Social and Emotional Learning Community of Practice Services

Build a social-emotional learning (SEL) community of practice for your county office of education.

PCY is offering expert consultation to county offices of education to launch or improve SEL communities of practice (CoP) to bolster locally led equity-driven SEL supports, particularly in response to the COVID-19 pandemic. Our goal is to advance more equitable outcomes for all of California’s students, and our work is grounded in the science of learning and development, which tells us all learning is social and emotional.

Who are we?

Partnership for Children & Youth (PCY) is a statewide intermediary organization that advances state policy and investment and builds educator capacity around expanded learning opportunities, SEL, and community school strategies. PCY has a long history of supporting SEL in California, including co-leading the California Department of Education’s State SEL Team from 2016 to 2019, which developed the California SEL Guiding Principles; founding and leading the SEL-focused 360°/365 Professional Learning Community; advising the SEL Statewide Community of Practice; and leading the Northern California County Office Community of Practice.

Why County Offices of Education?

Because of the central role county offices play in providing support to districts and schools, PCY’s services focus on advancing implementation of high-quality, evidence-based, equity-focused systemic SEL at the district and school level through building the capacity of county offices via professional and peer learning. In particular, PCY seeks to engage small to medium county offices across the state, with a special focus on rural counties, given the historic need to bolster capacity in those areas. PCY can support individual county offices to launch CoPs or groups of small county offices to form multi-county CoPs.

Services

Advancing equity is the foundation of PCY’s consulting services and our consultants center a commitment to children furthest from opportunity as they partner with county offices.

PCY will provide a dedicated expert consultant to co-design and guide a process to enhance the success of a county office SEL community of practice that is contextualized in your region.

Consultants bring technical expertise in adult learning, cross-community sharing, facilitation, SEL in adults and students, and fostering equitable, supportive learning environments.
In addition to serving as the primary process guide, consultants will broker expert speakers and additional technical assistance that is responsive to your CoP’s needs.

10 Principles of SEL Communities of Practice

PCY supports county offices to create meaningful, dynamic communities of practice that advance educational equity by cultivating mindsets that value emotions and relationships and examine biases. The CoP process supports adopting different ways of being, leading, and teaching that are more just, compassionate, and socially and emotionally skilled. The CoP will be guided by the following principles and activities:

Shared values, vision, and language. Together, participants will establish norms and guidelines—including overarching goals, commitment, and accountability—for active participation and establish a shared, research-based, culturally responsive definition of SEL.
SEL in service of equity. Participants will utilize SEL as a gateway to discussions are leading and teaching with an anti-racist lens, addressing racial and other biases, and advancing anti-racist policies.
Walking the talk. Facilitators will establish a space grounded on mutual trust and respect. Virtual gathering best practices and SEL-enhancing structures and experiences will be modeled throughout. A strong focus will be placed on wellbeing and stress management through daily practices.
Collaboration. Participants will have opportunities to work within their own county and district teams, as well as across teams to share promising practices, discuss experiences, and advance action.
Responsive focus. Meeting agendas will be responsive to teaching and learning during the COVID-19 pandemic and the movement for racial justice, with a focus on the most time-sensitive issues facing our school systems and SEL’s role in those realities. For example, interrupted instruction, distance/hybrid learning, and elevating voices of Black, brown, and other marginalized communities.
‘Unsiloing’ and integration. Using an integrated systems thinking lens, participants will learn how to position SEL within an MTSS framework and concretely align and integrate with other efforts. For example, equity initiatives, culturally responsive teaching, PBIS, restorative practices, trauma-informed/healing-centered classrooms, academics, and all professional learning.
Reflective, outcomes-focused practice. Meetings will include opportunities for teams to engage in ongoing dialogue to share insights, successes, challenges, and build concrete plans. Meetings will be well-structured and provide ample time for teams to collaborate, reflect, and address participants’ goals.
Leveraging capacity and resources. Participants will make strategic connections between other California SEL CoPs, including other counties, regions, and the state CoP to optimize learning, share tools, and remain aligned with connected simultaneous efforts.
Focus on California’s SEL assets. Participants will become familiar with and make plans to operationalize California’s SEL Guiding Principles in service of building adult, student, family, and community social and emotional capacity.
Continuous improvement lens. Participants will focus on enhancing data-driven continuous improvement in order to monitor implementation and outcomes, as appropriate. Frequent feedback surveys and co-planning will be used to ensure CoP quality.

Phases of Support

PCY will support the launch and early phases of your monthly community of practice, and build the capacity of county or regional teams to sustainably support the effort long term. PCY will support three phases of work:

PHASE I: READINESS CHECK AND PLANNING

Driving Questions: How best is your region served and what are the SEL and equity assets available that the CoP can leverage and build on? What are the immediate needs in order to launch a CoP?

Quickly assess the readiness of counties or regions to launch a virtual SEL CoP and provide pre-launch recommendations to maximize assets and successes.
Provide guidance on who county offices should invite to join the CoP team, including representatives from academics, health, expanded learning, counseling, and other pertinent stakeholder groups and support outreach.

PHASE II: LAUNCH AND STEWARDSHIP

Driving Questions: What is SEL and what does it look like when grounded in equity? How can SEL in service of equity be centered at every level of the system? What does it look like to lead and teach through the lens of SEL and equity in an ongoing way? In what areas does your county office or region most need to build capacity?

Inform CoP design and structure, based on context and experience gathered from other county-led CoPs.
Collaborate with local teams to build a dynamic scope and sequence for professional learning around SEL.
Support development of turnkey agendas, presentation materials, tools, and resources for CoP gatherings that can be used with districts and schools.
Provide a well-organized repository for content, meeting materials, and templates.
Provide templates for public-facing communication tools and marketing collateral.
Schedule and host gatherings in partnership with county offices, as needed.
Deliver presentations and provide technical assistance on topics such as applying the principles of SEL and equity to leadership, how to use SEL to unlock conversations about race and inequity, integrating SEL into academics and throughout the school day, and embedding SEL and wellbeing into all professional learning and team meetings.
Broker guest speakers that are most relevant to local contexts and just-in-time needs.
Facilitate presentations and/or peer coaching by district and county office-based experts from across the state who have particular areas of expertise and experience, as available.

PHASE III: GRADUAL RELEASE

Driving Questions: Taking stock of the capacity that has been build, what does it look like to sustainably continue the CoP?

Collaborate with the county team to develop a gradual release plan, whereby local team members take over leadership and management of their monthly CoP.
Provide ongoing light-touch support and facilitate cross-CoP learning through sharing resources and other communication tools.

Cost

PCY will tailor pricing for each engagement based on agreed upon scope, service, and timeline. Our intent is to be flexible and accommodating in order to meet the needs of county office teams and the educators you serve. We are happy to engage in dialogue to collaboratively identify funding to support the work based on local circumstances. For example, in our North State SEL Community of Practice, multiple county offices of education will be contributing a small portion of the funds they will receive through California’s new FEMA grant that is targeted to SEL work. We encourage counties to pool resources, which also enables broader peer learning and relationships.

Contact

For more information, please contact support@partnerforchildren.org