|
|
FALL COMMUNITY GATHERING FOR ALL MBLC MEMBER TEAMS
COMING UP TUESDAY, NOVEMBER 29, 11 AM - 3:30 PM (ONLINE)
|
|
|
Volume 1, Issue 2 | October 28, 2022
Greetings, MBLC Community:
We send good wishes for a cozy fall season.
Here’s our second edition of the Mastery-based Learning Collaborative (MBLC) newsletter. As MBLC member schools and Friends of MBLC, you’ll get this newsletter bimonthly during the school year to catch you up on recent happenings.
With educational equity as a guiding value, MBLC schools are using research-based practices to make academics and school culture richly responsive and sustaining to students as learners and as people.
Over spring and summer, each MBLC founding member school designed goals for the next two years’ work. Their goals build on existing strengths and address challenges and aspirations in each school.
And now it’s fall, and school is underway! Our MBLC community envisions school as a place of discovery and belonging, and each is exploring and implementing new ways to achieve that vision. Visits to schools make clear that 1) our collective journey is rich and has common threads across schools, 2) the MBLC work is taking shape in unique ways at each school, and 3) schools are actively learning from each other in exciting ways.
It’s our great pleasure and honor to work with the visionary, caring, dedicated teachers, leaders, counselors, paras, coaches, learners, and district leaders at these schools.
Please read on for updates on what we’ve been up to, and what’s ahead later in the fall and early winter.
—The MBLC Support Team:
Professional Learning Coaches: Clyde, Don, Chris, Joy, Kate, and Katie
WA SBE: Alissa, Seema, and Stephanie
|
|
|
Find resources from past events at the MBLC Community Site.
These events are coming up in the next few weeks. For events open to Friends of MBLC, look for this symbol: 💟 For a longer-range view, see MBLC Year at a Glance for School Year 2022-23. Online session for MBLC teams and Friends of MBLC. Recording can be viewed asynchronously after the session on the MBLC Community Site. *If you have already registered for the Schools Out Washington training on December 8 - please re-register and please forgive us for this technical error.
Thursday, November 3
3:45-4:45 p.m. | Webinar 6 💟 Culturally Responsive-Sustaining MBL: Systems for Supporting Students (Formative Assessments and Timely Feedback)
Featuring science/math teacher Cristina Rade from Competency Collaborative Living Lab School Frank McCourt HS.
Tuesday, November 29
11 a.m. to 3:30 p.m. | Fall Community Gathering
Featuring keynote speaker, Jeremy Chan-Kraushar, co-founder of Competency Collaborative, NYC public schools.
This is one of the three days each school year when all MBLC member school teams gather to share and learn together. Please register your whole MBLC team if you can—or a minimum of two team members who can share back to your full team later. (We know you’ll need to hire subs that day!) The day will include:
- Mini-electives on high-interest topics
- Team huddle time
- Pair share with another school to get feedback on your work
Tuesday, December 6
9:30 - 11 a.m. | Leaders’ Community of Practice, Session 2
Online session for MBLC Principals +1
Thursday, December 8
3-5:30 p.m. | School/Community Partnerships training with School’s Out Washington - SOWA 💟 ***Apologies for the technical difficulties! If you have already registered for this one, please re-register at the updated link above!
Online session for MBLC teams and Friends of MBLC. Recording can be viewed asynchronously after the session on the MBLC Community Site.
|
|
August 17-18 MBLC Summer Institute 2022
Our first Summer Institute focused on learning from and with practitioners of culturally responsive-sustaining MBL in several states. Each session included a panel discussion, interest-driven breakouts, and supported work time, ending with a full group share out.
|
September 22 School’s Out Washington Workshop: School-Community Partnership 201
Participants explored principles of and strategies for equitable, student-centered partnerships, using Youth Development Executives of King County (YDEKC)’s School and Community Partnership Toolkit.
September 29 MBLC Professional Learning Community (PLC): Session 1
In small PLC cohorts, MBLC school teams meet to learn with and from each other, exploring resources and how each school is working to make school more responsive, sustaining, and compelling. In our first session, we talked about who benefits from culturally responsive-sustaining MBL, what we want to do in our PLCs, and our problems of practice.
|
October 11 School’s Out Washington Workshop: Exploring Structural Racism
Participants considered connections between historical racial injustices and present-day realities for young people and communities of color.
October 12 Leaders Community of Practice: Session 1
In this quarterly meeting, school leaders directing the MBLC work at the school level share successes, troubleshoot problems, and exchange resources. In our first session, leaders identified their needs and hopes for this community of practice, and shared out about what’s happening in their schools from a leadership perspective.
October 13 Webinar 5: Culturally Responsive-Sustaining MBL: Building on Learning Outcomes
You asked for real-life examples of MBL in action. In this webinar, we shared numerous examples from elementary, middle and high school classrooms. We explored cycles of learning, reflection, and feedback that build the skills and knowledge named in the outcomes; assessments that offer rich opportunities for students to show what they know; and equitable grading that supports the learning process.
|
October 13-21 School Visit Week
Professional Learning Coaches and SBE team visited MBLC member schools across the state to meet students, staff, and leaders; to see how learning happens; to facilitate PL sessions; and to hear from student focus groups/panels. Thanks to schools who hosted us! Please see pics below.
October 24 MBLC Youth Advisor & Adult Allies: Session 1
Facilitated by Aneth Naranjo and Matt Gonzales of NYU Metro Center, we connected in youth/adult affinity groups about the history of youth activism—and how to nurture thriving, powerful, and equitable cross-generation collaboration. We are so excited about our youth advisors! Thanks to all youth and adult allies who joined.
October 24 MBLC Youth Advisor & Adult Allies: Session 1
Facilitated by Aneth Naranjo and Matt Gonzales of NYU Metro Center, we connected in youth/adult affinity groups about the history of youth activism—and how to nurture thriving, powerful, and equitable cross-generation collaboration. We are so excited about our youth advisors!
Thanks to all youth and adult allies who joined.
|
October 27 MBLC Professional Learning Community (PLC): Session 2
In this PLC session, we looked at resources from schools deeply engaged in MBL, and considered aspects of their work such as: What is MBL & Why MBL?, Designing strong learning outcomes, How a school’s MBL journey evolves over time, and MBL classroom lessons.
|
|
Over the past few weeks, we have had the opportunity to visit MBLC schools all over Washington. We experienced personalized, student-led learning and were grateful to speak to educators about what makes mastery-based learning successful for kids.
You can see our photos (we are always adding more) on the MBLC Flikr collection.
|
Innovation Lab HS, Bothell hosted a fabulous visit for other MBLC schools, featuring a deep dive into the school’s vision for equitable MBL from Principal Peter Schurke, class visits, a student panel, and pizza lunch with the ILHS all-start staff. Big thank you for planning and hosting, ILHS students, Peter, AP Kayla Andrews, teacher/instructional coach Kirby Morgan, Office Manager Kelly Duhamel, teacher Matt Fluster, school Counselor Jon Cohn, and all the staff we interacted with and learned from.
ICYMI: There was a wonderful article on the MBLC in the Seattle Times in August, by Janelle Retka: Some WA schools opt for ‘show what you know’ system over letter grades The article features Elma District schools, Enumclaw HS, and Innovation Lab HS. Don’t miss the accompanying photo essay, documenting a Healing of the Canoe collaboration between Enumclaw High School, Muckleshoot Cultural Center, and Pierce College.
From Highlander Institute: A framework for culturally responsive-sustaining pedagogy that includes teacher practices and student practices. We love this! https://highlanderinstitute.org/crsp-framework/
Video: A Student-Centered Model for Self-pacing (Modern Classrooms Project, via Edutopia)
Here are resources from practitioner presenters. Explore and enjoy!
Session 1: Culturally Responsive-sustaining education
Session 2: MBL
Session 3: Educational Equity
Session 4: MBL
Meg’s Building a supportive academic improvement system
|
|
|
Dear Embee Elsie:
My school is actively learning about and trying out culturally responsive-sustaining MBL practices that are new to us. We see how this student-centered approach is making a difference, BUT we have a BIG and many-acronymed question:
Along with our MBLC work, we are learning about and developing UDL (Universal Design for Learning), PBL (project-based learning), and SEL (Social-emotional Learning). Our staff meets in a new PLC (professional learning community) and we are a CTE (Career and Technical Education) school. Yes, that’s: CRSE/MBL/UDL/PBL/SEL/PLC/CTE.We believe in this exciting work, but it feels like a lot. Please help us fit together all the ingredients!
—CRSE/MBL/UDL/PBL/SEL/PLC/CTE Innovator
Dear Alphabet Soup Innovator (aka CRSE/MBL/UDL/PBL/SEL/PLC/CTE Innovator):
Thanks for writing. You have an alphabet soup of innovation underway: CRSE/MBL/UDL/PBL/PLC/CTE. These ingredients can strengthen teaching and learning, center both academic success and wellbeing of young people, build powerful skills, fosters effective and enjoyable collaboration . . . check, check, check. All the same, I do see how it feels challenging to do each thing justice, and hard to communicate clearly.
First thought: No one can actually multitask—you know that, right? (Try this quick and fun experiment to prove that multtaking is a myth.) So you’re setting out to develop several new practices, you’ll need a game plan for learning, trying out, and building expertise with this, then that.
- UNIFYING & CONNECTINGWhat’s one clear throughline/vision that unifies and connects all the facets? Is it “learner-centered school”? “Reaching for equity and excellence?” “Rich learning pathways”? How would you and your team state the overarching goal, a level above the alphabet soup ingredients (each of which is research-based; popular with educators, students, and families because it works; and worthy of a years-long journey of developing expertise)? How can you develop (rather than assume!) clarity about how each piece serves a purpose in the larger vision? I suggest brainstorming sessions, staff KWHLAQ charts, and Venn diagrams.
- CLARIFYING & DEVELOPING EACH PIECETime to build, confirm, and sustain clarity about each practice/approach is vital. Do you have a regular practice of inviting questions, brainstorms, collaborations, and reflections, early and often.? How about intervisitations for colleagues to showcase new practices they are trying out, and learn from and with each other?
- PRIORITIZING & ROAD-MAPPING How can you build a pathway that feels rich and exciting, instead of overwhelming and confusing? An African proverb leaps to mind: “If you want to go fast, go alone. If you want to go far, go together.”
- Next, and always: CELEBRATE WINS, REFLECT, SEEK FEEDBACK, MAKE COURSE CORRECTIONS . . . and CELEBRATE MORE WINS!
I hope this alphabet soup recipe works for you! Thanks for your dedication to making school a place of belonging and discovery for every learner. Let’s keep in touch as you keep cooking. — Embie Elsie
Reader, do you have a question for our advice columnist Embie Elsie (aka MBLC)? Please reach her here!
|
|
About us
The Mastery-based Learning Collaborative is a community of Washington State schools that are using youth-centered, mastery/competency-based, culturally responsive-sustaining practices and approaches. Our program is an initiative of Washington State Board of Education, in collaboration with the Office of Superintendent of Public Instruction and Professional Educator Standards Board.
Contact
Mastery Based Learning Collaborative
State Board of Education
Olympia, Washington
|
|
|
|
|
