- Community
- LTFS
PSESD initiated the Puget Sound Transformational Collaborative (PSTC) in response to the dual pandemics of COVID-19 and racial injustice with the objective of transforming conditions for the benefit of Black and brown students and families. The network includes student, family, community, district, and PSESD leaders across King & Pierce counties. Phase one (June-October 2020) involved cultivating relationships, identifying high leverage opportunity areas, and defining a shared purpose. Phase two (November 2020 – March 2021) advanced these efforts by building trusting partnerships for equitable collaboration in uplifting bright spots and transformational opportunities to strengthen Black and Brown student engagement. Regional racial equity leaders within the collaborative modeled and inspired collective learning, reflection, and commitments of members. These activities culminated in the creation of a Playbook reflecting the voices, wisdom, experiences, and recommendations of participating community leaders, district leaders, student leaders, and parent leaders as they engaged together in each of the priority areas for supporting Black & Brown student engagement:
- Erin Jones cultivated relationships for mutual trust and equitable collaboration. Through shared interrogation of White Supremacy culture characteristics, members identified their agency to disrupt these through individual commitments to action.
- Rena Mateja Walker Burr, Kayley Duong, Alexis Mburu, and Anya Souza-Ponce of the NAACP Youth Council grounded us in the regional priorities of our Youth of Color.
- Mary Fertakis, Grant Twyman, and Anthony Smith helped us identify opportunities for building racially equitable policy-practice connections within school districts.
- Sui-Lan Ho'okano, Tamasha Emedi, Érica Gonzalez-Jones, and Eileen Yoshina shared insights from the Educators of Color Leadership Community and inspired reflection on creating liberatory spaces for Educators of Color.
- Carlina Brown-Banks and Susan Enfield illuminated the Dual Capacity-Building Framework for fostering equitable family-school partnerships.
- Sebrena Burr, Marla Newton, Lolita O'Donnell, and Angelica Alvarez helped the collaborative consider evaluation and progress monitoring opportunities for strengthening family-school partnerships.
- Fahren Johnson shared lessons learned from a district and community partnership designed to systematically support social and emotional learning.
See the resulting Playbook below. Phase 3 (Fall 2021) will further cultivate the PSTC community, with a focus on translating Playbook commitments & recommendations to practice through shared action and learning cycles.
For more information, please contact Adam Kay at akay@psesd.org