Workgroup Updates
June & May
Community Schools Steering Committee
The Community Schools Steering Committee received over 30 applications from LAUSD schools to participate in the first cohort of the district’s community schools pilot. In addition, the L.A. Unified Community Schools Steering Committee developed a rubric to evaluate the applications. The committee met on July 8 to select up to 20 schools to participate in the first community schools pilot cohort in the 2019-20 school year. Selected schools will be notified in July.
Institutions of Higher Education (IHE) Collaborative
(convened by UNITE-LA)
- L.A. College Promise (convened by Office of Mayor Eric Garcetti)
On May 29, the L.A. College Promise celebrated its inaugural class of graduates. Hosted at Cal State L.A., the ceremony brought together over 500 family and community members to celebrate 150 graduating students. The program included keynote remarks by Mayor Eric Garcetti, who launched the program in 2016, and by notable education leaders, including LAUSD Board President Monica Garcia, L.A. Community College District Chancellor Francisco Rodriguez, and California Community Colleges Chancellor Eloy Oakley. While final numbers for the Class of 2019 are still pending, the Promise has been very successful at increasing the direct college enrollment rates of LAUSD graduates. LEARN MORE.
- Los Angeles Educator Pathways Partnership (LAEPP) (convened by UNITE-LA & LAUSD)
Partners from LAUSD and local university teacher training programs are in the process of renewing the bilateral MOUs for new phases of data sharing. The LAEPP group is also working out the logistics of sharing and matching new teacher subject area test data from the universities.
- Student Success Workgroup (convened by UNITE-LA)
The Student Success Workgroup met on June 10, 2019 to discuss transfer pathways alignment. Members received a briefing on the Associate Degrees for Transfer (ADT) research project, which involves the four CSU campuses at Dominguez Hills, Los Angeles, Northridge and Pomona. With assistance from WestEd, UNITE-LA is mapping existing ADT curricular pathways between local community colleges and CSU, identifying transfer feeder patterns, and impacted programs. The goal of the ADT project is to develop a shared understanding of the regional transfer pipeline in order to inform strategic enrollment planning and facilitate stronger partnerships between local community colleges and CSU campuses.
- CSUN Connections (convened by UNITE-LA)
On May 7, the CSUN Connections partners met at L.A. Valley College to debrief on lessons learned from participating in a day-long institute on reverse transfer. The institute was facilitated by the Institute for HIgher Education Policy (IHEP) and the Lumina Foundation and highlighted best practices and key policies for institutions considering reverse transfer as a strategy to help more students reach completion.
CSUN, L.A. Valley, L.A. Mission, and L.A. Pierce College have been working since 2017 to develop a local reverse transfer pilot to help community college transfer students who have left CSUN to earn a first-time associate degree. The pilot will also help re-direct first-time freshmen who have been academically dismissed from CSUN so that they can get back on path through community college.
On May 21st, Juana Hernandez, senior manager of postsecondary initiatives, spoke about the CSUN Connections reverse transfer partnership as part of IHEP’s national policy summit on transfer and college affordability.
Kindergarten Readiness Assessment
(convened by First 5 LA)
UNITE-LA staff interviewed eight EDI implementing communities across the nation to learn how communities have used the EDI data to move the needle on early childhood policies and systems change. Staff traveled to four of the communities (Erikson Institute, Chicago; ReadyKidSA, San Antonio; Oakland Starting Smart and Strong, Oakland; Starting Smart and Strong, San Jose). UNITE-LA is close to finishing a summary of key findings from the interview as well as lessons learned.
UNITE-LA identified a list of potential members for the L.A. Compact Early Childhood Stewardship Group and developed a one pager describing the purpose of the group.
L.A. Opportunity Youth Collaborative, convened by the Alliance for Children’s Rights, L.A. Area Chamber of Commerce, John Burton Advocates for Youth, & iFoster
(convened by Alliance for Children’s Rights)
The OYC Strategic Planning Operations Workgroup met on June 14 to flesh out the framework for the OYC’s new strategic plan, as well as a governance structure for the co-covening partners.
On May 22, LA P3 & the OYC hosted their quarterly partners meeting at Goodwill Southern California on the topic of coordinating housing for homeless youth.
- Fostering Careers L.A. (convened by the L.A. Chamber of Commerce & Alliance for Children’s Rights)
On May 28, The workgroup held a listening session with over 50 DCFS social workers who work with the transition-age foster youth population to garner feedback on the development of a Foster Youth Career Readiness Guide and on the implementation of SB 12, which requires social workers to identify a person for each foster youth in their caseload who will help the youth with college and financial aid applications.
The L.A. Chamber and the Alliance for Children’s Rights continued to work with Diogenes Community Solutions to advance a draft of the Foster Youth Career Readiness Guide.
Fostering Careers LA partners continue to work on implementation of a new coordinated referral process to connect foster youth with paid work experiences, with the goal of enrolling 400 foster youth by the end of September.
- OYC Foster Youth College Advancement Project (convened by John Burton Advocates for Youth & UNITE-LA)
Through targeted outreach and collaboration, LA County attained a 61% FAFSA completion rate for its foster youth who were high school seniors. This passes our goal goal of 60% and far suprsasses last year’s completeion rate of 45%.