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MBLC SUMMER INSTITUTE 2023 

MON-TUES, AUGUST 7-8, 10 am-3:15 pm at Highline College, Des Moines

For MBLC member school teams and school staff, and (space allowing!) for Friends of MBLC. Member schools, please invite additional staff if you wish.

Volume 1, Issue 6 | June 2023

Greetings, MBLC Community:

Appreciations to you as we finish up a rich and wonderful first full year as a community. In this year of learning and doing together, you’ve shown dedication and ingenuity in making school work better and feel better for students we serve across Washington State. 

We’re excited to see many of you at the MBLC Summer Institute August 7 & 8 at Highline College in Auburn, WA. Together we’ll plan for a powerful year ahead. You’ll leave energized and prepared for implementing learner-centered, culturally responsive-sustaining MBL at the classroom or school wide level—choose the workshop strand that best suits your role and interests.

There will be plenty of room at Green River College, so please invite interested school colleagues to join your MBLC team at the institute. We’ve arranged a special rate at a local hotel. Details are in the Summer Institute agenda. Please register before school is out.

We wish you a healthy, happy, joyful, and restful summer break.

Stay cool, thank you, and see you in August! —

PS: MBLC is going to grow in 2024! Let your friends and colleagues at interested schools/districts know about our August 10 Cohort 2 Info Session. Details in Upcoming Events below. (There will be a 2nd identical Cohort 2 Info Session in September, date TBD.)

Your dedicated MBLC Support Team and fans,

Professional Learning Coaches: Clyde, Don, Chris, Joy, Kate, and Katie

WA SBE: Alissa, Seema, and Stephanie

Upcoming

Find resources from past events at the MBLC Community Site.

You can register and get more info at the MBLC Site: bit.ly/MBLCsite or check out our Google Calendar of Events: bit.ly/MBLC_Eventcalendar.  

For events open to Friends of MBLC, look for this symbol: 💟

In-person events

MBLC Summer Institute | Mon/Tues Aug 7-8  | 10 am-3:15 pm 💟 
Green River College, Auburn

Prep for September with workshops on various aspects of CRSE/MBL at the classroom and school wide levels. Member schools: Please save these dates for your whole team—and there’s plenty of room if other staff from your school would like to join us. Read more about this event (including lodging options) and register here! Friends of MBLC welcome, space allowing.

Online events

GRANT OPPORTUNITY: MASTERY-BASED LEARNING COLLABORATIVE (MBLC) COHORT 2 INFO SESSION | Thurs, Aug 10 | 1-2 pm 💟

Interested in applying to become a new MBLC member school? Come to an info session to learn about culturally responsive mastery-based learning, the experience of joining this community of schools, grant funding, professional learning, and more.

NOTE: Viewing the August 10 or September (date TBD) Cohort 2 Info Session is a required step in applying for MBLC Cohort 2 membership.

Register here and share with others: bit.ly/MBLC2_InfoSession_Aug

Extracurricular opportunities

Post-Institute Place-Based, Community-Based, Immersion Learning Day with Sui-Lan Ho’okano | Wed Aug 9 | 9 am - 3 pm (optional) 
💟 Green River College, Auburn

This optional post-Institute Immersion Learning Day with Sui-Lan and a team of local practitioners is designed especially for the MBLC community and friends, in partnership with New Learning Collaborative. You’ll experience interdisciplinary, mastery-based learning that honors diverse knowledge systems—and enjoy the natural world in some outdoor activities. Lunch included. Registration opens today! Register by June 30 for Early Bird rate of $250/person.

Join Great Schools Partnership for a Summer of Learning

Summer is the perfect opportunity to slow down and ask questions. How can we continuously improve our district, our school, our classroom practices? How can we ensure equitable outcomes for all students? As educators, how can we challenge and support each other throughout the academic year? We invite you to explore and seek answers to questions such as these by registering for one (or more!) of our multi-day virtual summer institutes. 

Register here for the Institutes. Early Bird pricing is available for MBLC schools if you register by June 30 using the discount code: earlybird23 It is case sensitive, and is valid for all four Summer Institute registration forms. It will reduce the price to $425 (a little over 5% off the regular price). If you have issues using the code, please reach out to events@greatschoolspartnership.org.

Dates and topics:

• July 11-13: Leveraging Professional Learning Groups to Improve Instruction and Increase Educational Equity
• July 18-20: Building Family and Community Engagement for Educational Equity
• July 25-27: Coherence and Equity Through the Portrait of a Graduate Process
• August 1-3: Building Restorative Practices

Aurora Institute Symposium

Aurora Institute Symposium, the leading national conference for K-12 competency-based learning, is coming October 15-17 in Palm Springs, CA. The MBLC project will be well-represented among presenters at this event! https://aurora-institute.org/symposium2023/attend/

Recent happenings

Here’s what we’ve been up to lately! Find recordings and resources from past events at the MBLC Event Archive on the community site: bit.ly/MBLCsite.

Tues, April 25 | Leaders Community of Practice, Session 4

School leaders of MBLC met to share plans for next school year—and to hear from La Conner District MBLC team lead Beth Clothier and La Conner Superintendent Will Nelson about how MBLC work happens at La Conner Middle School and High School.

Participants said: “Loved the opportunity to talk with a small group about their MBL project and process.” “It worked well to be in breakout rooms on specific moves for implementation of MBL.”

Wed, April 26 | Youth Advisors & Adult Allies Session 

MBLC youth advisors and adult allies met to prep for their leadership roles at the Spring Gathering Tuesday May 2 at Highline College in Des Moines.

Thurs, April 27 | Webinar 11 | The Power of Culturally Responsive-Sustaining Learning Experiences, featuring Sui-Lan Ho’okano, Cultural Program Director at MBLC Member School Enumclaw HS 

Sui-Lan, who leads the MBLC team at Enumclaw High School, and holds many other leadership roles in educational equity, shared about a powerful interdisciplinary, place-based, and community-based immersion learning trip in February for students at her school. We heard from students about what it meant to them to be immersed in indigenous ways of being and knowing, and how their trip has inspired deep and lasting student-led cultural learning in community with other students at EHS.

Participants said: “I'm thinking that when we study culture, I need to do a survey of the cultures represented in my classes each year and provide more opportunities for them to tie in their culture with what we are learning!” …“I hope to encourage students to tie their own cultural aspects into our assignments whenever possible to make their learning more authentic!” …“Connecting learning to community and nature is powerful.”

Mon, May 8 | PLC Session 5

MBLC school teams shared out resources and reflections on their MBLC implementation this school year. 

Participants said: “Real world share outs. I saved a copy of the glow/grow rubric. Hearing from others who are in the trenches with us was really powerful.” … “This was the best session to date. Amazing to see all the student centered work everyone did.”

Tues, May 16 | Webinar 12 | Virtual Visit to a longtime MBL School in Vermont, featuring Emily Rinkema & Stan Williams from Champlain Valley Union HS

Emily and Stan laid out the proficiency-based system of teaching and learning they and colleagues designed at Champlain Valley Union High School in VT. They shared about the impact MBL has had on teaching and learning, and next steps we could all take to build on the principles at the heart of CVUHS's work.

Participants said: “I’m thinking about how I can change the way I support students . . . It is not about what we teach. It's about what the student learns.”. . .“Seeing how they've agreed on targets for measuring was very helpful.”. . .“Evidence-based assessment; Know-Understand-Do (KUD) as a different perspective than Know-Want-Learn (KWL).”

In-person events

Spring Community Gathering | Tues May 2 at Highline College, Des Moines

The highlight of the year was student panels! We heard about the impact of our work from 4 youth advisors from many MBLC member schools. We also learned together in high-interest electives, school team planning huddles, and school-to-school shares.

Participants said: “I’m thinking about ways to apply my learning to my own practice.” . . . “I am eager to see how these ideas will support our implementation next year.” . . .“Conversations with other schools have been very beneficial.”

Visit to Avanti HS | Thurs May 4 | Olympia

The visit focused on MBLC Member Avanti HS’s interdisciplinary, hands-on learning offerings—including a class on math and biking. We visited classes, talked with staff and students, and reflected on how we could use our learning from this visit in our own practice. Guests included educators from 5 MBLC member schools, the State Board of Education, and State Representative Skyler Rude.

Participants said: “I’m thinking about ways to apply my learning to my own practice.” . . . “I am eager to see how these ideas will support our implementation next year.” . . .“Conversations with other schools have been very beneficial.”

Read this, watch that

Here are resources and videos for your use. Enjoy, and let us know your wish list for next time!

What’s the clearest path to building equitable and lasting MBL systems? Here’s a new pre-summer blog post on the MBLC site! Wishing you iced coffee or tea, a hammock in the shade, and some sleeping in mornings coming up very soon.

What does research say about feedback, grading, and learning? This excellent short piece by Thomas Guskey (author of Implementing Mastery Learning among other wonderful books) may surprise you.

Watch every minute of this wonderful 4-part interview with Zaretta Hammond, author of Culturally Responsive Teaching and the Brain.

• Zaretta Hammond: Part 1 
• Zaretta Hammond: Part 2 
• Zaretta Hammond: Part 3
• Zaretta Hammond: Part 4

MBLC Event archive Have you checked out the growing event archive on the MBLC Community Site? It’s a treasure trove of recordings and resources from past events.

Advice from Embee Elsie (M-B-L-C)

Dear Embee Elsie:

We LOVED hearing from student advisors at the Spring Gathering in May, and learned a lot. One student said they had learned about the Oregon Trail 11 times over the course of their public education, but had learned zero in school about the history and contributions to society of people like themselves. That was powerful.

We want to invite students at our school to advise our MBLC work, too. Three questions.

• We are a middle school—are our students too young to advise us meaningfully?

• There’s a lot of terminology involved in talking about this work—how much should we share about MBL, rubrics, CRSE, cultural competence, and other terms in talking with young people?

• We know youth leadership can look many different ways . . .  do you have any guidance for us about who to invite as advisors?

Thanks!—Believing in the Next Generation

Dear Believing:

Our young people are the true experts about what does and does not make school matter for them—it’s exciting that you’re ready to work with youth advisors on your MBLC team next year. Here are some responses for you. 

1. Middle school students are definitely old enough to advise you meaningfully. You might be surprised by their deep insights about their experience of school. Use student-friendly language, as you would in any learning experience with them, and please share forward what you learn.
2. You can handle the terminology issue the way you would handle teaching and discussing any technical content with students—teach into the terms that may be unfamiliar but are essential to joining the conversation, and use analogies, examples, and visuals to help students to connect terms to their prior knowledge.
3. If there are students at your school who are less engaged than you wish they were—it’s a rare school that does not have students who are somewhat school-avoidant since the pandemic—these are your experts about what’s not working for them. Ask students whose identities have been historically underserved/misserved in school: Black students, Brown students, multiple-language learners, those with IEPs, and LGBTQIA+ students. These students can tell you what changes matter, what makes them feel affirmed and engaged. I love that you said youth leadership can look many different ways—that’s true! You don’t need to choose the most extraverted students. If you build trust and create a space where students can connect authentically, they will share their experiences with you and you will learn so much from them.

Please share back what you learn from the next generation! Very best—Embie

Reader, do you have a question for our advice columnist Embie Elsie (aka M-B-L-C)? 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