Congratulations to the Class of 2024
t’s always a joyful moment to celebrate with graduating seniors and their families. This year was especially poignant at Mann UCLA Community School as the inaugural 6th grade class walked the stage. Addressing their peers, graduation speakers Ashley Hernandez, Emily Hernandez, and Isabel Pedroza-Flores (pictured above) offered sage advice, thanked their teachers and families, and expressed their hopes for the future. All three students are heading to UCLA in the fall. At the RFK UCLA Community School, 108 seniors and their families joined in the Cocoanut Grove to celebrate the milestone together. Student speakers included Leo Molina and Nury Eloisa Salazar Ibanez who eloquently shared, in Spanish and in English, their journeys and reflected on the support they received from their families, teachers, and community.
CCSPP Empower Summit 2024
The State Transformational Assistance Center (S-TAC), led by the UCLA Center for Community Schooling, Alameda County Office of Education, the National Education Association and Californians for Justice, hosted the Community Schools Empower Summit in Hollywood on June 13th and 14th. The successful summit drew over 1,300 participants from across California, including students, parents, educators, and representatives from over 350 California Community Schools Partnership Program grantees. The two-day event included a powerful keynote address that featured Ericka Huggins, former director of the Oakland Community School, and students.
Based on statewide data from schools and districts participating in the historic California Community Schools Partnership Program (CCSPP), the California Community Schools in Action blog series shares how community schools are reshaping the educational landscape.
In this third post we explore the progress of CCSPP grantees as they work to transform the classroom experiences and improve the learning outcomes of our young people. We examine the implementation of community-based learning strategies across the 450 schools that comprise the first cohort of grantees, based on Annual Progress Report responses. We also highlight some bright spots across the state that are prioritizing community-based teaching and learning in their community schools.
CCSPP Cohort 3 Grantees Announced
On May 8th, the California State Board of Education approved Cohort 3 California Community Schools Partnership Program (CCSPP) Implementation Grant Awards. Representing regions from across the state–from Shasta County to Southern California–a total of 288 awards were made which will support approximately 1000 schools to deepen their commitment to community schooling. Today, with the support of CCSPP grants, over 2000 schools in California are engaged in transforming their schools to community schools. To learn more about the work of CCSPP grantees, click here.
Measuring What Matters: A White Paper
California’s historic $4.1B investment in community schools presents an extraordinary opportunity to collect and use multiple measures of implementation quality and whole-child outcomes. This white paper charts a path for combining state and local measures to inform the development, monitoring, and improvement of community schooling across California.