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  MBLC FALL GATHERING 2023  OCTOBER 24, 10 am-3:30 pm at The Club at Snoqualmie Ridge

For MBLC member school teams and school staff. Member schools, please invite additional staff if you wish.

Register by October 12!

Volume 2, Issue 1 | September 2023

Greetings MBLC Community:

Warm hello and welcome back to a new school year! We hope it’s off to a positive start—and that you had time to rest, play, and eat something delicious over the summer.

Read on for a preview of professional learning events this fall and this school year. We are honored to partner with MBLC founding member schools in a community-wide effort to make school work better and feel better for the young people and families we serve. We are already learning with you, and there’s more coming soon. 

As always, you can register and get more info at the MBLC Site: bit.ly/MBLCsite 

See you at fall events online, and in person at the Fall Gathering in Snoqualmie on Thursday, October 24! 

Your fans, aka the MBLC Support Team,

Professional Learning Coaches: Clyde, Emily, Joy, Kate, and Katie

WA SBE: Alissa, Seema, and Stephanie

Upcoming

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: 💟

Online events:

Thursday, Sep 28, 3:45 - 4:45 PM

Webinar: Catalyzing Sustainable School Change  REGISTER NOW!  💟 

In this webinar, we will explore how to catalyze lasting school change—starting with establishing clear direction and shared purpose, and building to transformative and sustained schoolwide shifts. We will discuss strategies to build schoolwide momentum and commitment to creating innovative learning environments that are just, rigorous, equitable, responsive, and welcoming. We will also talk about the role of your MBLC team as the engine of change at your school!

Who should attend MBLC webinars?

• MBLC school teams and interested staff
• Friends of the MBLC

Thursday, Oct 12, 9:30 - 11:00 AM

Leaders Community of Practice REGISTER NOW!

In our first quarterly meetings, leaders of the MBL work at the school level (principal +1) will talk about the MBLC team as the engine of change in the school. We will share successes, troubleshoot problems, and exchange resources. The Community of Practice is a key part of our support system as we take this journey together with educational equity as our guiding value.

What will we do in our meetings?

• Share programs, documents, or policies and give feedback
• Discuss dilemmas/problems of practice
• Analyze student work generated in different schools
• Read or view and discuss resources together

Who should sign up?

• Principals in MBLC schools
• (optional) one additional person who is also taking a leadership role in your school’s MBLC group is welcome to join

Online events later this fall:

• Thursday, Nov 2, 3:45 PM - 4:45 PM: Webinar 14 💟 Registration and more info coming soon at bit.ly/MBLCsite.
• Tuesday, Nov 28, 3:30 - 5:00 PM: PLC Session 2 REGISTER NOW!
• Tuesday, Dec 5, 9:30 - 11:00 AM: Leaders Community of Practice Session 2 REGISTER NOW!

In person events Tuesday, October 24, 2023   | 10:00 a.m. - 3:30 p.m. Fall Community Gathering  REGISTER NOW! (Registration closes October 12!) Location: The Club at Snoqualmie Ridge, 36005 SE Ridge St, Snoqualmie, WA 98065 At this event we'll focus together on: Welcome and Introductions MBLC Building Blocks: Touching Base with our Implementation Steps & with the Principles & Practices of CRS MBL (These resources are newly updated based on your feedback). Implementation Workshops Working Lunch: School Team Action Planning Professional Learning Communities (PLCs—read on for more details*) School Team Huddle and Pair Share with another School Closing * More on PLCs: At the Fall Gathering, we will hold PLC Session 1 in person. Last year, school MBLC teams were grouped together in PLCs. This year's PLCs are interest-driven. Each member of your MBLC team is invited to choose which PLC to attend. You and your MBLC team colleagues can decide among yourselves if you want to be all together in one PLC, or spread out and share back to each other. As you consider which PLC to join, we encourage you to communicate with your MBLC team about what will serve your and your school's MBLC work best.          Interest-driven PLC Choices for the 2023-24 school year: Project-based Unit/Assessment Design for MBL: This PLC will be a space where teachers can share learning, questions, dilemmas and successes in crafting project-based units or assessments. We will learn about and explore how to craft projects that are culturally responsive and that enable students to explore ideas and develop criticality while building academic skills. We also discuss and share ideas about how to integrate mastery-based approaches into projects. Grading for Accuracy and Equity: This PLC will be a space where educators and school leaders can explore culturally responsive-sustaining, mastery-based approaches to feedback and grading. Participants will explore tools and systems together, discuss challenges and dilemmas, and share resources. Youth Leadership and Agency: What are youth leadership and agency? How can we partner with young people in our MBLC work, foster youth leadership and agency, and effectively invite and act on meaningful, ongoing input from the students we put at the center of our innovations? PLC participants will engage in action research in partnership with students to inform the MBLC change process in our schools and classrooms.

External events: At MTC’s 2023 Symposium October 2-3 in Boston, you will have the opportunity to utilize tools, exchange user stories, and learn more about mapping your route to competency-based learning. Learn more and register here mastery.org/what-we-do/2023-symposium/

Aurora Institute Symposium, the leading national conference for K-12 competency-based learning, is coming October 15-17 in Palm Springs, CA. https://aurora-institute.org/symposium2023/attend/ The MBLC will be well-represented among presenters at this event! Our sessions: Student-Centered Learning and Culturally Responsive-Sustaining Education: Sunday, October 15, 2023, 9:00 am - 12:00 pm PT Sui-Lan Ho’okano, Cultural Program Director from Enumclaw School District; Joy Nolan from New Learning Collaborative, LLC Increasing Capacity and Support for Mastery-Based Learning (MBL) in Washington State Through the MBL Collaborative: Moving Practice to Policy: Tuesday, October 17, 2023, 9:45 am - 10:45 am PT Alissa Muller, Seema Bahl, Washington State Board of Education; Joy Nolan, New Learning Collaborative, LLC; Kate Gardoqui, Great Schools Partnership; Michael Nguyen, Washington Professional Educator Standards Board; Eliot Levine, Aurora Institute

Read this, watch that!

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

We’re excited to share another school profile from Chris Sturgis of CompetencyWorks fame. This profile features MBLC member Avanti High School in Olympia. Read about their well developed, learner-centered approach to educational equity, justice, and project-based learning. bit.ly/AvantiHS_MBLCProfile. 

Tumwater Middle Schools in the news! 

This short article and short video share MBLC member Tumwater School District’s hands-on, career-oriented summer school courses, including drone piloting and architecture—it's wonderful to see this work happening, and also to see student’s positive reactions. 

Tumwater middle schools try new approach in science classes after pandemic To re-engage students, teachers are turning to more hands-on learning.

What Beliefs are the Bedrock of Your Competency-Based System? - Aurora Institute

This CompetencyWorks post from Chris Sturgis shares a set of 10 bedrock principles/beliefs created by a Technical Advisory Group of leaders and educators from around the United States, who have deep experience in MBL. You can use these 10 thought-provoking and powerful principles as an opportunity for discourse and reflection, and decision-making. What are the stated and unstated bedrock beliefs of the MBL system your school is building?

These Educator Competencies for Culturally Responsive-Sustaining Education come from Pennsylvania’s Department of Education. They offer another worthwhile opportunity for reflection and staff discussion.

In this 68-second video, Trabian Shorters, CEO of BMe Community, shares his definition of asset framing and its importance for creating equity for all members of our community. Trabian Shorters: Define People by Their Aspirations, Not Their Challenges

Here’s a short podcast episode (about 15 minutes, all solid gold) on belonging from the Culturally Responsive teaching and the Brain Podcast with Zaretta Hammond. It is well worth a listen as you work on building trust and belonging with students whom you may experience as most unlike yourself. Episode 10: Four Tips for Building Trust as an Extension of Belonging

Let’s go to the tapes! More goodness from Zaretta Hammond. This 2-minute video describes how video recording your classroom interactions can help you and your students reflect on support for independent, productive struggle. Zaretta Hammond: Why Teachers Should Videotape Students' Productive Struggle #PLtogether

The Learner-Centered Competency-Based Learning Management System This post from Getting Smart lays out core criteria that any next-generation LMS should incorporate. If you’re considering switching to a new LMS platform, this read is for you. Note that this piece covers LMSs, and does not mention the widely used tool JumpRope, a grading tracker that is widely used in mastery-/competency-based schools.

MBLC Event archive Our growing event archive on the MBLC Community Site is a treasure trove of recordings and resources from past events.

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. 

Mon-Tues, August 7-8  | MBLC Summer Institute 2023 

Green River College, Auburn, WA More than 100 MBLC members and friends engaged in hands-on/interactive learning and planning at our two-day MBLC Summer Institute! Each participant set a personal intention for the coming school year (see examples below), and attended their choice of two high-interest workshop series meant to build capacity and offer planning time at the classroom level or the school wide level.

Some participants’ intentions for this school year:

• I intend to create clear outcomes and authentic assessments in all math pathways—because it creates more transparency, and allows students to be more active in their own learning.
• I intend to design an equitable grading system aligned to learning outcomes—because our students need fair and justified grading that can be seen across each core subject.
• I intend to focus on fostering a true sense of belonging for each and every member of our learning community—because our students and staff have said that should be out focus.
• I intend to make our MBLC purpose, goals, and criteria more transparent for teachers, students, parents, and the community—because to some degree, our students and parents have seen school as a game where there is a secret path to get to the end.

Gold strand: Teaching and Learning - MBL/CRSE unit planning workshops

Transform a familiar unit or build a new unit that

• features clear and meaningful learning outcomes & success criteria
• invites students to use their interests and life experience
• features rich and active learning
• communicates clear expectations
• Offers responsive supports (rubrics and timely feedback)
• Rich, authentic assessments/demonstrations of proficiency, and multiple “at bats”

Green strand: Workshops on school change, tuned to the MBLC vision Plan for sustainable, high-quality, more equitable schoolwide systems that

• Build and nurture shared understanding and capacity
• Manage human-first change 
• Shift mind-sets about teaching and learning across the school community
• Transform school culture and systems

Summer Institute Participants said: 

• Activities were well paced. I appreciated the time for group work..
• I enjoyed the breakout sessions where we were able to work with small groups. Learning new ideas really helped expand my own ideas for this upcoming school year!
• Fantastic to catch up with people and re-center on our process.
• It is important to connect with other educators to continue the work with the implementation of MBL/PBL to discuss what is working and what is not working.
• I’m now thinking about youth councils to explore better how to meet their needs in the building. What can we do to make these safe spaces for kids to speak?
• How do we make this happen in a large school?
• The PLC time was awesome. Lots of work completed. Thank you.

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

Dear Embee Elsie:

As we begin a new school year as an MBLC school, our staff are full of ideas and to-do lists for changes we want to make. We’re creating a system of learning outcomes, and designing glow/grow rubrics for the outcomes. Two departments are focusing on developing authentic performance assessments. We’re talking with students in hopes of gaining some youth advisor partners, and a big focus of professional learning is building cultural competence as a staff. You get the idea! I could add about 10 more priorities to this list. But as you know, our school building and our work hours fill up with children every day—so here are my two questions:

• How can we find time to do this work without getting wiped out?
• How should we spend the finite planning/collaboration time we do have?

Thanks!—Busy but Inspired MBLC teacher

Dear Busy but Inspired:

Thanks for this question—and for all the rich work your school is doing. We appreciate you so much for working together on powerful learning and healthy school culture. Part of doing transformative work is avoiding burnout, so we are glad you wrote in.

Here are some ideas:

• We hope you’re using your MBLC grant funding for in-house professional learning that supports the work you’re doing, and paying staff members who are working on implementation shifts outside their contracted hours. Another powerful use of funding is to hire subs for small groups of teachers so they can have an in-house retreat to collaborate for a full day.
• Focusing and prioritizing is vital. Keep a “parking lot” of changes you and your team want to work on—just because you realize something needs doing does not mean it has to be done this week. Great things take time! 
• Some schools are finding it useful to create committees to work on specific aspects of the work. The committees can come together to “jigsaw” what’s happening so everyone stays in the loop, without getting overwhelmed by being part of every aspect of the work.
• Celebrate progress and affirming moments along the way. Did someone just finish teaching a newly designed unit based on learning outcomes and culturally responsive-sustaining practices? Did a student say they loved a classroom conversation, or show brilliantly how they learned a new skill? A round of applause or snaps, or a yummy snack in a team meeting is a great way to recognize wins like these. We suggest making a regular practice of sharing out “What’s going well?” when you meet as a team.

• Lean into support from the MBLC coach for your school. Your coach can share examples so you don’t have to reinvent the wheel on your outcomes and rubrics, and other aspects of the work. They can help you strategize—and can bring an outside perspective, active support, and a round of their own applause for the progress and accomplishments they see happening at your school.

Now you’ve inspired me, busy person! Thank you.

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