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West Wind’s 10th Anniversary: A Time to Give Back

Posted on August 15, 2011August 19, 2011 by Mandi Bozarth

Reading Time: 2 minutes

This year West Wind Education Policy, Inc. is celebrating its 10^th anniversary. To honor the goals and purposes of West Wind, staff chose to celebrate by completing service projects in our community to support local K-12 education. In June, the West Wind team assisted the Mayor’s Youth Empowerment (MYEP) and Fast Trac Program as they transitioned into a new building. MYEP provides day-habilitation, respite, residential, after school and summer care opportunities for youth and adults with disabilities. The Fast Trac Program provides support for youth in grades 4 through 12, bringing together teachers, community leaders, families and students to provide activities, events, mentoring and academic guidance to students. The Fast Trac program offers the following as a statement of purpose:

“Our goal is change. Giving students a reason to change has always been the missing piece in motivating students to focus on their education. Since the FasTrac Program began, these students have exceeded all expectations set by themselves and by their parents. This program has grown from six original African-American students to currently over 100 students of all ethnic backgrounds. Additionally, the program assists students in 4th through 12th grade, now with a program for elementary school students, FasTrac-E, which follows each student in the program beginning in 4th grade, all the way through their high school career.”

MYEP and Fast Trac are amazing organizations, getting wonderful results for students. When we arrived, the staff was busy preparing materials for students and moving equipment through the rooms. Donated art work had been hung on the wall; games, books, and toys filled the rooms; foosball tables and televisions were available as well as school and art supplies. We spent the morning wiping out bins, locating missing puzzle pieces, dusting furniture, arranging books, and even moving a very heavy foosball table.

On the morning of August 3 the West Wind team joined other volunteers and organizers from To Gather Together, a local organization that gathers donations to buy school supplies from churches, individuals, businesses, and social services agencies. To Gather Together provides school supplies to over 3,000 children in Johnson County, Iowa. West Wind staff assisted by counting out supplies such as crayons, markers, folders, and paper. We sorted the supplies into stacks for specific schools and teams of volunteers delivered these the next day.

West Wind wants to offer our thanks to both the Mayor’s Youth Empowerment/Fast Trac Programs and To Gather Together for providing us the opportunity to support them in their work. Both of these programs are an amazing asset to our community and the staff and volunteers who make these programs function deserve a round of applause for their hard work and dedication to education for all children. Thank you on behalf of the West Wind team. It is heartening to work with individuals on the ground dedicated to educational opportunities for each and every child.

Best Practices for Organizing Online Communities of Practice

Posted on August 5, 2011October 10, 2019 by West Wind

Reading Time: < 1 minute

[box class=”grey_box”]Written by Mandi Bozarth, Alyssa Rodriguez, and Circe Stumbo[/box]

This document discusses the “Best Practices” for managing an online collaboration site in support of professional communities of practice. Collaboration sites can provide professionals the space to work together across great distances in real time, allowing for work to be shared with immediacy, critiques to be offered in a timely way, and professional networks to be enhanced meaningfully across organizations.

Download the Document (PDF)

How Adults Learn: What Do Reformers Need to Know?

Posted on August 4, 2011August 4, 2011 by Deb Hansen

Reading Time: 3 minutes

The West Wind Education Policy web site describes our work in the area of knowledge building and professional development as being based on theories of andragogy–or adult learning. The study of adult learning theory and experience in designing and supporting professional development for educators has taught us a lot about the way teachers and school leaders learn when engaging in professional growth experiences. Andragogy theories suggest that adults need to learn experientially and to be actively involved in the planning and evaluation of their instruction. We know that adults learn best when the topic is of immediate value. We know that experience (including mistakes) provides the basis for effective learning activities and that problem-centered learning rather than content-oriented learning is more meaningful to the adult. Educators, like all other adult learners bring with them a reservoir of experiences, but they also bring extensive doubts and fears to the educational process. Well-designed learning establishes an environment where each learner feels safe and supported, where the individual’s needs and uniqueness are honored, and where the participant’s abilities and life achievements are acknowledged and respected. A productive learning environment encourages experimentation and creativity, while fostering intellectual freedom.

Carrie Leana, a researcher from the University of Pittsburgh studied the influence of human and social capital in school settings. Her research suggests that social capital thrives in an atmosphere of mutual trust and collective practice. According to Leana, a school climate that is characterized by trust provides an environment where teachers routinely talk to each other, share the same norms, and hold strong agreement in their descriptions of their school’s culture. Her findings suggest that a trusting climate is more important than the teacher education level, teacher certification, or other human capital measures in predicting student achievement scores.

As federal, state, and local district leaders establish policies that seek to improve educator effectiveness, they are advancing requirements that are intended to change practices in human capital management. Reforms being considered aim at raising standards, ensuring that mentoring and induction supports are in place, offering quality professional development, and improving teacher preparation and performance evaluation systems. If these reforms are going to make a difference, the designers and implementers should consider how the intended and unintended consequences will impact the learning environment for educators. Those responsible for leading reforms should ask questions such as:

• Will reforms provide the infrastructure and the necessary funding to provide intensive professional development?
• Are there policies in place that allocate adequate time for professional growth and collaboration?
• Will performance review processes offer meaningful, accurate, and timely feedback in a way that enhances reflection and supports continuous growth in a safe culture?
• Are educator effectiveness systems designed to contribute to a culture of inquiry, trust, and professional collaboration or is there a risk they will contribute to learning environments that are characterized by competition and norms that create distrust?
• Are teachers full partners in discussions and decision making about changes to the educator effectiveness systems?
• Once changes are implemented, are they evaluated to determine whether the intended outcomes are accomplished? Have any unintended consequences occurred?

For those of us involved in the work of knowledge building and supporting policy developers it is key that we keep asking ourselves this question: What can we do to help policy leaders learn about andragogy, as well as human and social capital so they can make thoughtful decisions about how to build the capacity of educators?

Knowles, M. S. et al (1984) Andragogy in Action. Applying modern principles of adult education, San Francisco: Jossey Bass. Web reference site of Nan B. Adams, PhD . Southeastern Louisiana University.

Retrieved from:
www2.selu.edu/Academics/Faculty/nadams/etec630&665/Knowles.html

Smith, M. K. (2002) ‘Malcolm Knowles, informal adult education, self-direction and andragogy’, the encyclopedia of informal education, Retrieved from www.infed.org/thinkers/et-knowl.htm.

Leana.C. (2010) Social Capital: The Collective Component of Teaching Quality Annenberg Institute for School Reform | Voices in Urban Education p 16-23. Retrieved from www.annenberginstitute.org/VUE/wp-content/pdf/VUE27_Leana.pdf

Eight Elements of High School Improvement

Posted on July 28, 2011October 10, 2019 by West Wind

Reading Time: 2 minutes

[box class=”grey_box”]Developed by the National High School Center at AIR, with contributions from Circe Stumbo[/box]

Download the Full Paper (PDF)

Research on comprehensive school reform suggests that improvement strategies have the best opportunity for success and sustainability when they take into account the broad array of elements that make up the system being improved. Yet, many current high school improvement initiatives are focused only on specific priority topics (e.g., dropout prevention), specific intervention strategies (e.g., advisories, small schools), or program initiatives (e.g., Check and Connect). Although such approaches can have an important impact, their reach is too frequently limited to a subset of systemic reform elements. Implementing such initiatives may lead to success in addressing specific needs, but the probability of widespread improvement is small when initiatives are implemented in isolation from the broader education systems within which they operate.

The National High School Center’s goal is to encourage researchers, policymakers, and practitioners at all levels to engage in comprehensive, systemic efforts to maximize attainment for all high school students, with a focus on those students who have been historically underserved. To this end, we have developed a framework that consists of eight core elements and provides a lens for mapping school, district, and state high school improvement efforts. The exercise of mapping should inform strategic planning and implementation efforts by illuminating the connections among elements, revealing strengths and gaps in current state and district policies, and highlighting the stakeholders who should be aware of and involved in future improvement efforts.

This document offers descriptions of the eight elements of high school improvement:

Rigorous Curriculum and Instruction
Teacher Effectiveness and Professional Growth
Stakeholder Engagement
Organization and Structure
Assessment and Accountability
Student and Family Involvement
Effective Leadership
Sustainability

Four points are important to note. First, the particular combination or separation of the elements is less significant than an understanding that these elements, which are often treated as discrete, actually are inter-related parts of a single system. Each element has an impact on the others, so understanding their interconnectivity is a critical task. Second, a major challenge of using this framework is the risk of overwhelming those involved in the work. Every high school improvement initiative does not need to have some activity in each of the elements at every moment. Rather, mapping the implications of an improvement initiative among all affected elements at the outset will lead to more strategic decisions initially and over time. Third, every high school and related high school improvement initiative is situated in a unique geographic, cultural, demographic, political, and societal context, which influences the school’s vision, mission, structure, culture, and outcomes. Any efforts at high school improvement must take into account these particular school- and system-level contexts. These considerations affect each element and must be explicitly addressed when improvement strategies are devised. Fourth, if scalable and sustainable improvement is the ultimate goal, it is likely that the implementation of improvement efforts will require organizational change. No strategy can be complete without attention to the challenges of leading change within the respective organizational cultures.

Download the Full Paper (PDF)

Interview with Dr. Cynthia Osborne, University of Texas

Posted on July 26, 2011October 10, 2019 by West Wind

Reading Time: < 1 minute

Reform strategies give opportunities and voice to students

Posted on July 15, 2011August 19, 2011 by Circe Stumbo

Reading Time: < 1 minute

The National High School Center this summer is modeling two strategies that are central to education reform efforts: first by providing community-based education opportunities for local youth and second by giving voice to that student experience.

NHSC’s parent organization American Institutes for Research is sponsoring a student employee through Washington DC’s Mayor’s Youth Leadership Institute (MYLI), a community program that provides learning and growth opportunities to DC youth. Daisha Hale, a 2011 graduate from Benjamin Banneker Academic Senior High School in Washington, DC, is working at AIR and last week published a post for the National High School Center’s High School Matters blog describing her experience with the MYLI.

West Wind is serving on the High School Matters blog editorial team and we are looking for high school students to contribute to the blog. West Wind also has been including local students and youth in our own programming, as well, such as our employment of students with disabilities through the local schools’ Transitions Service Center, serving as a mentor and Bronze Sponsor for Iowa City’s Fast Trac program, showcasing artwork by Tate High School students in our office gallery, and by inviting student contributors to our blog.

Can your organization provide community-based programs for students? Do you have structures—publications, meetings, etc.—where student voice should be present?

Muscatine to Host the Iowa Latino Conference

Posted on July 7, 2011July 7, 2011 by Alyssa Rodriguez

Reading Time: 2 minutes

The 13th Annual Iowa Latino Conference is scheduled for October 28-29, 2011 in Muscatine, Iowa. West Wind Education Policy Inc. has had the opportunity to offer volunteer support to the conference; I look forward to representing West Wind and helping plan the Friday Youth Leadership Development Summit to offer new opportunities for a young and growing population. Although I was born and raised an Iowan Latina, this is my first time being involved with the conference. Through its absence in my youth, I know how important this event will be for young Latinos to come together, network and embrace their potential as the future of Latinos in Iowa.

The conference and summit will feature keynote speaker, Michael Benitez Jr., a Ph.D. student at Iowa State University. Benitez, Jr. is a seasoned speaker on a multitude of topics including Chicanos/Latinos, Education, and Hip Hop. He is said to challenge “the complacency students grow used to and how institutions cultivate apathy among our youth”[1]. This will align perfectly to the summit’s “leadership” theme.

In addition to Benitez, Jr., there will be a morning college fair and catering (the conference hopes to showcase the many local Mexican food restaurants) during lunch. This is a great opportunity for Muscatine to display its community and embrace Latinos who make up 15%[2] of this city’s population while welcoming conference participants from across Iowa.

“Latinos are a growing part of our community, and I’m pleased to say that. The work ethic, caring and love they bring are qualities we desperately need in our community” said Bill Phelan, head of the Greater Muscatine Chamber of Commerce & Industry[3].

The conference is “the only opportunity for Latino leaders, artists and educators to come together as a community to learn and share their knowledge and talent with those who support and celebrate Latin American culture and traditions,” according to conference committee co-chair, Carlos Duran of Mobilizing Muscatine Excellence[4].

The Friday date for the Youth Summit serves Muscatine School District’s schedule well as there are no classes that day. Organizers are recruiting students from all around Iowa to attend. The opening day of the conference will also feature a Professional Development Institute (details forthcoming). On Saturday, October 29, the conference will be geared to all community members. You can find the latest information about the conference here.

[1] Speak Out! (2011, July 7). Michael Benitez Jr: Scholar and speaker integrating Hip Hop pedagogy and academic inquiry. Retrieved from http://www.speakoutnow.org/userdata_display.php?modin=50&uid=676

[2] Ferguson, Mike. (2011). Muscatine lands major Latino conference. The Muscatine Journal. Retrieved from http://muscatinejournal.com/news/local/article_dd7c71fc-9704-11e0-b42b-001cc4c03286.html

[3] Ibid.

[4] Ibid.

Thank You to All Our Para-Professionals

Posted on July 7, 2011July 7, 2011 by Mandi Bozarth

Reading Time: 3 minutes

Last month my mother, Sherry Bozarth, retired from 18 years in the Oklahoma public school system. She took a position in the school cafeteria when I was in junior high so that she would have the same schedule as my sister and I – and, I suspect, so that she could keep an eye on us. After several years, she became a para-professional, a position she held for 13 years. Para-professionals support special educational needs students in the classroom. Over the years she worked with a broad range of students with very different needs. And during that time, as I watched her grow within her career, I learned a lot about what it takes to offer education to all students.

I have worked with students with special educational needs as a teacher, a teacher’s assistant, and as a volunteer. I realize that providing these students with real, meaningful educational opportunities takes a great deal of time, effort, and patience. My mother worked year after year, taking part in professional development to keep abreast of new technologies and new pedagogical ideas, reading textbooks at home at night to make sure she had an individualized plan for her students, and standing up for the students she supported inside the classroom and within the school. She sometimes came home from work with bruises after a child had kicked or hit her in a difficult moment; several times I watched her cry when one of her students was ill or in trouble; and many times I heard stories about students spitting on her, yelling at her, or threatening her. But she never lost her dedication to those students and their right to an education. She took one of her students on a field trip to a renaissance fair in a city 60 miles away, because that was his dream. Every year she looked forward to the Special Olympics like no other person I know. In fact, sometimes after listening to her brag about the medals her students won my sister and I wondered if we needed to explain to her how the Special Olympics really work. All Special Olympic participants receive a medal and the top three receive gold, silver, and bronze medals; my mother never included the color of the medals in her success stories.

Each day she called me on her way home from work. Some days she was tired, but her passion for her education and her pride in the daily accomplishments of her students was always there.

It was my mother’s dream to work in the public school as an educator, so it is hardly surprising that she did so with such zeal and dedication. And that zeal is obvious when you run into one of her students. My mother worked in a school in a rural town of 1,000 people – the same school I attended from K-12 – so it is unavoidable that you run into her students everywhere you go. Just yesterday she told me that one of her students saw her getting out of her car and yelled her name until she came to say hello. She worked with one girl for several years and if you happen to see her in town she runs over and shares everything she has done since the last time she saw my mother. These students see what I see in her and so many educators in our schools—a true love of teaching and a pride in student achievement.

My mother’s dedication to equal educational opportunities for all students is something I see in our schools a lot, but it is not something we hear about in the news lately. Our teachers, principles and superintendents are key to strong school systems, and the support staff play an equal role. Strong support from a school’s para-professionals often makes the difference between a child with special educational needs receiving meaningful educational opportunities and a child moving through the system without the opportunity to grow.

So thank you Mom for all your hard work. I am proud of you. And thank you to all the dedicated para-professionals in our schools.

Portland School Board Adopts Racial Equity Policy

Posted on June 27, 2011June 27, 2011 by Circe Stumbo

Reading Time: 2 minutes

On June 13, the Portland (Oregon) School Board voted unanimously to adopt a Racial Equity Policy for the district. The Racial Equity Policy was supported by community and school leaders and, according to a district announcement, was met with applause during its first reading before the board on May 9.

The Racial Equity Policy acknowledges that Portland’s data is not unique (data from districts across the nation reveal similar racial disparities) and that complex societal and historical factors contribute to the inequities its students face. However, the Racial Equity Policy states:

Nonetheless, rather than perpetuating disparities, Portland Public Schools must address and overcome this inequity and institutional racism, providing all students with the support and opportunity to succeed. Portland Public Schools will significantly change its practices in order to achieve and maintain racial equity in education.

The Racial Equity Policy represents the progress of a district that has been telling what Superintendent Carole Smith called in her Guest Column in the Oregonian “the ‘brutual truth’ about factors that limit educational opportunities for our students, such as: inequity among our schools, classes that fail to meet the needs of all students and outdated ways of supporting better teaching.” Smith acknowledged that the district opened itself up for criticism when it began collaboratively analyzing data and asking difficult questions about race. However, she noted that the district gained something more important: “a better understanding of how to engage students at all grades and prepare them for a successful future.”

Congratulations to Portland Public Schools for telling the truth and to the Portland School Board for adopting a Racial Equity Policy that acknowledges and seeks to rectify that truth – not by scapegoating children of color, their families, and their communities but by accepting the responsibility to educate all of its students. We hope Portland will serve as a role model for other districts in addressing institutional racism and inequity, and we look forward to seeing how Portland’s Racial Equity Policy unfolds.

Image source: Portland Public Schools

Africa in an Afternoon Hits Home

Posted on June 15, 2011September 14, 2011 by Circe Stumbo

Reading Time: 3 minutes

I recently returned from my first trip beyond the borders of these United States. My son, who is 20, and I went to Spain with a couple of backpacks, a general idea of the cities we wanted to visit and no hotel or transportation reservations for the two weeks of our stay. During our time there knew we would visit Madrid, Barcelona, and Granada and the rest of our days were open for whatever adventures we might happen upon.

One morning we ventured south to Gibraltar, the British territory on the southern tip of Spain. Gibraltar, famed for the massive Rock of Gibraltar, which is really a small mountain in the midst of the flat waters where the Mediterranean Sea and Atlantic Ocean meet, is known as one of the Pillars of Hercules. Historically, the Pillars of Hercules mark the end of the known world and the entrance to the Straits of Gibraltar. With the Rock of Gibraltar as one Pillar, the other Pillar, is a mere 7 miles across the Straits, is in Africa. The exact location of the south Pillar is often disputed as there is not a physical monolith as distinct as the Rock of the northern Pillar.

Despite the fact that there is no monolith, the short distance across the Straits of Gibraltar to Morocco, Africa’s northernmost country, yields an irresistible and inviting view of its northern coast. So, we decided to go there. To Africa. For the afternoon. Because we could.

We hailed a cab and within an hour we were on a ferry, passports stamped, and were crossing the Straits for a leisurely afternoon in Africa. As the ferry crossed, a large foothill dominated the view–possibly the Southern Pillar? As we approached the coast, I could see on the side of the foothill very large Arabic lettering and wondered what it meant.

When I saw that sign the reality that we had just decided to go to Africa for the afternoon started settling in. I went from feeling excited to feeling sick. The closer we got, the more sick I felt. Why did I feel like this? Was it because in our hasty departure from Spain it had not occurred to me that I do not know a single word of Arabic, the language of our destination? Or was it that I had a one-way ferry ticket, only 40 euros in my pocket, and it was just occurring to me my credit cards were only authorized for use in Spain? For a second, it might have been some of that, but I knew between my son and I we had the problem-solving abilities and moxy to get us back to Spain.

That sick feeling persisted until I finally slept sometime the next morning (we did get back to Spain that night). I spent most of that afternoon in Africa, and many hours since, knowing that sick feeling was a result of suddenly realizing how cavalier I had been about getting to go to a place from which so many have been taken against their will.

Instead of spending that afternoon strolling the city and relaxing with some mint tea, the customary drink of Morocco, I spent it struggling in my thoughts with the global and historical context of my privilege and wishing I had been more thoughtful and intentional about that brief journey.

In the weeks that have since passed, the logistical details and mishaps of that day have become an entertaining anecdote as we share our stories of our trip with friends. More importantly, that brief journey has become part of my ongoing personal journey to understand my white privilege, both at home and beyond.