welcome to part two of a special show on community education in our community and the focus of this particular show is community engagement initiatives using the resources that are already in existence using the collective impact to help communities help children which communities helping children that is a lofty goal is that something that is relevant for today very relevant weisel so as you look at schools as institutions and the limited ability to support children and that's because of lots of kind of systemic reasons i'm a lot of it has to do with budgets and dwindling resources in our educational institution it's really important that the community being gauged in that process as a piece of the infrastructure that supports children toward their success when i came up the community was i would say three quarters of my education i learned reading and writing and arithmetic it school but my cultural understanding my level of moral values my spiritual understanding came from my community it didn't come from my school and so that's the piece that i think really holds the opportunity for us as a community change the outcomes are going on the day with our children so the community was in the home set g our community said it it was all of those places and the school the school was a part of the community so for instance when i went to kindergarten and my mother decided she was going back to work part time as a librarian she hired mrs murray to be our babysitter but then she took mrs murray to the school and got her hired as a yard duty and so we were surrounded by this community that supported was our there's doand who worked at a school in west oakland and was very concerned about us as african american children growing up in the ivory tower but also read of else or read oh so she took us down to the west oakland school and said let me show you the other side of education and have you come and meet another piece of your community so that kind of exposure we didn't get from the schools we got from the community that supported us yes i remember something about exposure and experience and ongoing process you and your child this was a workshop that we did in the berkeley schools for african american adults because we the parents really did as the adult school it was very well attended and they were hungry for this these parents wanted this mr you're just trying to take it in a step back even further and sometimes when you talk about community talk about neighborhoods and you talk about village the kind of energy changeable but i represent pilates because that's a concept that i relate to from my upbringing and i think that because our belief today is dysfunctional for a lot of reasons ranging from suburban flight from corporate flight  from the media from the breakdown of the families such to some extent absenteeism of churches so it's a multitude of reasons why the village has has become dysfunctional and the results of that is what we see in the bill today's gangs and violence and drugs so it's no longer a positive role modeling is no longer a place where you feel safe so i will leave that it's important for those of us who know that experience to collect  together and not necessarily move back but be able to give back and so the power base here is knowing not only not only the why but now becomes the how and so as we move forward now we want to reste all of that village so that we can then begin to move forward in the only way is going to happen is that we have to come together bring our skills and collectively work together to restore was been lost so the how part so how what is the how part that you are speaking about the how part is how do you connect with those children and families who who are living in this bill is this on fire and obviously there's a lot of different methodologies but i actually believe the better way you connect with those families is to go where the children go and children go to school so initially making contact with those children who are considered greatest needs in the school allows you by the font to know who they are because often these are the students who contact from those of us who understand the power of the village so through connecting with those children that's a conduit to get into the community to get into the families to get into the homes to begin to address the needs of th so that is now becomes no longer dysfunctional but it's more functional so unreal and reality what we're talking about as with this methodology is to be able to bring the village to the school it sounds like you're not you're not addresses the needs of the school the needs of the community as well as in needs of the home and once those needs or denah fi then we move forward to eradicate issues around social physical psychological intellectual as well as spiritual challenges that families are facing so in reality you know it is important that you connect and begin to build those resolutions based upon knowing who those families are yes it does sound like the school is very and it may have been left out of the loop sometimes with the village or the community well the school is really the key now for a lot of reasons and i'll get back to why the church is important because there's a lot of love from administrators a lot of love from teachers but there's also an issue of cultural competency and also issues of being orthotics and so it's important to have people  supporting the school who represent all of those things that i just described but the churches can and will play a part particularly if there is an opportunity for them to get into the school and be able to address these issues that we're talking about and that's why it's important april is six for a lot of those those interesting churches to come out to this major forum that we're putting together you hear more about it surely but to come out and learn the why and the how the churches can actually get involved to make a difference because a lot of the issues around spiritual as well yes i'm so glad to hear that the school the school though is beginning to see seem like a part where engagement is being  actively done yes so there's a two fold kind of approach that we have one is the vertical approach which is dealing with the child through the school system but vertical like that it's i'm sorry case through you know preschool through twelfth grade and then on to college and career and our infrastructure objective is to create a pipeline that holds the child through that process but we also have to understand that berkeley a child only does well in a family that supportive of them or a community that supports them and then families do well in communities where they're properly nurtured and where there's a basis for relationships that n so that's where we engage the different community stakeholders including churches including families including other community based organizations and n g o s who have a stake in the outcome for children yes you know so it's a say so therefore the collective impact because when families are sitting there wondering where they're going to live where the food is coming from if we don't have that all those pieces of the pie at the table working together collectively with the same objectives the same goals the same direction then we're doing something that's not abstract we're taught but we have to wrap around the whole family so when you do your wrap around work how do you make it happen how do you do that what we do is to bring together with multidisciplinary team all the service providers we look to see who is there who is not at the table who we need to bring in to be part of the system and this comes about by families identifying what the needs are when they and we meet with them and they say this is going on we don't have someone we what it takes for us to get to get the services we need to go across a county that hasn't and proper transportation for us to get there then we know that we have to then to work on that resource to bring our bring the service into the community are buying ways to get them to have the services and your expertise is the clinical social work yes how are you using that to teach our work with the community we do the clinical work as well as the case management work the advocacy so we will help a parent learn how to navigate the different systems that they have to navigate go with them to the school and help them to learn how to talk and be in that communication at the school very often what happens at a school through to get a basic piece of information is you know in so you might call it in insensitive approach but you're saying the other practical approach is how do you do that again please we go we advocate advocate and also as well as advocate we help parents use their resiliency and build their skills yes and i do believe that vocabulary building up parents are they would love to know the the things that are needed to communicate more effectively and member what we did in fact black parenting when i was in charge of the center in east oakland and we had a husband and wife who taught the course and the husband had written the course outline but they would break those groups into circles and they found out that using the african proverbs and other things like that worked quite well with asian students and white students fathers who came to the class with their children so fathers with their two and all backgrounds were able to relate to this teaching that they did but they also did problem solving they had this their skills were being utilized because while they were developing their skills they also were in a skill table to share and come up with their own solutions but then they learned others with how to work with others in that class you know one of the one of the valuable benefits i believe is that parents are looking for and we we also provide that through peacemakers is that the family mentoring concept meaning that you're mentoring the child but also you're providing advice and support and so when actually all the parents are looking for mento well and through the partnership in working with parents we're discovering that oftentimes by having a presence with them they're no longer signing in agreeing to sometimes medications then all of a sign a green sometimes to be position where the children are placed into certain types of classes that really are not appropriate but if you really don't feel comfortable or you don't really know how to communicate or know what to say sometimes there's a tendency for you to agree with everything so the parent advocacy part of it is critical it's empowering and also i think it helps us eliminate some decisions that are made in a not appropriate yes miss russell i'm just thinking about all the things that have been shared so for empowerment and engaging parents had the babysitter hired at the school and he used the word village and what it was and what's interesting is the only way to in my mind for us to get back to this concept the village that i actually have never experienced as an eighty's baby i've only heard of it however i do believe in it and so for me mike you know what lesson i keep talking about what was or what should have been but maybe if we get everyone to feel connected you actually have to empower them right so that the bus driver has to know that he's also in charge of getting you know darnell to school and he's also in he's also linked with the parent you know to say good bye and maybe even calling the bus driver by name what a concept to just say good morning to the janitor and when you're going into whatever building or even the gas station worker you know sometimes the gas station workers are able to see the young young people in the middle of the day on a weekday inside of their gas station or at different models and you know if one retail worker could say hey aren't you guys supposed to be in school or her interest was to be at church right now you know between eleven and one in just the kind of hold them accountable and that  you know i mean that alone will allow our youth as well as our parents you know to kind of be accountable and lead to get there and i was just thinking the only way to get there is if they feel empowered enough to be that that they feel like linked in that connection for whatever capacity doesn't have to be a tired old college educated position and it can be whatever it is you are doing blue collar white collar housewife sheriff i mean it's whatever it's that you kind of know there i actually am in charge have all of those affix in the room in the different sessions because we want to hear all of their perspectives there's a police officer that we used to inspect all the police departments when i worked with the juvenile justice delinquency prevention commission  those persons was in one of the cities i think it was fremont he was as a coach he was a coach for a lot of the young children when he went down the street they were always speaking to him and working with him so the relationship that he built had to do with him as a human being of the children as we'll have i work with the parents ok so one of the things sometimes will make house visits you know sometimes sitting behind the desk and having them come to the school they may not have access to transportation to get to the school so we're going to come to where you are and we're going to have a house visit and we may have t v we may have water we may to sit on the couch we made to sit on the stoop which is the port to my east coast you may just sit out wherever they are we're going to come to you and we're going to tell them face to face with authenticity of course in a genuine  sense of self and say you know what i want to help you get your child to where you want to get where you actually want them to be a lot of times our parents want their child to get there but they don't really know how to how what are the steps to getting them there it could be cow that you could be vocational it could be the army you know i mean it could be just a job to help provide for grandma but i know other things for families to get them to buy in for families was actually to go to where they were that was for sure what we did wherever that was sometimes even that time of day a lot of times you're in school from eight to two or eight to four or and they wouldn't get out of wipe until six so i guess well we'll be there until six thirty and sometimes have a dinner at the school but hey whatever it takes sometimes  providing dinner that's another thing sometimes with another lot of social workers where within this course some our kids are eating when you have been at work when your school there or churches are in an impoverished community they're not eating so you want them to concentrate but anybody knows that the only way that you can have energy is through the fuel of from food so sometimes we need to provide you know me first so if we were my breakfast to the child maybe the parent also meant an apple and a cereal bar so it's kind of like knowing that what the child needs is probably what the home to embrace that family will to put the family in the in the mindset that you want to help them go beyond whatever the challenges or it could be food it could be clothing it could be the mother wants to go back to school but doesn't know that the opportunities are there she wanted to attend a community college so it's really about giving information and showing love in a sort of maisie how family is really resonate positively and look forward to seeing you when they know you coming because you care and see the irony is that's what every human being needs including the superintendent the prince the parents of all the school side administrators the counselors the teachers the custodian you know everyone the cafeteria workers they collective impact a partner for oh say that again it's a collective impact partner form where love seeking organizations who resonate with the approach that we're discussing to come and have a conversation with us about how we launch an i pilot initiative in a community and they resonate well they understand the village concept they understand that a collective approach is really the only way that we're going to make broadest positive social movement and that they have a stake in the outcome and the wellbeing of children it's inclusive it's a new including they're being included so that's why i was getting a mention that thing about every person needs that they're not always getting it superintendence don't always respect their it minister principles are not always respected so i think everyone kind of talked about it's grounded in the relationship ok and you have to as you go into the i'm community to assess the needs of families you have to have also have to go there to determine what the approach should be yes the information lies in the family how you do it you can enable here really do that you have to get into the family and into a relationship with them and that's where the answers lie exactly we can't do that from a satellite position is this as a i think that's been missing in a lot of things in america how you do what you do makes the difference you didn't finish what you were going to say and then it is a team it's a team and to tell that story the teacher might go into the home and see the fact that there's no place for this youngster to start then she comes back to the team and you realize that there's no place for the mother that where she has any space that has her so then the counselor that as working with the mother and says ok this needs to be up for the whole family each person having their own space say ice so often we need space in the core of all the were saying to me starts with the understanding that people initially don't really know i want to know what you know until they first know you care and once they know that you really authentically care then they're open to know what you know and unfortunately we take the reverse they want to pound in all this i know this that and you lose all the connections in terms of building their relationship a good example of what we've discovered in some of our home visits is that we have children that may be in the fourth grade and they are obviously going to have homework but their parents can only do second grade homework so we're challenging the parents want you check in the homework that's why it's important to build their caring relationship first to begin to find out what those challenges are and then help them move forward to overcome whatever those obstacles or is important to care first and not presume to know yes yes  this mother who only had a third grade and you mention and she tutored her own children but she did it in her own way and it was authentic for her even though she didn't know the information she was able to get them to go to the library and do their homework so it was really she took on the task of what she saw effective people do but in this case you're it was in my bank modeling it was modeled modeling so well we'd like to invite the community to our collective impact partner for all right on april sixth contra cost community college we have just launched our website that's w w w that c initiatives dot org and you can go there and get more information about the forum and also register to participate if they'd like yes and we having your email and web site placed on the the program a wonderful so hopefully they will call that and tell us a little bit more about the be the conference or calling it a forum because more and much more intimate kind of approach to engaging the community we have five workshops sessions one of them is around coming up with a common body of metrics to measure the work the qualitative work that the collective impact partnership will be doing we have  a workshop on public health which will include foster kinship care mental health and healthy eating active living and also community engagement we have one for on academic education from pre k to twelfth grade that's our infrastructure of the cradle to career pipeline we have one on toward college and beyond and then one on our cultural school will be launching a cultural school in the community for children well these all be going on the same time they'll be five separate workshops at the same time yes and we're asking people to commit to one because we have solid outcomes that we're trying to achieve for that day so we were not going to really tolerate downswing around from one workshop to another we'd like the community come to assist us accomplish those outcomes and so then you have something that is the describing all that on the website yes me yes so this sounds like it's very unique in the how you put this together structured it well this is actually very neat but i've i think that if you just kind of marinate on some of the conversation that we've shared is obvious just from those that are here today that the collaboration is already in place looking at  services of each of us and how we're going to network and how we're going to commentate these services to to again mimic or restore that whole idea of the village and imagine having other partners at the this she has a nonprofit called full circle learning and she'll present her model for a whole child learning which will be the basis for the forum as we wrap up i'd like to thank you for that information a