 Welcome to In the Studio. Today's theme is equity in education, and I'm Tom Adams, a member of the Davis School Board. Equity in education is the challenge for all schools and classrooms throughout the state and Yolo County, and Yolo County is no exception. The forthcoming dashboard, the new accountability tool, will show many districts, even the most successful ones, will need to improve efforts in addressing the needs of English learners, fostering homeless youth, students with disabilities, and students of poverty. With me today to discuss this issue in education is Garth Lewis, assistant superintendent and incoming superintendent of Yolo County Office of Education, Jackie Wong, school board member in Washington Unified, Kevin Williams, classroom teacher at Davis Senior High School and creator of the Race and Social Justice curriculum. So with this theme, what I want our panelists to think about is what do you see as the immediate need to address in Yolo County, specifically in terms of either the classroom as a school board member or in terms of the Yolo County Office of Education? I would say the first thing that I, as a classroom teacher that needs to be addressed is just awareness among our student population, especially I teach at Davis Senior High School and while our student community is very diverse, I think the vast majority of students don't think it is diverse or they don't see that diversity. And the biggest challenge for me as a teacher is getting them to be aware that these issues that you mentioned in the opening exist not only on our campus but within our classroom, within their peer groups. It can be delicate in how to do that, but with the Race and Social Justice curriculum, it's built in and it is kind of part of what we do during the year. As a matter of fact, that's part of what we're tackling right now in classes, beginning to think about these issues that you brought up and how do we investigate the extent to which they exist on our campus and in our community. So you find your students are pretty welcoming once they're faced with the challenge and willing to delve into these issues. Absolutely. They're very welcoming but as with adults and students, it's a matter of education. It's a matter of the very first thing you need to do is make them aware that it's there and then you have to begin teaching. So the making them aware is probably the easiest part. It's how you get them to deal with meaningful change or what they can do on campus as students but also encouraging adults on campus, teachers and administrators to take on and do the heavy lifting to help these underrepresented groups. That's great. So Jackie, you're on a school board. So taking a broader view in terms of working at the district level and being a board member, what do you see from your perspective? So stepping back a little bit, I think that it does start in the classroom but I actually ran off of fulfilling the promise of the local control funding formula which is actually California's major education reform system so that we would focus on the population that you had outlined in the opening statement. Washington Unified has the benefit of being selected as one of the California School Board Association equity network partners and kind of diving deep at that school board level, how do we as leadership and governing board fulfill this promise and understand the data and how do we actually authentically engage community partners with kind of the diverse backgrounds that they have including students and tell the story of the data in a way where people don't feel left behind. Diversity is the beginning. What we're learning about from each other in the SESB equity network is that the root cause is racism, right? The institutional racism that has been created long before we were on boards or in the classroom, right? How do we unpack that in a way and tell the story of what we see today in terms of educational inequities that exist within the system, academic or otherwise or social emotional are rooted in that and begin to use the data to unpack that to invest in a way, strategically invest in a way that will actually produce the changes that we want as intended by the local control funding formula. So for me is I think that a lot of times at the school board level what I'm seeing is that folks are so used to the NCLB punishment model of using the data in the way where you would reconstitute classrooms and you would close down school districts and historically I have worked in one of those school districts and that's just not very uplifting at all. When you actually think about the opportunity at LCFF is that it should be community-centered, student-centered practice but using the data in a way so that we as school board members invest in a way that builds upon the strengths of our classrooms, our communities and our teachers, right? And so using that as a continuous cycle of improvement, understanding what equity means, why are some of our students of certain demographics being suspended and pushed out more than other students even though we may have diverse cultures on campus, talking about it is the beginning but then we have the responsibility as a governing board to unpack that data in a way that makes it very transparent to the public and actually engaging the public and bringing them into our school district and our LCAP planning so local control accountability plan efforts so that we make the right investments that's community-driven to change that for our students. So that's from my lens the opportunity before us. So when the dashboard comes out in December do you think there'll be any surprises or are you pretty much anticipating results that you've seen in your assessment data? So we there aren't from my lens there aren't a lot of surprises and I think that the having seen some of the kind of what might be coming out that it makes it a little bit more transparent for the public. So the question for us as a school board is how do you take that and maybe actually bring it to the community forums that we are having coming up to explain it to the community, the students and others about what this really means right and this is actually a look back so remember the data is based on past performance right so the incoming cohort of students isn't necessarily that that isn't the data of the students that you're teaching right now. So again how do we use it and reiterate the fact that it's a planning tool right to fully engage and be transparent with where we are in terms of educational progress for all of our students because we want all of our students to succeed right but if we own if we don't unpack the data we will continue to perpetuate the systemic kind of inequities that have existed again as I've mentioned before us. So for me the dashboard I think I'm hopeful but it takes really kind of what you were saying is like we need to kind of go to the core of why we're doing this and have a really deep understanding of LCFF and equity from our personal kind of where we are rooted and then that translates to our staff and and and so on and so forth yeah so Garth what do you have you're now at the county level so you know what how would what would you add to this in terms of county role. So one thing is that I think about this work with sort of two things in mind one is a quote from Edward Deming who stated that every system is designed to get it to get the exact results that is that it's getting right so that's that's one issue and then the other is the definition of equity that I'm borrowing from Dr. Jeff Andrade which paraphrasing essentially is calling us to give people what they need when they need it right so there's a timeliness that's that's associated with this work and so as I think about the the first quote as it relates to the system I am not going to be surprised about the results that we're getting because they historically we've seen the same student groups in as we as it relates to outcomes educational outcomes whether it's on the top end of the spectrum related to graduation rates or college and career readiness or the idea of who's at the top as relates to reading and math scores and those who are in in the most need historically that that particular demographic those demographic outcomes have not shifted significantly as a as a system and so for for us from a county perspective the big question is how do we support system leaders in really in interrogating their system practices the leadership practices and what the data are telling us that we need to to shift in those practices in order to get a different result right and so the and in addition to the accountability measures that have been identified by the state and that will be shared in this this upcoming release what are the other data that we need to take a look at that should also inform our practice primarily I think about this in terms of qualitative data as well and so taking a look at how are we engaging with those that we intend to serve the youth the families and taking into account those lived experiences in how our systems adjust the the methodology that we utilize at the classroom level and the leadership decision-making level and one of the one of the structures that we are using at the County Office of Education to engage in this work is the professional learning network right PLN where we engage with district superintendents and their executive leadership in really again interrogating best practices looking for root causes and being vulnerable and explicit about the work that we need to do in order to reach those those populations that historically we haven't done a great job with in public education right so I mean this is real interesting for me in terms of we've talked about interrogating practices meaning you know really kind of mapping out what what you are doing are you getting the intended results we've talked about root cause analysis and so and then we talk about supporting the teachers ourselves and so I'm just wondering in terms of what do you all of you see as kind of the new initiatives are new practices we should actually start doing based upon the data that we have now and will be coming out I mean how will it how will it change your practice well I'll say one of the areas that we are looking to do a better job in is really looking for impact so as a County Office of Education one of the things that we do consistently is offer professional learning opportunities as well as convenings of various stakeholders related to specific themes so for example on October 30th we partnered to host the building of resilient YOLO Summit engaging stakeholders from various youth and family-serving agencies and entities where we need to really improve our practice is looking for impact on their practice right so as a consequence of participating in a professional learning experience how do we tie that learning experience from the professional to what actually has happening in the classroom we know from research that the that the the largest effect size largest predictor for student outcomes and and increase student academic achievement is the efficacy of that classroom teacher right and so one of the areas that we will be exploring and for our own accountability as a County Office of Education is how do we ensure that the methodology we're using for professional learning actually supports improvement of practice okay at the classroom level so Jacqueline real quickly what do you think Washington Unified will do to address this we actually echo that sentiment we actually made a major investment these past couple years on professional development ensuring that our classroom teachers get the time that actually a lot of students are requesting with one another to learn best practices and to look at the data and to share kind of what they know to be you know to be to support improvement for their students so that I really do echo that really yeah that I think that's that's key right we we need to support our both are actually classified and certificated right we need to hear from them we needed they are the leaders in those classrooms they know what those students need and so creating kind of set time every single Wednesday for us we've made that investment in our teachers in in addition to that we've actually also when we've looked at the data we've looked we we understand that we needed to improve in our special education subgroup as well as their English language learner subgroup so we've actually restructured that to make sure that it's aligned with the best practices both both in special education and English language learners we've made a significant investments monetarily in our LCAP and we design both programs because a couple years ago we looked at the data we knew that we needed to do something different so Kevin how do we help you best well it's been really interesting to listen to both of you Garth and Jackie because what I think hearing what you're saying is what we should be asking our students to do your very reflective people your jobs ask you to reflect on data and trends try new things that aren't working that have tried new things because things haven't been working in the past and I don't think as classroom teachers we do that enough I'm not even talking about reflecting on on my what I do as a teacher but asking students to it should be built into a social studies classroom that there's an applied nature to it you're learning all this for reasons because so you can solve problems and I think in the especially in in the climate that we live in the political climate of the 21st century that we need to engage active learners and take something like the dashboard that you've been talking about I don't know what that is and I think it sounds like it's got some great data in it that students might especially in the RSA classroom be able to look at and see trends that could click on to their brain into their brains and go that's something I'm seeing on campus and we've got this we you know because in RSA they go out and they do surveys they they they investigate the nature of problems they create date they get databases that you almost have like an army of survey writer or data collectors on campus and they care so much about it and I think what we need I would like to see us do is marry make it more visible to to teachers and students what you do and maybe make that connection so that we're not I think we might be doing the same things but not knowing that we're doing the same things I mean you're doing them in a much deeper way than I'm doing it but one one other thing I think of asking students to do some of that investigation is it empowers them to see themselves as changers of the community and the environments that they live in and as a teacher there I always say it's the most proud moment every year when they present their data because you see that they've owned something that they've created that they've had a part of which is a lot deeper learning than I can regurgitate information from a textbook or a lecture so unfortunately we're running out of time but if I could just kind of summarize for all of us I think we're realizing that none of these problems can be resolved by any one entity or one person it takes really a community effort is what I've heard whether it be educational leadership at the county level the important role of trustees and explaining these issues to the public and bringing parents along and then the important role of the teacher inspiring students to address these so thank you all of you Garth and Jackie and Kevin this has been a very nice forum and definitely stimulating we could have gone on longer but if you have any questions feel free to write me and I'll be happy to forward them to our guests and get your questions answered that in terms of the this issue of equity and education definitely we'll be there with Yolo County Washington Unified Davis Joint Unified and all other schools in Yolo County addressing the great needs of it resolving inequities in our system and making sure that we have a fair and free education for all our students so thank you and thank you for tuning in to in the studio