2 EDCAL January 28, 2019
CTE advocates make an overseas presentation
The Metropolitan Education District,
located in San Jose and offering more than
20 Career Technical Education courses, is
extending its reach to Asia in a long-term
collaborative to strengthen CTE program-
ming in California and abroad.
“The world is very large and there is
good work being done in these industries
in all corners of our industry,” said Alyssa
Lynch, MetroEd superintendent. “It’s up to
Alyssa Lynch, center of back row, superintendent of MetroEd, took part in a delegation that traveled to Taiwan
to see how career technical education programs are being utilized in another country.
MTSS
Continued from page 1
Across all of our schools, there are five
critical components to building MTSS at
Val Verde:
1) Building a culture around being
responsive to every child’s needs.
2) Looking at and responding to whole
child data (behavior, academics, and SEL).
3) Embracing a continuous improve-
ment mindset.
4) Protecting time to understand student
progress using data and planning supports.
5) Structures, supports, and resources
from district leadership to sites are in place.
MTSS became a powerful way of help-
ing to redefine what it truly meant to be
member of the Val Verde community. The
district decided to focus on ensuring clarity
of objectives and availability of the tools
and resources necessary to support the
whole child. The sites felt it was important
to have a collective responsibility for all
their students rather than sites or teach-
ers responsible solely for their assigned
students. Sites were thereby able to build a
culture that empowers all parents, students,
staff, and community members to have the
capacity to structure supports that meet all
students’ needs.
Val Verde created an MTSS vision that
featured continuous improvement and sup-
port to help each site develop their unique
yet positive culture and climate. Tiered
supports are layered and follow a cycle of
studying the data, planning, and acting to
ensure that the supports in place foster stu-
dents’ success. Val Verde invested time and
resources into making sure MTSS address-
es the whole child, and that operational
data—academic, discipline, SEL, etc. are
collected systematically and made available
to those who need it. MTSS success is not
just defined by how students perform aca-
demically but also by their attitude, behav-
ior, self-confidence, and mental wellbeing.
We prepare students for jobs that don’t
yet exist, and we need to work with stu-
dents to improve executive function, so they
can make better decisions and understand
the consequences of those decisions. The
starting point is to look at the data and
educators to close the gaps and connect our
students in ways that haven’t been previ-
ously done.”
Late last year, Lynch, board mem-
ber Katherine Tseng, and instructor Jim
Burnham of Silicon Valley CTE trav-
eled to New Taipei City Department of
Technological and Vocational Education in
Taiwan to see how CTE programs are being
utilized overseas.
The trip included tours of seven schools
to see Maker Spaces, which are classrooms
that serve as labs for students to cre-
ate and design products, including soft-
ware programs to create video games and
robots. In these environments, students use
Programmable Logic Controllers and learn
about industrial robotic theory and motors.
Lynch served as keynote speaker at the
at the New Taipei City Vocational Student
Conference. This was the first time mem-
bers from MetroEd have traveled to New
Taipei City, however, a delegation of 10 New
Taipei City Department of Technological
and Vocational Education teachers toured
all of the MetroEd CTE classes in 2016.
Lynch says the biggest takeaway from
the tour is the curriculum being taught to
students.
“The school focuses heavily on reading,
career exploration in the middle grades,
design thinking, innovation and creativ-
ity and they partner with seven countries
around the world,” she said.
The trip to Asia is part of a long-term
CTE collaboration.
Later this month, two foreign school
principals are scheduled to visit MetroEd/
Silicon Valley CTE center to intern and
experience being a principal in the United
States. In June, Burnham will travel to New
Taipei City for a month-long professional
development offering for several teachers
in the engineering and programming field.
“There are more opportunities for col-
laboration and I think any time you can
share information and practices, it only
stands to benefit students,” Lynch said.
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create structures that support teachers and
students.
In order to sustain full system engage-
ment, Val Verde has created intentional
systems and structures to ensure support
from district leadership, out to sites and into
classrooms. Val Verde’s cabinet reserves time
each week to meet with Education Services
director and district TOSAs for PBIS and
MTSS. The district uses their monthly
principal meetings to have cluster teams
analyze data and set goals. Each site has
a Positive Behavior Intervention Supports
coordinator, two Response to Intervention
facilitators, and an instructional coach who
leads structured released time for data talks.
Also engaged in the process is the district-
based learning team representing district
leadership, site administrators, and both
certificated and classified union represen-
tatives. Teams focused on MTSS work together to shape, develop, and increase the
collective capacity of schools. As Val Verde
continues to build our infrastructure, we
are also looking for the best ways to build a
sustainable capacity so that we can continue
to move forward no matter who leads and
how plentiful the critical resources.
Building a culture that is truly dedicated
to “all students means all students” requires
action using data, developing meaning-
ful structures, protecting precious time to
respond to the data, and a climate of moti-
vating rather than mandating.
Val Verde is taking measured, albeit
aggressive, steps to ensure that all district,
site, and community MTSS practitioners
acquire the skills and tools to ensure all
students graduate future ready.
ERS tices look like, how to organize resources
and where to get started.
Continued from page 1
through Connected Professional Learning,”
the study explores what these strategic prac-
To learn more and to download the report,
go to http://bit.ly/2Qpj8da.
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