Administrators and counselors in our Thriving Futures program this year designed a gamut of ways to improve students’ future readiness–from identifying employer partnerships and expanding career exploration opportunities, to revising 339 plans, strengthening programming around social and emotional learning (SEL), and raising the bar for meeting state Career Education & Work (CEW) benchmarks.
The Consortium launched Thriving Futures last fall in response to feedback from counselors who were looking for ways to enhance future readiness in their schools. Teams from 11 districts participated, each selecting a focus area and a project to work on over the course of the school year. The teams came together three times during the year to design their plans, get coaching and support, share their ideas across districts, and get feedback.
At Penn-Trafford High School, “We accomplished a lot,” said Assistant Principal Amy Horvat, noting that her team began planning to incorporate social and emotional learning into school programming.
They chose SEL because “we looked at what kids are missing going into the workforce” and got feedback indicating students need to build resilience, improve communications skills, and be better prepared to work collaboratively.
Separately, although already scoring high, with 90.4 percent of students meeting state CEW standards, Laurel Highlands School District’s team used its time in Thriving Futures to reach even higher.
“We’re always looking to get better,” said Randy Miller, Laurel Highlands’ Director of Curriculum & Instruction. Among other ways, he said the Thriving Futures team aimed to improve data capture of CEW performance from Alternative Education, cyber schools, and other outside settings that Laurel Highlands students may be attending. Data from those settings wasn’t consistently being entered in the district’s electronic records system.
Crediting the district’s Thriving Futures team, Miller said he feels confident that Laurel Highlands’ numbers will improve when the state updates its data at the end of the school year. “Having the opportunity to work with our team, collaborate with other districts, and use the strategies that the Consortium set up for our conferences definitely facilitated the process.”
“We’ll offer Thriving Futures again beginning in the fall,” said Debbie Pixton, Director of Organizational Strategy & Special Projects, who organized Thriving Futures in collaboration with Jenn Sethman. “We’ve had really positive feedback, including from teams that want to work further on projects they started this year or initiate new ones.”
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