SEL Today - Issue 2

SPECIAL PUBLICATION FROM ACE-ED.ORG

Exclusive Interview: Nevada Superintendent of Public Instruction Jhone Ebert How Community Service Supports Social & Emotional Learning Featured Exhibitors: • Boxlight • Discovery Education • Texthelp VISIT SELTODAY.ORG

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Students Really Need Community Service Right Now

By Michele Pitman

In every extraordinary time, there have been challenges that make us wonder if we should try to carry on in a normal way, or if the change foisted upon us is a chance to reestablish priorities. We’re in that moment and student community service is one of those priorities. Without truly understanding an important element of service--which is the intentional documentation of a student’s transformation through personal reflections --student volunteering and service work seems an easy “let’s skip that” exercise.

It would be easy to walk away from it in difficult times like these, but to do so would diminish personal growth opportunities for students and leave gaping holes in college applications and job experiences. It also stresses an already taxed system of community service organizations. Here’s why.

Students Need to Make a Difference Either pre- or post-pandemic, students always need to find ways to make a difference in other people’s lives, to “go the distance” in order to make things happen. Service programs let students feel that sense of urgency and experience the emotion, the ideas and energies expended while helping another organization or individual.

Employers today say that emotional intelligence is one of their most sought after, yet most difficult to measure attributes in candidates. Through service that is documented, verified and reflected upon, students build those capabilities.

Students Need Healing Students have been essentially alone for a year now, or more. Social activities have been online and far from normal, and hybrid schooling hasn’t made things easier. Service programs were great before COVID, but as we get to the other side of it, they have become even more valuable. There is no better way for students to mend the strain and emotional fatigue of living in a COVID world than to actively get involved helping others. The need to help is innate and service to others is a tremendous COVID relief antidote. Guidance leaders know it.

Boards of education will support student service work as the asset to the community it has become, and also as part of the healing process for healthy student growth.

Students Need to Learn Resilience The usual places where students volunteer have been off limits or restricted during the pandemic.

We discovered interesting shifts in what kind of service has been allowed in the past 18 months.

Hospitals, convalescent homes, and local businesses weren’t available, so volunteering shifted to home. Students received credit for helping out in their family, for babysitting and tutoring younger siblings, for taking care of elderly family members, for being the home network tech support, for cooking meals, or for delivering groceries to neighbors who couldn’t leave the houses. In many ways, volunteering came closer to home this past year. It became a family and community survival skill and I think we are better for it. Chipping in to help someone you care about is powerful.

Students Need to Reflect I, of course, am a champion for our system in helping schools organize, direct, and track student

service activities. However, the most compelling and necessary component of community service, beyond validating that the service occurred, is the student’s reflections on the engagement.

Reflections can be required, written down, and documented for a student’s service record. Through frequent reflection, students discover and share the meaning of their service work in a personal way, they connect to the work and internalize the significance of their experience. It’s not just a requirement or job to be done, but rather part of life’s journey. The importance of reflection is well beyond what is required for a service program, but I have been told many times that students find it unexpected, valuable, even “significant.” Reflections deepen the involvement, and they add to the productive and responsible citizen they will ultimately become.

I’m thrilled to see students coming back to classrooms, going to football games and getting involved in clubs. But perhaps I am more excited to see local organizations opening back up to volunteers, and schools allowing students to tutor in person to help their peers. And, while the struggles have been great, I believe our society has stepped into a new realm of empathetic enlightenment.

Making sure our students stop to reflect on how they helped others is the gift we cannot lose and we’ll continue to give our schools the tools they

need to make this happen.

Michele Pitman is founder and CEO of intelliVOL, developers of x2VOL which is the most widely used community service and service learning platform. She has committed herself to helping individuals and schools do more community service, not only as a path to college acceptance and scholarships, but primarily because of the great challenge many service organizations face in filling volunteer positions.

Corporate Education Partnerships

Discovery Education has established collaborative relationships with a variety of like-minded corporate partners that are committed to supporting equitable access to college and examples of diverse career paths. Together, we can help students receive what they need to succeed in college and the workplace.

These featured programs provide a variety of free resources to help students with the knowledge and academic preparation needed to enroll in college and succeed after high school.

Navigate the college financial aid process using Financial Pur$uit, an online module for teens.

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Take students on a financial literacy journey to develop skills and habits they need to be financially successful.

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Introduce students to the professionals using data to innovate the future.

Highlight STEM careers using career profile videos to inspire teens to explore a fulfilling career in STEM. SiemensStemDay.com

Engage your classroom with real-world career activities that showcase the STEM skills that lead to career success.

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It’s Time to Move From Digital Access With Jhone Ebert Nevada Superintendent of Public Instruction to Digital Equity We were honored to speak with Nevada Superintendent of Public Instruction Jhone Ebert, who champions equity and accessibility, seeking to close opportunity gaps and narrow the digital divide.

Through the COVID-19 pandemic, she has worked to provide support and flexibility to districts and schools, while ensuring that vulnerable students receive the services they need, including nutrition services, broadband and devices, special education services, English learner supports, professional development for teachers, and social-emotional supports and resources for all community members. Read below to learn more.

In March of 2020 at the onset of pandemic, the Nevada Department of Education launched the Nevada Digital Learning Collaborative (NvDLC) as part of an investment in high-quality digital content and distance learning resources. Can you give an update on the impact of this program has had on teaching and learning in the state?

The NvDLC website was launched on July 14, 2020, in response to school building closures.

The website offers a robust library of more than 200 free resources in a number of formats including books, webinars, and videos. For educators, the NvDLC offers professional learning, high-quality curricular materials, and instructional strategies to help them meaningfully connect with students and families in a virtual learning environment. For students and families, it provides support for digital learning, including a translation option to

support students and families whose native language is not English.

Since its launch, NvDLC content has been viewed over 53,000 times by more than 15,000 visitors. During its first year, with the support of educator experts in remote learning known as Digital Ambassadors, over 200 artifacts, including podcasts, video chats, how-to guides, webinars, and live panel discussions were published on the NvDLC website. The group also hosted two digital learning summits and seven panel discussions throughout the 2020-21 school year.

We are proud that the NvDLC has created a place for all Nevada educators to collaborate on teaching and learning and for families to be empowered to support their child’s success during this challenging time. It has provided resources and tools for educators, students, and

families as we are all true partners in this new world of learning. And, it has removed emphasized access, equity, diversity, and inclusion.

The NvDLC was a component of your effort to improve equity and access to digital resources in the state. Can you share the impact NvDLC has had on equity and access in Nevada? What are some of the success stories, from an equity perspective?

The NvDLC has enabled equitable access for all Nevada educators, students, and parents and families to professional learning courses, curriculum, and instructional materials. It has also been an important support for districts facing teacher shortages by providing them with course access and resources for educators who may be teaching out of their field as well as substitute teachers.

In tandem with the work around the NvDLC, getting students connected to the internet was a priority for the state to tackle. Connecting Kids, a bipartisan public-private coalition with the goal of connecting every K-12 student and helping to close Nevada’s digital divide, became a priority of Governor Steve Sisolak’s COVID-19 Private Sector Task Force in summer 2020. In partnership with the Governor’s COVID-19 Task Force and the Nevada Department of Education, Communities in Schools Nevada, the Elaine P. Wynn and Family Foundation, and the Public Education Foundation led the way on this initiative.

By January 5, 2021, Connecting Kids confirmed that we had successfully provided a device and internet connection to every student in the State who was participating in distance learning.

In addition to large urban districts like Clark County, Nevada has a significant number of rural students. How is this specifically helping to improve educational equity for rural students?

Yes – 15 of Nevada’s county school districts are considered rural, in addition to the remote rural areas in our large districts, Clark and Washoe.

For rural educators, the NvDLC has provided access to courses, materials, and professional learning in both quantity and quality.

One educator from our rural district recently shared with us that “the NvDLC has given me a place to ask questions and find informational videos on tools like Nearpod. I also have subscribed to the YouTube channel and bookmarked it for references.”

The more resources we can provide online and the more comfortable we are able to help teachers, students, and families become with remote learning, the more opportunities we have to bring a breadth of educational opportunities to rural students. In a rural setting, there may be only a handful of students interested in taking specific materials or coursework. By having access to NvDLC, the opportunities are made available to all students regardless of zip code. This includes world languages and advanced coursework.

A lack of professional learning for educators can have an impact on educational equity. How has Nevada sought to address the issue of improving professional learning for all teachers?

In our work at the Nevada Department of Education, we have prioritized offering differentiated professional learning for teachers throughout the State. In fact, “Access to high-quality professional development for educators in addressing learning loss” is one of our eight priorities for Federal Relief Funding.

We have worked hard to ensure our educators, school and district leaders, and staff have many opportunities, timeframes, and means by which to access professional development. It is our priority to make sure that no barriers – time, scheduling, money, or otherwise – stand in the way of our educators receiving the professional

development and support they need.

There are several ways we offer professional learning to our educators in an equitable way, both in real-time and on-demand: The NvDLC has become a helpful hub for educators and is packed with professional learning opportunities.

Our professional learning calendar which has even more opportunities for educators, and a professional learning catalog where all educators in Nevada can access on-demand learning sessions.

We also host monthly webinars on equitable access, monthly book studies to explore blended learning, and weekly support sessions for educators with the opportunity to schedule 1:1 support sessions with experts.

We have a discussion board monitored daily to support educators’ immediate needs and questions.

Our Regional Professional Development Programs (RPDPs) are State programs offering professional development focused on the content teachers teach, how they teach it, student performance, and changes in instructional strategies that result in increased student achievement.

We also coordinate with strategic partners to expandprofessional learning opportunities.

These types of partnerships give educators nocost professional development opportunities and provide tangible skills for working with today’s technology. A few examples are: Discovery Education offers professional learning events twice a month on important, timely, and responsive topics for our educators.

We recently announced that Google is providing 10,000 Certified Educator Level 1 vouchers at no cost to support Nevada Educators.

We partner with NWEA to offer several professional learning opportunities each year, available for credit hours.

Canvas, our Learning Management System, has been integrated Statewide for our educators to access professional development as well as high-quality instructional materials and curriculum through a single sign-on.

It’s also important to note that providing professional learning to educators is a key factor in enabling them to offer equitable education for each and every one of our children. We focus on providing professional learning that empowers our educators to care for the whole child – including the social-emotional and mental health needs of our students. One meaningful resource to this end is our Social, Emotional, Academic Development Center, or “SEAD Center.” The SEAD Center is a free resource for all Nevada educators which provides supports for your mental health and well-being and offers a virtual support system and Statewide community of educators.

Educators can enroll for free for online trainings and support.

Among the resources Nevada has made available to all students are edtech resources like Canvas, myON, and Discovery Education. Have these resources been well received? What role do private sector partners play in this work? Any lessons you can pass on to school systems working with corporate partners like these?

Our educators and school district leaders are appreciative of any resources which can enhance their classroom instructional approaches or increase efficiencies.

We have been fortunate throughout the pandemic that we have formed public-private partnerships where partners came to us and asked, “What do you need?” There were no assumptions or directions about what anyone

thought was best – we all were ready to do whatever was in the best interest of kids.

In this work, our private partners offer long-term support, ideas, and perspectives on how to engage and re-engage our stakeholders on an ongoing basis. For instance, myON has worked with us this month to release a Hispanic Heritage Month reading list, allowing us to connect the tool with a timely world moment for teachers to use in the classroom and/or families to use at home.

A lesson to pass on is that I would recommend reaching out to peers that are implementing similar solutions to you to scale best practices or maybe peers that are leading in certain areas so you can learn from their experience. For example, there are multiple states using the same learning management tool (Canvas). We are in ongoing discussions with Canvas about how we can share courses, content, and resources and amplify the work of our educators among states. This approach has helped us cut down on duplicative work and has been mutually beneficial state-to-state.

I would also recommend you find ways to integrate your work and resources together to act as a cohesive unit. We are currently in the process of developing a “Comprehensive Digital Learning Guide” which will focus on connecting digital learning pedagogy to the many resources and tools offered. This Guide has been designed by staff experts in standards, school improvement, inclusive education, and other key components of modern education. It is anticipated to be launched in Fall 2021 and will be accompanied by a robust professional learning effort. Our goal with this effort is to avoid having our resources live in silos on their own, but to have them connected in a way that is useful and supportive for our educators.

Finally, it is important to keep in mind that we are at an unprecedented moment in time – the pandemic and its impacts have never before been experienced. Nobody has all of the

answers, so you must be willing to try new things and “fail forward” when necessary.

As you began to leverage the resources of the NvDLC to improve access and equity statewide, what was your biggest surprise? Were there any lessons learned that you can share with readers?

We have learned several lessons throughout our work with the NvDLC:

• Digital learning is not taking the place of face-to-face learning, but we must ensure our students receive the skillsets necessary to be future-ready and globally prepared.

We live in a technological, global society that is evolving faster than we can keep up, and we have to evolve our approaches to make sure our students are competitive and prepared for whatever future they strive to move toward.

• We still have infrastructure needs throughout Nevada and need to ensure all stakeholders have access to the internet on an ongoing basis.

• Educator readiness to lead instruction remotely is extremely varied; many educators were not prepared to integrate blended or digital learning in daily instruction.

• We can no longer be afraid of innovation or shy away from risk-taking. Our actions, preparation, and policies need to be reflective of 2021 and beyond – and we cannot be afraid to move away from the “normal” of the past. This is how we will progress and reimagine education overall.

NAVIGATING TRAUMA IN A POST-COVID WORLD How SEL Can Help Students Cope

By Jill McVey, PhD, research scientist, ACT

WHAT IS TRAUMA? Given the disruptions that we have all experienced due to the COVID-19 pandemic, many of us are becoming more aware of the effect that trauma can have on school, work, and home life. Any experience that causes intense physical or psychological stress reactions can be considered trauma. Traumatic events can be isolated, like the loss of a loved one, or things that happen over time, such as bullying or poverty. It’s important to note that while there are certain events that most of us would find to be traumatic, ultimately, it’s the person’s perceptions of the event that matter.

Additionally, it is also possible for a person to experience what’s known as secondary trauma – a reaction from witnessing a traumatic event or learning about it happening to someone else.

TRAUMA-INFORMED PRACTICES As we grapple as a society with systemic racism, the COVID-19 pandemic, and ongoing political unrest, we need to have a way to help our students cope with these events and any other hardships they may be experiencing.

Trauma-informed practices in schools provide a framework for understanding and responding to different types of trauma. Despite the perception that trauma is rare, it is estimated that at least half to two-thirds of children have experienced trauma in their lives.

Past (or present) trauma can affect students by making it more likely for their fight or flight response to be activated, since experiencing trauma has an effect on the brain.

This means that students may often be in a heightened state of watchfulness (“on alert”) without realizing it. In addition to reacting to things that others may not notice, students who are constantly on alert may struggle to focus on schoolwork. Trauma has been associated with difficulties in emotional regulation; difficulty forming or maintaining social relationships; and difficulties in school.

Fortunately, you do not need to know the details about a student’s trauma – or even if they have experienced it – in order to provide a foundation to help them cope. Understanding how trauma can affect students and having strategies to provide a safe and positive environment are important pieces of trauma-informed practices. As part of Mosaic™

by ACT® SEL professional development program, Powerful Educator, we focus on three main tenets of trauma-informed practice: safety, relationships, and coping skills.

SAFETY A safe environment is one in which students can depend upon consistency, which includes a predictable schedule along with adults on whom the student can rely. A feeling of safety at school is important for all students, but additional supports may be needed for students who have experienced trauma, such as advanced warnings about transitions or changes to routines. A focus on positive student behaviors, instead of negative ones, can also help foster a sense of safety.

RELATIONSHIPS Relationships are likewise critical to building a safe environment and helping students who have experienced trauma. Positive and supportive teacher-student relationships are important in myriad student outcomes. To name a few, strong teacher-student relationships are associated with increased student engagement, inclusion, and belonging, as well as increased attendance and achievement. For the student with trauma, strong relationships can help them feel secure and be less likely to be “on alert,” freeing up space for them to focus on learning.

COPING SKILLS Finally, helping students develop coping skills for managing thoughts and emotions can help lay the groundwork for developing healthy behaviors in response to stress. In addition to teaching students healthy coping strategies (which can be as simple as pausing and taking a deep breath, like this song from the TV series “Daniel Tiger’s Neighborhood” introduces), model these behaviors in the classroom. For example, naming feelings and appropriately dealing with them: “I’m feeling really frustrated that I can’t get my computer to connect to the projector! I’m going to take a deep breath, and I’ll try again a little later.”

TRAUMA-INFORMED PRACTICES CAN HELP The COVID-19 pandemic has created a tumultuous time for all of us, and as a result, many of us are considering the role of trauma for the first time. Creating a safe environment, building positive relationships, and equipping students with skills needed to navigate uncomfortable emotions will go a long way toward a healthy learning environment for all students, regardless of their personal experiences with trauma.

For additional resources & information about trauma-informed practices, please visit our website or register to view a recording of our webinar.

Visit the Exhibit Hall at

Featured Exhibitors Boxlight has long strived to provide comprehensive and cutting-edge educational technology solutions to help teachers support students of all levels and needs.

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Texthelp is focused on helping all people learn, understand and communicate through the use of digital education and accessibility tools.

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