom, and is the author the book Teaching Generation Text.

LocateMySchool™, a web-based, interactive, software-as-a-service developed by Planware, a division of Educational Data Systems, now provides 24/7 access to important school boundary information, directions from an entered address, and contact info in one application.

[WHAT’S NEW: NEW TOOLS FOR SCHOOLS]

LocateMySchool provides:

*Single platform offering access to colorful, layered school boundary maps and customized locations such as bus stops, crossing guards, daycare or after-school centers, and sports venues;

*Familiar Google Maps interface delivering walking, biking, or driving directions from any entered address within the district;

*Multi-language support and Google Translate features; and

*Live customer service and support.

Districts can also use LocateMySchool to provide a visual display of different or proposed boundary scenarios for presentation to boards, committees, parents, and the public for review.

For more information and pricing for LocateMySchool, visit EdData.com/LocateMySchool.

Kids today! If you believed the headlines, you'd think that technology has created a generation of kids who are impatient, bored, and entitled. While that could be true, don't blame the kids or the tech. It is up to the adults in their worlds to ensure we raise kids who know how to be safe and responsible digital citizens.Educators do this by following the curriculum from providers like Common Sense Education, Google’s “Be Internet Awesome,” and EverFi’s “Ignition.”

I asked a group of Common Sense Educators which sites they recommend for parents.

Below are the resources they suggested schools can share to support parents in keeping their children safe online.

5 Digital Citizenship Resources for Parents

• Social Media Guidelines - NYC
  These are the student guidelines schools share with parents. There are also guides for parents, infographics, and an activity book that go along with the guidelines.
• Digital Citizenship Responsibilities - NYC
  New York City Schools educators created plain language guidance to advice for supporting good digital citizenship with students and infographics to accompany this advice.

In an effort to spark a social movement against hatred in all forms, USC Shoah Foundation and Discovery Education today launched the fifth annual IWitness Video Challenge

First, students will hear testimonies of survivors and witnesses of genocide. They will then complete a research-based and standards-aligned activity. After being inspired to counter hate, participants will develop a community action project. To be considered for the IWitness Video Challenge, students must document their experience in a video essay for submission.

The student who creates the national winning entry will receive a $5,000 scholarship. Second place will receive a $1,000 scholarship; third place, a $500 scholarship.

The educator associated with the national winning entry will receive a $1,000 grant to inspire, impact and implement change in their local school.

The school or organization associated with the national winning entry will receive a $2,500 grant to implement change in their community.

Submissions for the 2018 IWitness Video Challenge are being accepted now until April 13, 2018. For more information and complete rules, visit IWitness.usc.edu.

The Wonderment

Ambitious global community aims for public good through student engagement 

Pros: The idea behind the site is powerful, and the developers' work to create a robust social network is encouraging and even inspiring.
Cons: Quality can vary widely: outside videos and user-submitted content are occasionally superficial or downright inappropriate.
Bottom Line: A powerful, improving social network for exploring the world and effecting positive change.

Read more here.

By Common Sense Education

App of the Day picks are selected from the top edtech tools reviewed by Common Sense Education, which helps educators find the best ed-tech tools, learn best practices for teaching with tech, and equip students with the skills they need to use technology safely and responsibly. 

Houghton Mifflin Harcourt’s second annual Educator Confidence Report examines educator sentiment on a range of issues, including technology use in classrooms, professional learning opportunities, and overall comfort and familiarity with digital learning tools.

Key takeaways from the report include:

● 58% reported a desire for more parent and family engagement

● 84% spend their own money on professional development

● Facebook is the most popular social media tool educators use to communicate with families (although district administrators have a slight preference for Twitter)

● Educators expressed less concern about teacher accountability requirements (50%) compared to last year (63%)

● Concern about meeting the requirements of Common Core/state standards assessments dropped 11 percentage points (from 58% to 47%)

● 39% are administering end-of-year state assessments in a digital format

● Newer teachers (10 or fewer years of experience) use social media to engage with students more often than more experienced educators

● More experienced teachers (11+ years) use tools such as digital whiteboards and online assessments with greater frequency than newer teachers.

FOR MORE GO TO: HTTP://WWW.TECHLEARNING.COM/SEP16

k12insight.com ■ Retail Price: Price based on student enrollment. Price includes software, implementation, and training for all staff.

Quality and Effectiveness: While social media is a great tool for communication in education, it can be difficult for school and district personnel to organize, prioritize, and respond to the deluge of school-related communications on various platforms. Let’s Talk! provides an easy-to-use dashboard so schools can review all communications sent via social media platforms, including Facebook, Instagram, and Twitter, as well as voice and email messages, in one place to help ensure speedy and appropriate responses. This streamlining solution from K12 Insight assigns each communication to the correct person or department, such as the head of school or IT department, and monitors response times, feedback scores, and accountability.

Ease of Use: Let’s Talk! is easy to navigate and quick to load. Communication tools for stakeholders are intuitively designed and include “hot topic” buttons such as “safety” and “weather.” Online “dialogues” are simply designed to ensure user comfort. Schools can quickly dispatch a bulk communication to stakeholders with a personalized greeting. A tornado watch and torrential rain recently prompted my school leaders to postpone school for 90 minutes; Let’s Talk! would have helped the school communicate the situation to families and teachers much more quickly.

Creative Use of Technology: Let’s Talk! uniquely brings school-related communications from various online locations together on an organized dashboard. Critical communications can be flagged with keywords, such as safety and weather. Families and staff can initiate a communication in English (or 33 other supported languages), anonymously or with contact information. If contact information is included, once a communication is considered resolved Let’s Talk! automatically sends a feedback form to the initiator with a 10-point scale to evaluate the correspondence. For administrators, the feedback management system includes categories such as concerns, compliments, suggestions, comments, and questions to help organize potential downstream connotations that need additional, and sometimes immediate, attention.

Suitability for Use in a School Environment: K12 Insight has a team dedicated to Let’s Talk! implementation. An experienced and strategic account executive helps each school or district from the ground level with every step in the process. A principal can access all communications and responses to increase internal accountability. Dashboard reports, which are easily downloaded and shared, show trending topics, who is communicating, and school response times. School leaders can set priorities and respond with confidence, based on data from these dashboard reports.

OVERALL RATING:

Let’s Talk! is an innovative product that can help any school or district effectively use social media to improve communication with stakeholders. Let’s Talk! also works seamlessly with K12 Insight’s Engage platform to create and send surveys, gather deeper insights, and analyze data. K12 Insight’s Advisory Services offers collaborative educational research methods from experienced school leaders who can audit and provide solid evidence for recommendations.

TOP FEATURES

● Let’s Talk! effectively uses technology to organize and oversee school-related communications on social media platforms, including Facebook, Instagram, and Twitter, plus voice and email messages, enabling school leaders to respond quickly and appropriately and prevent crises.

● School stakeholders will appreciate that Let’s Talk! provides one easy way to communicate their ideas, comments, and questions.

● Let’s Talk! provides solid data to school leaders so they can make better-informed decisions with confidence.

One of the most valuable components of college and career preparation can be partnering with area businesses, colleges, and government. Since many students will be seeking jobs in these organizations, knowing specifically what they look for in potential employees is key to navigating meaningful career preparation. But where do schools begin this conversation?

Wheeling High School, one of six comprehensive high schools in District 214 in Illinois, has answered that question in a how to guide. This guide, called “Pathways and Partnerships,” is a blueprint for matching high school students with local businesses, colleges, and government. As the idea for the program began to take shape, they designed a plan to bring partnerships into their schools, developed capacity for ongoing dialogue with partners to ensure sustainability, and conceptualized a model that fits their demographics and community.

They offer the following tips for creating a similar program in your school or district.

PARTNERING WITH THE PRIVATE SECTOR

To establish private sector partnerships, Wheeling High School administrators suggest the following steps:

■ Research and contact potential stakeholders from private and public sectors.

■ Contact trade and local organizations and ask to attend meetings and/or establish membership.

■ Develop marketing to create awareness.

■ Host open houses at your schools for potential stakeholders.

■ Offer to host the meetings of local organizations at your schools.

■ Establish an advisory council for your program with representatives from these local organizations.

Wheeling has partnered with the TMA (Tooling and Manufacturing Association), the Wheeling Rotary club, the Chamber of Commerce, the SME (Society of Manufacturing Engineers), and other national and local businesses. The benefits of these partnerships have included scholarships, internships, financial support, curriculum input, and equipment and material donations.

PARTNERING WITH HIGHER ED

Wheeling High School has also worked with area colleges to offer educational partnerships such as dual-credit courses, certifications, research, and other professional development opportunities for teachers and students. To begin this partnership conversation, they suggest that schools do the following:

■ Designate a point person on your end and a contact person at the college or university.

■ Design goals for the partnership.

■ Establish clear expectations for all parties involved.

■ Meet regularly throughout the school year to ensure open lines of communication.

■ Evaluate the partnership annually to improve programming.

When Wheeling partnered with Northern Illinois University, the university provided monthly professional development opportunities led by professors. D214 also partnered with William Rainey Harper College, which offers D214 students dual-credit and certification opportunities in fields such as manufacturing, engineering, nano science, and nursing. Because students in the nursing program can receive certification at the end of year three, juniors and seniors at Wheeling High and Elk Grove High School can graduate from Harper College with a CNA certification.

PARTNERING WITH GOVERNMENTAL INSTITUTIONS

Wheeling High School has also developed governmental partnerships. They began these partnerships by doing the following:

■ Developing relationships with elected officials.

■ Inviting them to their school for events.

■ Mentioning them in school literature when appropriate.

Wheeling invites local officials to events like their manufacturing job fair and original research competitions, and they even hosted US Secretary of Education Arne Duncan for their nano lab grand opening. The benefits of school-government partnerships include opportunities for internships, curricular input, grants, financial support, and publicity.

As schools and districts continue to explore the ways in which they need to prepare students for further education and careers in the 21st century and help them to develop career pathways, partnerships will be an integral part of that preparation. These partnerships could lead to internships, career shadowing, field trips, curricular support and, in many cases, to job placement beyond high school.

Angela Sisi is the principal of Wheeling High School and Kevin Muck is the CTE/PE/health division head at Wheeling High School in Township High School District 214 in Illinois.