In this week’s post, I’d like to highlight our continued partnership with Alliance Renee & Meyer Luskin Academy. Luskin Academy opened in 2012, and currently serves 488 students for grades 9th – 12th in Los Angeles’ Hyde Park neighborhood. It is one of 25 middle and high schools that make up Alliance College-Ready Public Schools, a network of Los Angeles charter schools serving communities that have historically faced systemic oppression, marginalization, and—as a result—were underperforming schools.
​
Seneca began this partnership with Luskin last school year after Alliance came to tour our Bay Area programs in early 2019. Alliance’s home office team connected us to Luskin’s principal, who had led his previous school to implement a full inclusion special education model—and it became quickly apparent how aligned his vision was to the goals of the UE model. Toward this end, Luskin had recently “staffed up” a robust and experienced student support team of deans, counselors, and special education leads, and our central partnership goal was to figure out the best ways to coordinate and collaborate efforts across these teams.

Through the support of grants from Los Angeles Unified School District, our own Geoff Nuñez is now serving his second year at Luskin as a Behavior Interventions Coach. After supporting multiple Alliance schools last year, we were lucky to establish Geoff full-time at Luskin this school year. His expanded role now includes:

• Individual Staff Coaching on (virtual) classroom management, individualized student support, and staff professional development goals.
• Monthly School-Wide Professional Development, ranging from UE’s Foundations Series to more tailored PDs, including over 10 hours provided during Luskin’s back to school orientation week.
• Supporting the Counseling, Deans, and Special Education Teams through weekly meetings to develop school-wide behavioral and social-emotional supports.
• Facilitating Collaborative Student Support Team Meetings for students receiving support from multiple teams.

In his second year, Geoff has become an integral part of the Luskin team, and has led many of the school-wide discussions on school culture and community-building as staff grapple with the challenges of distanced learning. As Luskin’s leadership team leads monthly professional development on anti-racist educational practices—working primarily from Mica Pollock’s Everyday Antiracism—we are collaborating to find overlap and more opportunities to integrate this stance with Geoff’s monthly PDs, in an effort to truly make antiracism a part of our everyday work as educators.

Seneca’s All-In! Partnership Program is in its fifth year partnering with Horace Mann Elementary School in Oakland Unified School District. This year has been unique, as we have started the year providing all services virtually. This has presented some challenges, as well as some opportunities, to connect more with parents and caregivers. 

Our partnership with Horace Mann has also grown over the years into a true collaboration. Seneca staff are integrated members of the Coordination of Services Team (COST), and hence collaborate often with teachers and participate in restorative practices with school staff, students, and families. Particularly during remote learning, Shakera has been instrumental in helping her clients and their families to access not only their educational and academic resources, but basic resources as well, such as food provision and internet access. As our work has shifted during the Shelter-In-Place (SIP), we have been reminded that basic needs are an important part of overall wellness, including mental and emotional wellness. 

​We are grateful for our partnership with Horace Mann and are looking forward to our continued collaboration and all the many adventures that lie ahead!

As we know, school and learning has gone through a lot of changes during the time of shelter in place. It is now more important than ever for schools to follow PBIS guidelines and have consistent expectations as well as positive behavior supports for students in their distance learning classrooms.  Under the guidance of their Unconditional Education Coach Tiana Dudley, Montalvin Manor K-8 hasn’t skipped a beat in continuing to directly teach their students the expectations for being in class.  Check out their amazing video by clicking below!

​In addition, Tiana has been able to leverage the school’s online platform to deliver Social Emotional Learning lessons to all grades and classes.  If you have a Seesaw account, you can check out a sample video by clicking on the video below.  If you don’t have one yet, it’s free to sign up!  Register at https://web.seesaw.me/. 

​Lastly, it’s important to remember the value of recognizing positive behaviors. In collaboration with the school’s Culture and Climate team, Tiana has been able to continue with a version of Montalvin’s positive referral system. Staff members proactively shout out students who are showing examples of Montalvin’s Core Values by filling out a google form which school leaders compile into highlights to share with the whole school community via their weekly newsletters and Seesaw notifications!  

Hi All! Wow! We have all made it to the end of the school year! In reflection, I am both humbled by- and proud of the work we all have done, despite the challenges we faced – and to honor that I would like to highlight one of our newer partnerships.

I’m not sure if you know this, but we have expanded our Unconditional Education reach and have partnered with an amazing school in Marin City called Bayside MLK Jr. Academy. Bayside serves about 110 predominantly African American and Latinx students ranging in grades from TK – 8 and is the only public district school in the Sausalito Marin City School District. We are currently in our 2nd year of partnership and we are feeling so proud of what the school has been able to accomplish thus far 😊.

Bayside, a known landmark for Marin City, has faced many changes, systemic and educational oppressions, yet much like the community that surrounds it, they have shown great perseverance and strength in ensuring they always strive to meet the needs of their students and families.
​
*To read more about the history of Marin City,  check out this article Marin City: The Rebirth of a Community.

As Bayside’s mission is to bring together and align essential resources to support students and their families in a safe, healthy and culturally relevant environment (by balancing and focusing on social emotional, creative, physical, and academic skills to ensure that our students have all the tools they need to be successful throughout their lives), it’s no wonder they sought out an Unconditional Education partnership with us.
​
Our partnership consists of supporting them through the role of our UE Coach, Kelsey Corrales, and it has been invigorating to support their work and witness the many positive changes that they have created. To highlight a few of those changes, I’d like to share that they have:

• Fully implemented PBIS at the tier 1 level, focusing on “Panther PRIDE”: Pride; Respect; Integrity; Determination; Excellence.
• Created a robust and effective Coordination of Services Team “COST.”
• Began making huge strides toward their tier 2 interventions in all strands.
• Engaged staff to create a Culture and Climate Committee “C3” which uses data to identify goals and objectives to improve the overall culture and climate of the school.
• Have undergone several trainings throughout our partnership, supporting in being more trauma-informed and forming ability to more often utilize trauma-informed approaches in their work.

Bayside has made huge strides in providing Unconditional Education, doing “whatever it takes” to ensure their students receive the education they deserve, such as creating safe and socially-distanced classrooms during this time for students who are not able to access their education at home due to the shelter in place. The principal, Mr. David Finnane, with support from school staff, was able to identify the students and families most in need of support and, all working together, created individual plans for about 6-10 students who came to school every day, in person, to get their academic needs met (this was all done in agreement with families and ensuring proper safety, sanitation, and PPE was in place). This, for me, demonstrates the commitment Bayside has to its students and serves as a beautiful reminder of my “why” for doing this work. 

Each school year brings change and a sense of newness. In the coming 2020-21 school year, Learning Without Limits (LWL) will experience new leadership and a fresh structure. The school as a whole has been actively planning for this transition and our Learning Lab Team, also known as the Special Education Team, had the opportunity to collaborate about what we would like the structure of the Learning Lab Team to look like next year. 

​We utilized this image known as “Below the Green Line” to outline our structures and culture for the next Learning Lab Team. The author of “Below the Green Line,” Steve Zueiback, emphasizes how the components of System Infrastructure and the components of Human Infrastructure are both crucial when it comes to maintaining a healthy and sustainable organization. It is important to constantly build and improve upon the components above and below the green line. The areas below the green line are the heart of the operation. Zueiback notes that an efficient organization works on all six areas simultaneously. 
​
LWL is a very caring community – the whole team brings into account the relationships, information, and identity aspects of the school when creating structures, patterns, and processes. During our previous Learning Lab Team meetings, we realized our main attention was focusing above the green line. However, a lot of the systems we identified were rooted in the values we hold below the green line. In other words, the Below values our Learning Lab Team holds also appear in the systems that exist Above. For example, while we have a hierarchy, there is a sense of humbleness from the leadership team which allows for a soft hierarchy and an emphasis on collaboration. Additionally, LWL, like Seneca, values feedback in all directions of the leadership hierarchy. LWL’s Learning Lab Team has created a place for everyone at the table. Each team member is heard and valued. Without collaboration, we would not be able to provide the best individualized services possible to our students and their families. Each member of a student’s team sees a different aspect of the student whether it be academic, speech, behavior, OT or therapy. Collaboration allows us to put all these pieces together and allows us to see the whole student. All the components of the System and Human Infrastructures come together to create a unique organization.

With the support of Zueiback’s article, the Learning Lab Team identified what we would like the incoming team to know about our team’s culture, values, beliefs and systems. A reoccurring theme was the amount of collaboration that takes place as well as the importance of communication, feedback, adaptability and humor. Together, we created a document that will be passed on to the next Learning Lab leader depicting how our culture and structures go hand in hand. 

​The end of the school year should be filled with celebrations and happy memories, but for many of our students this year, that was not the case. Due to the shelter in place, our students who worked hard and achieved their promotions to middle school & high school were not able to participate in their promotion ceremonies. We could not let these huge milestones go uncelebrated and decided to deliver promotion packages to our students at Bridges Academy, Community Day School, Lincoln Middle School, Prescott Elementary School, Sequoia Elementary School, and Think College Now.  

​As with many of our partnerships and programs in Seneca, COVID-19 has thrown us all for a loop. It has been amazing to see how Seneca Staff have jumped at every opportunity to meet the needs of students, families, partnerships, and colleagues. This is especially true at our partnership with Emerson Elementary School where we have two Clinical Intervention Specialists and a Behavioral Intervention Specialist, working what seems like 24 hours a day. They don’t actually work 24 hours a day, don’t worry HR! They just work really, really hard. Throughout the year, and years prior, they have truly integrated themselves within the Emerson Community and have continued to be a constant support and presence throughout COVID-19. We all know that these are confusing times and can only imagine what it must feel like for our younger students. In an effort of prevention and education, Seneca Staff have developed a (Social Emotional Learning) SEL Curriculum to help students understand and explain the effects of the pandemic when students do return to school. This going to be a major aide in supporting the students as they transition back from an extended time outside of the four walls of our schools. 

As one would imagine, and a number of us are experiencing at the moment, it is really difficult to connect with students and families during remote learning. Seneca Staff and Emerson have developed “Communication Captains” which assigns students to a specific staff member for weekly check-ins. This has enabled staff to help meet family needs (food, gift cards, etc.) and continue the facilitation/development of relationships. One of our weekly highlights is our food distribution to students and families during the pandemic. Not to worry, decked out in PPE and social distancing, staff joyously wave to students and families as they coordinate and deliver food packages throughout the Emerson Community. It is also important to acknowledge the affects that COVID-19 has had on our colleagues (including colleagues within our partnership). Seneca Staff at Emerson regularly meet with teachers and provide mental health supports for those who are experiencing their own struggles with COVID-19. Due to the relationships that the CISs and BIS have within the partnership, School Administration highly values these individuals and have trusted them in leading weekly professional development opportunities at the school which include in deep discussions at their book club (“Brain Wash”) and yoga sessions from Seneca’s very own yogi Jenna Laube. All this to say, well done Emerson Crew, we are proud of you all and the work that you do - I appreciate ya’ll! 

In the spring of 2019, the Santa Clara County Behavioral Health Department invited interested representatives from Santa Clara County school districts to visit our Unconditional Education (UE) partnership at Verde Elementary in Richmond.  Fremont Union High School District was among those districts who attended the tour and applied for a UE partnership.  Beginning in the fall of 2019, All-In has been proud to be in partnership with Fremont High School in Sunnyvale.  
 
Fremont High has an enrollment of approximately 2,100 students who reflect the diversity of Sunnyvale and Santa Clara County.  61% of their students speak a language other than English at home, with over 60 languages represented.  While FHS has a team of talented mental health providers on campus, the school identified a clear need to provide more support for students in need, particularly students in the general education program.  In September 2019, our Seneca team, composed of Clinical Intervention Specialist Kayla Antes and Bilingual Student Support Assistant Abraham Munoz Godino, began working to serve the school community.  In supporting the students on their caseload, Kayla and Abraham work closely with families and teachers, to create as much consistency and cohesion as possible in the treatment teams. 
 
One of our missions in providing mental and behavioral health to students on campus as opposed to an outside clinic is accessibility and flexibility.  There is a great benefit to students having consistent scheduled weekly sessions at school to practice tools of communication, reflection, and self-regulation.  In addition to the scheduled weekly sessions, our students at FHS know that the Seneca Center hub on campus is a place where they can go if they’re experiencing stress or challenge on a given day and could use some support.  If neither of our staff are available at that moment of need, students can leave a note for our team and/or send a text message to our staff requesting support at the staff’s next opportunity.  In this way, our team can be responsive to the needs of our student caseload and provide a Wellness Center-type space for them, which is something our team and the school would like to expand upon as we move into the 2020-21 school year. 

​Extending the secondary benefit of the services we provide is a key priority area. In addition to support provided in our Seneca Center hub, Kayla and Abraham provide push-in support in the classroom as needed, which is a great support for our focal student and also for the teacher and classroom as a whole.

We are excited to continue our partnership with Fremont High into the 2020-21 school year and to expand our support to more students in need.  A significant number of newcomers have joined the school community this year after their journeys of immigration, and we want to partner with the school in broadening and deepening the range of supports those students and their families can access.  We are also looking at ways we can provide capacity building and support for more teachers and staff.  We’re grateful for the partnership with FHS and Santa Clara Behavioral Health and are excited for what the future holds in this collaboration.

Montalvin Manor is a k-8th grade school in the West Contra Costa unified school district. Montalvin Manor is located in San Pablo/ Richmond border and is centered in a residential area, giving the school a small-town feel. Montalvin Manor strives to provide a stimulating learning environment and is a in partnership with our Unconditional Education model, that works towards building capacity to create a positive and inclusive environment for all students to succeed. “Montalvin Manor seeks to develop the student’s maturity and self-esteem and character to enable them to be successful in their academics and their private at Montalvin Manor and beyond by incorporating our core values in every aspect of our student’s education (Montalvin Manor Elementary School).”

• Community - working together, being inclusive and non-biased, and taking care of one another
• Compassion – caring for another, developing empathy, and no bullying
• Curiosity – joy of learning, exploration, and urgency for more knowledge
• Courage – trying new things, standing up for what’s right, and owning up for your actions 
• Grit – do you best while learning from your mistakes, finish what you start, and never give up

​These core values help staff and students reach the full potential here at Montalvin Manor. 

Community is seen as parents that are apart of the PTA put on luncheons to give back to the staff. The upper grades work together to ensure the community is eco - friendly and recycles. We hold weekly team meetings to increase our education around ways to increase engagement in core values and our understanding of the unconditional education model.
Compassion is seen on compass when teachers try to understand student’s back grounds and how they can best support the student to overcome their personal struggles to thrive at school.  Students show compassion by making sure hurt peers are okay and are willing to walk hurt friends to the office. Students also engage in tools like the peace path to resolve conflicts and to ensure everyone involved had a chance to be heard.

Curiosity is seen all around the campus when kids are excited about learning and ask questions to improve their knowledge. Curiosity is demonstrated within the cost process as they take time to understand what the underlying factors around students’ behaviors instead of defaulting to punitive approaches.

Courage is seen when students and staff try new things that maybe be unfamiliar or difficult to best benefit the campus. Courage is seen in every classroom as the students try to gain knowledge and try their best to understand new lesson.
Grit is seen around the whole campus. As we strive to be better as a whole and continuously meet to make sure things that are not working are improved to benefit the whole campus. We teach are students to learn from their mistakes and not to give up.

​As a partnership with the Unconditional Education model, we continue to collaborate with Montalvin Manor Elementary school to support students and teachers.  

​Our program had the opportunity to expand our partnerships in Oakland Unified School District this year in collaboration with Alameda County Behavioral Health. One new partnership we established is at Burckhalter Elementary School where we’ve been providing Tier 3 mental health and behavioral support since August 2019.
 
Burckhalter is located on a beautiful campus in East Oakland where students are supported to thrive in academics, arts, after-school programs, and community connections. The school benefits from the strong, experienced leadership of Principal Geathers and a well-established Coordination of Services Team led by Ms. Mac that works to make sure student support needs are effectively met.  

Burckhalter is located on a beautiful campus in East Oakland where students are supported to thrive in academics, arts, after-school programs, and community connections. The school benefits from the strong, experienced leadership of Principal Geathers and a well-established Coordination of Services Team led by Ms. Mac that works to make sure student support needs are effectively met.  ​

Seneca staff Johndalyn Armstrong has been at Burckhalter since the beginning of our partnership there. Johndalyn has done great work building relationships with students, families, and school staff.  In early February, we were excited to welcome Rachel Most to join the team as she returned from her maternity leave.  We’re looking forward to finishing this school year strong - continuing to provide the best possible care to the students and families on our caseload and to have a positive impact on the school culture at large - and to continue deepening and enhancing our Burckhalter-Seneca partnership as we move into the future.