Seek Common Ground’s Action Accelerator for American Rescue Plan – K-12 School Funding has provided project funding, networking, and access to research to community-facing organizations to elevate the voices of Black, Brown, Indigenous, people-of-color, low-income, immigrant, and refugee families, students, and educators. These groups have developed ideas and plans for the communities they serve and represent to both have a seat at the table and have their concerns and aspirations be held paramount in school district ARPA funding decisions. With the transformational possibilities of the American Rescue Plan, the time is now for the needs and aspirations of communities to drive decisions on recovering from the COVID-19 pandemic and redesigning systems to serve everyone.
Phase I of the SCG ARPA Action Accelerator included seven organizations: Alliance for Quality Education, Black and Brown Coalition for Educational Equity and Excellence, Coleman Advocates for Children and Youth, Colorado Education Initiative, Intercultural Development Research Association (IDRA), Kentucky Student Voice Team, and Teach Plus - Mississippi, taking place from June to August 2021. Two organizations from phase I (Colorado Education Initiative and Teach Plus - Mississippi) joined two new organizations (College Now - Greater Cleveland and the Education Trust - New York) in managing phase II projects from October to December 2021.
Additionally, leaders from the Black and Brown Coalition for Educational Equity and Excellence, Coleman Advocates for Children and Youth, Colorado Education Initiative, IDRA, Kentucky Student Voice Team, and Teach Plus - Mississippi participated in a new initiative, launched by SCG in Phase II, to act as project advisors. This allowed SCG to both leverage the expertise and capacity of partner organizations and provide phase II participants with invaluable advice and counsel.
In Phase III of the SCG ARPA Action Accelerator, organizations will seek to advance their communities' funding priorities by ensuring that federal relief funding (and overall budgeting) reflects the needs and priorities of those most impacted—students, families, and educators—in their community. Phase III organizations will look not only to state and district K-12 education budgets, but to other state and local budgets with relief funding intended to meet the needs of the same families that schools serve. Phase III will run from May to October 2022 and includes five organizations: Alliance for Quality Education, Black and Brown Coalition for Educational Equity and Excellence, CivicLex, New Mexico First, and Teach Plus - Mississippi.
LEARNING COMMUNITY
(Phases I, II, and III)
aLLIANCE FOR QUALITY EDUCATION
NEW YORK
In phase I, the Alliance for Quality Education prioritized the voices of Black, Brown, low-income, and immigrant parents in how to allocate federal education relief funds. AQE’s efforts centered on information gathering and organizing parents in New York City and Rochester. The resultant report, We Demand: How New York’s Communities Want to Use New Federal Aid to Public Schools, documented parent priorities around academic and health supports for students with forward-looking guidance on how to leverage these resources to foster greater equality. AQE used the report as a framework to organize efforts across five additional New York school districts.
In phase III, AQE will organize efforts across NYC to champion a robust education justice agenda, focused on school climate and ensuring adequate resources for NYC schools. Their strategy is to connect parents with decision makers on policy and spending priorities.
Black and Brown Coalition for Educational Equity and Excellence
montgomery County, MAryland
In phase I, the Black and Brown Coalition for Educational Equity and Excellence partnered with University of Maryland College of Education professor, Dr. Sophia Rodriguez, to conduct interviews with underserved Black, Brown, low-income, and immigrant families with students in Montgomery County, MD Public Schools to learn more about their COVID-19 recovery needs and explore the barriers that have prevented them from participating in critical school- and district-level decision making, particularly the allocation of federal education relief funds.
In phase III, the Coalition, by engaging the Montgomery County Department of Health and Human Services and the network of community-based mental health non-profits, seeks to expand mental-health supports to students and families struggling to recover from the isolation and trauma wrought by the pandemic.
CIVICLEX
Lexington, Kentucky
Joining the ARPA phase III learning community, CivicLex is a non-profit civic education organization building civic health through education, media outreach, and relationship building. Their project will focus on helping the residents of Lexington-Fayette County understand how ARPA funds are being utilized by agencies in Lexington and develop ways for their voices to be engaged.
Coleman Advocates
San Francisco, california
In phase I, Coleman Advocates for Children and Youth facilitated direct engagement with Black, Brown, low-income, and immigrant families in San Francisco about federal education relief funding impacts and opportunities. CACY then engaged district leaders, coalition members, and community partners, including the teacher’s union, in conversations about how ARPA funds should be used to best meet the needs of SFUSD students, families, and educators.
College now Greater Cleveland
Cleveland, Ohio
Joining the Learning Community in phase II, College Now of Greater Cleveland worked with families of the Warrensville Heights High School to identify, solicit, and document critical needs for education in an interactive workshop. This engagement initiated an ongoing conversation with district decision makers around design needs and desired community support for educational and career development.
Colorado Education Initiative
Colorado
In phase I, the Colorado Education Initiative conducted a statewide effort on behalf of partner school districts and communities to ensure federal education relief funds were distributed through a community-driven and equity lens across multiple funding streams. They conducted a listening and learning tour with key partners outside traditional advocacy and power structures and delivered their findings to the Colorado Board of Education, resulting in a $15 million investment into their coalition’s priority: expanding career and technical education in rural areas.
In phase II, CEI continued their thought partnership with state agencies in designing ARPA allocations to ensure equitable access to recovery dollars. Participation in group feedback sessions resulted in the launch of the “Rural Co-Action” RFP, a direct outgrowth of the collective advocacy that they pursued in phase I.
Education Trust - New york
New york
Joining the learning community in phase II, the Education Trust– New York designed the Parent Advocate Policy Lab to expand parent leaders’ knowledge of new relief funding sources and to amplify their advocacy efforts. During the Lab, which will continue through the summer, parents develop skills in policy writing, power mapping, and advocacy strategies to engage with local and state decision makers.
Intercultural Development Research Association
texas & Georgia
In phase I, the Intercultural Development Research Association hired student researchers to lead participatory action research regarding the COVID-19 pandemic and hosted listening and learning sessions to collect recommendations from students and caregivers on how districts should use federal education relief funds.
Kentucky Student Voice Team
KEntucky
In phase I, the Kentucky Student Voice Team conducted a youth-led research project to identify youth concerns, priorities, and solutions to education inequities and injustice to inform the investment of federal education relief funds. They used quantitative and qualitative data from their Coping with COVID surveys and school climate audits to create a toolkit featuring best practices for capturing student perspectives on ARPA funding.
New mexico first
new mexico
Joining the Learning Community in phase III, New Mexico First will work statewide to increase civic engagement in all 33 counties in New Mexico, including rural areas, and members of 19 pueblos and 4 tribes. The proposed project is focused on improving the behavioral health system across the entire state of New Mexico.
Teach Plus Mississippi
Mississippi, with focus on the delta
In phase I, Teach Plus - Mississippi collected input from teachers across the state through their signature teacher fellowship and targeted educator questionnaires on how to allocate federal education relief funds, determining an essential need for school districts to invest in mental health services.
In phase II, they hosted a Youth Mental Health First Aid training for Policy Fellows, alumni, and current Mississippi Teacher Network members. Combined with the research done by Teach Plus Policy Fellows, the training provided a basis for policy recommendations to strengthen mental health legislation.
In phase III, Teach Plus - Mississippi intends to develop a model for better collaboration among educators, counselors, and mental health service providers across public school districts through the creation of Mental Health & Wellness teams. These teams will consist of educators, administrators, counselors, and mental health providers.
