Our Future Ready Alliance gives educators a network of peer and professional support for helping students become “future ready” and ensuring that they graduate with formal, viable plans to take their next steps after high school. Our approach to student planning is grounded in three questions that that help kids imagine their futures—Who am I? Who do I want to be? How do I get there?
As in the past, participation in the Alliance is for teams of about four to eight educators, including at least one administrator. This year’s operating model includes two components—Professional Learning Communities (PLCs) and a workshop series for each PLC. The PLCs and workshops focus on four areas related to future readiness: social and emotional learning, partnerships, instructional approaches, and student plans. Examples of possible content for each appear below.
Structure
Professional Learning Communities (PLCs): Our PLCs give educators opportunities for facilitated discussions addressing problems of practice they’re facing around their focus area. Each PLC will meet two-three times this year, for 90 minutes. Additionally, all PLCs will gather once or twice a year to learn from each other in discussions across topics.
Workshop Series: Two or three workshops related to each of the four focus areas will be offered this year. The workshops provide opportunities to learn and practice new content. Alliance participants should plan to attend the workshops related to their PLCs. Up to 25 additional educators from participating districts may attend each half-day workshop. Workshops will be virtual and provide a combination of asynchronous and synchronous resources from CPE staff and outside experts.
Four focus areas and content possibilities:
- Social and Emotional Learning (SEL): connections to future readiness, employability, and wellness
- Partnerships: opportunities for work-based learning experiences, small-group career mentoring, and family engagement
- Instructional Approaches: Project-Based Learning (PBL), Human-Centered Design (HCD), Standards-Based Learning
- Student Plans: elements of impactful student plans, portfolios, and key transitions between grades
