“When I’ve seen it in action, I know it works. It’s much more than a current slogan. When (students can) see the connection between what they’re learning in the textbooks and labs and how it relates to the real world — that really motivates them.”
California State Superintendent of Public Instruction
Linked Learning Spotlight
Join a Linked Learning Alliance Working Group!
Looking for a way to deepen your involvement in the field of Linked Learning? Join one of five Linked Learning Alliance working groups to stay up-to-date on key issues in the field and let your voice be heard!
Building Awareness: Building awareness and support for Linked Learning as a promising strategy to improve California high schools and student achievement as well as its workforce and economic development.
Employer and Industry Engagement: Coordinating a broad range of activities and initiatives for employer and industry engagement in support of Linked Learning.
Pathway Development: Expanding and enhancing Linked Learning Pathways through expanding work-based learning opportunities, supporting counseling and guidance opportunities, increasing broad-based coalitions, and creating post-secondary Linked Learning relationships.
Policy Development: Leveraging the strength and diversity of the Linked Learning Alliance to guide policy that promotes expansion of pathway options for California youth. Identifying key examples, opportunities, and strategies that will advance local, state, and federal policies to increase students' access to quality pathways.
Research, Evaluation, and Assessment: Encouraging research and evaluation work that addresses critical issues related to the design and implementation of Linked Learning programs, and supporting the expansion of Linked Learning programs in California high schools.
Interested in joining a working group? Email This e-mail address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it .
Linked Learning is Expanding within Sacramento City Unified School District!
Sacramento City Unified School District is improving and increasing Linked Learning options for students. In addition to refining and expanding curriculum at its eleven existing pathway programs, the district brought two new pathways online this school year.
The two new Linked Learning Pathways are a Law Academy and a manufacturing pathway that blends design, architecture, construction and automotive arts. The Law Academy is housed at CK McClatchy High School. Law Academy students have been learning about a wide variety of legal proceedings and are engaging with local leaders in the legal field. The E CATS manufacturing pathway is based at John F. Kennedy High School. A variety of interesting vehicles and structures will soon emerge from the computers and shop equipment operated by Kennedy students.
Sacramento City Unified is also extremely excited about a prototype Linked Learning related project at Harkness Elementary School. Students there are identifying careers they are interested in pursuing in the area of public service, and are meeting local professionals and family members engaged in public service professions and mapping their academic path to securing the career of interest. Parents will be engaged in the process throughout the year and participate in formal visits to events on campus three times during the school year.
Click here to view video of students discussing the new C.K. McClatchy High School Law Academy
Past Member Spotlights:
Linked Learning Teacher Training Institutes at California State University and University of California
Led by the School of Teacher Education at San Diego State University, seven of California's public universities have joined a growing network of teacher training institutions across the state that are implementing a recently updated, state-approved teaching credential program designed to prepare teachers for the unique classroom environment they will encounter in Linked Learning schools.
The CSU system is responsible for training more than half of the state's public school teachers. This program is a revision of the existing state teaching credential. Its expansion has helped lead to successful implementation of the Linked Learning approach in many high schools.
The updated credential program adds a Linked Learning "lens" to existing teacher-training courses. It was created in 2008 at San Diego State University's (SDSU) School of Teacher Education after faculty members began hearing from administrators in Linked Learning pathways that teachers needed additional knowledge and skills to participate fully in the growing number of career academies being established in California's high schools. Since then, SDSU has led a wide-ranging effort to find new ways to strengthen the participating campuses' teacher preparation practices to include the "lens."
With support from the James Irvine Foundation and technical assistance from ConnectEd, San Diego State first redesigned its own credential program. Particular attention was given to elements that had not previously been addressed in teacher preparation, but have proven to be critical components of teaching in the Linked Learning environment, including work-based learning, teacher collaboration, and developing integrated curriculum across disciplines.
After San Diego State retooled its own teacher training methods to incorporate a Linked Learning "lens" in their existing curricula, the school received a grant to create a replicable model of this new system that could be used in other universities as well. In the past two years, five other schools in the CSU system, one in the UC system, and one private university have begun the work of adding those elements to their teacher training curriculum.
Since 2008, more than 300 teachers have received their teaching credentials from these programs, with many moving into teaching positions at the growing number of Linked Learning schools.
The university campuses that currently offer teacher credentialing programs with a Linked Learning lens include the following:
· CSU San Bernardino
· CSU Fresno
· CSU Sacramento
· San Diego State University
· CSU Long Beach
· CSU East Bay
· Claremont Graduate University
· UCLA
Visit the School of Teacher Education website here.
Long Beach Unified School District
Long Beach Unified School District (LBUSD), is committed to "Engaging Every Learner, Every Day in a Linked Learning Experience." The district serves the cities of Long Beach, Signal Hill, Lakewood and Avalon, and is the third largest school district in California, with 88,000 students in 85 schools. LBUSD's student population is highly diverse: Hispanic 51.6%, African American 17.1%, Asian 8.1%, White/Caucasian 6.1%, Filipino 3.7%, Pacific Islander 1.9% and American Indian 0.2%; 25% English Learners; and 9% receiving special education services. Approximately 70% of LBUSD's student population is eligible for free/reduced lunch. As such, it has been a district priority to work systematically and comprehensively to ensure that every student experiences a personalized and rich academic experience that prepares him/her for postsecondary success in education and career.
The District has spent several years transforming its high schools into higher performing educational institutions where students are known by their teachers, administrators, and counselors; where they are learning and growing in smaller environments more closely focused on their postsecondary and career needs and goals; and where they are becoming more familiar with a higher set of performance expectations anchored in real world competencies. LBUSD now has more than 40 Linked Learning pathway programs.
With funding to support the expansion of smaller learning communities in all of its high schools, LBUSD has been able to continue the growth process identified through its intensive and explicit Academic and Career Success Initiative, and the goals of the District's High School Office: 1) Preparing all students for postsecondary and career options through Linked Learning; 2) Providing support services within each pathway; and, 3) Enrolling students in a coherent sequence of rigorous courses aligned to student outcomes, leading to Linked Learning Certification.
In its third year of Linked Learning implementation, the District has successfully led a scaled roll-out of Student Outcome Charts at all of its high schools, creating a common language around what makes each pathway unique; utilized these Student Outcome Charts as an orientation tool for parents, students, and teachers new to pathway programs; trained over thirty ninth and tenth grade interdisciplinary teacher teams in Performance Mapping; revised all ninth and tenth grade academic course outlines to reflect the integration of the "Five Power CTE Foundation Standards" identified by local business and postsecondary partners as critical to success; and aligned interdepartmental efforts in the central office to prioritize the work of Linked Learning. With support from the LBUSD Board of Education, four LBUSD pathways have already attained certification and the district has set the bold metric that 90% of its forty pathway programs will be Linked Learning certified by 2016.
To learn more, please click here to visit their Linked Learning website
Click here to see video of LBUSD Education Business Advisory
Porterville Unified School District
Porterville Unified School District (PUSD) is committed to preparing students for the world of college and careers. In 2009, Porterville was chosen as one of nine districts in the statewide Linked Learning District Initiative funded by the James Irvine Foundation. PUSD now offers nine "open choice" career-themed small learning communities within the five high schools in the district.
PUSD has worked diligently to ensure that all students have access to pathways that prepare them for college and careers. Prior to the development and formation of its first pathway, PUSD initiated a systematic approach to examine performance, demographic, and systemic data. Following extensive district-wide discussions by all stakeholder groups, the PUSD Governing Board ratified a variety of policy changes. The first was to increase graduation requirements. Second, the district changed its master schedule from a six to a seven-period day. The change in the master schedule helps ensure students have access to all courses needed for graduation, and offers schools more flexibility in scheduling common planning time for pathway teacher teams, protects elective programs, and addresses pathway needs. The district made this change without the cost increases typically presumed to accompany scheduling changes and with strong support from their teachers. The change in graduation requirements raised expectations for all students and helps ensure that all have an opportunity to meet the a-g eligibility requirements for entrance to the state's universities as well as complete a sequence of career and technical courses.
PUSD remains committed to "open access and equity for all" and gives middle school students information about pathways and the opportunity to attend any pathway based on interest. To ensure access to pathways for students and families, PUSD provides transportation for all students enrolled in a pathway of their choice.
More information on Porterville Unified School District can be found here.
View Interview with Cynthia G. Brown of Porterville USD
Alliance for a Better Community
The Alliance for a Better Community (ABC) is a coalition of Latino leaders in Los Angeles that is working with the Linked Learning Alliance to help build awareness about Linked Learning among parents, administrators and students throughout high schools in Los Angeles. Along with conducting Linked Learning information sessions at local schools, the ABC team also regularly leads field trips to successful Linked Learning programs in San Diego and Palmdale, allowing groups of 50 to 75 parents and school administrators to see firsthand how Linked Learning is helping improve student performance. ABC is also participating in the implementation of Linked Learning in many Los Angeles Unified schools, helping teachers and parents get involved as their schools develop new work-based learning opportunities and introduce Linked Learning curricula. ABC authored The Bottom-Up Approach: How Youth & Parent Organizing Strengthen Linked Learning Pathways to Both College and Career in order to promote partnerships between schools and parents and students. ABC is also an evaluator for the Linked Learning Statewide Certification Review Team.
In addition, ABC's policy experts regularly meet with local school board members in Los Angeles and legislators in Sacramento to share success stories about Linked Learning - and to educate policy-makers about the benefits of expanding this approach across the LA region and the rest of California. To learn more about ABC, please visit http://www.afabc.org.
California School Boards Association
The California School Boards Association is committed to supporting districts that are striving to prepare students for the world of college and career. To support that goal, CSBA has begun the work of providing support to our members who are contemplating or are already implementing a Linked Learning approach to reform in their high schools. One way we are doing that is to provide training to the governing teams of California Linked Learning District Initiative participants who have received grants from the Irvine Foundation. The role of the governing board in implementing reform is crucial. The school board's primary responsibilities are to set direction for the district, set policy, allocate resources, communicate with the public, and hold the superintendent accountable for outcomes. These roles provide the foundation for any successful reform initiative which without, could easily falter. CSBA is convening its own Linked Learning Task Force this summer to further develop strategies for districts who are thinking of moving in this direction. www.csba.org
