WEBVTT 00:00:00.000 --> 00:00:04.500 [children playing] 00:00:04.500 --> 00:00:14.000 ♪ [gentle piano music] 00:00:16.550 --> 00:00:23.600 One of our missions and areas of focus in Student Support is providing supports for those youth and families who are furthest from justice. 00:00:24.700 --> 00:00:31.440 One of our programs that highlights this is our Education Advocate program that connects youth involved with the criminal justice systems 00:00:31.560 --> 00:00:35.960 with an Advocate to help them in achieving their goals and to reduce their risk of recidivism. 00:00:36.200 --> 00:00:38.520 Our Education Advocates are from the communities that we serve. 00:00:39.080 --> 00:00:45.960 So, we are understanding not only what it is to live in our communities, but at some point we were those students 00:00:46.420 --> 00:00:49.580 and we had to learn how to navigate those systems on our own 00:00:50.280 --> 00:00:56.500 and a lot of us come from a point of well if this was me, and I was in that situation, what could I do? 00:00:56.880 --> 00:01:00.800 Data shows that our non-white students are often disciplined in schools at a greater rate, 00:01:00.940 --> 00:01:02.360 removed from school more often, 00:01:02.600 --> 00:01:05.180 and more likely to end up in the criminal justice system, 00:01:05.239 --> 00:01:07.580 and are more likely to drop out of school that their white peers. 00:01:08.080 --> 00:01:13.220 We see similar patterns with our students who have special needs or who are from the LGBTQ+ population. 00:01:14.040 --> 00:01:18.720 When we talk about barriers, one thing that we have to think about is that most of the time 00:01:18.720 --> 00:01:23.560 the barriers impact people who are not white and middle class. 00:01:24.020 --> 00:01:26.060 So we build our continuum of supports in districts, 00:01:26.160 --> 00:01:27.860 it's important to look at demographic data 00:01:28.260 --> 00:01:29.580 and actually the community we're serving. 00:01:29.980 --> 00:01:34.660 The way in which MTSS framework looks in one district is going to look different in another district. 00:01:35.880 --> 00:01:39.500 Identifying needs and using data to figure out where kids are at. 00:01:39.940 --> 00:01:44.200 If you're not proactive or preventative or intentional about it, then you're often going to miss kids. 00:01:45.020 --> 00:01:48.160 Is your Tier 1 supporting 80 percent of those students at least? 00:01:48.900 --> 00:01:52.860 Is it supporting 80 percent of your Hispanic students? 00:01:52.980 --> 00:01:56.700 Is it supporting 80 percent of your indigenous Native American population, right? 00:01:56.700 --> 00:01:59.190 And if it's not then we need to build our system differently. 00:01:59.540 --> 00:02:11.480 How do we not only dismantle racism within our caste systems, but also how do we identify it within some of the practices that we 00:02:12.200 --> 00:02:14.340 find ourselves in every day? 00:02:14.660 --> 00:02:20.300 And the nice thing is that we have school districts who are also talking about how to dismantle that as well 00:02:20.300 --> 00:02:28.940 and identify when our BIPOC youth, our Black Indigenous People of Color, are facing those types of things. 00:02:29.500 --> 00:02:32.740 We always are trying to pull in the cultural aspect 00:02:32.740 --> 00:02:35.480 and to be really mindful of that. 00:02:35.640 --> 00:02:42.820 Another thing that I feel very passionate about that we are really trying to focus in is restorative practices for all students. 00:02:42.980 --> 00:02:46.200 When we're re-engaging students back into the schools, 00:02:46.200 --> 00:02:48.660 how and what does that look like? 00:02:48.980 --> 00:02:52.480 Rather than just, okay, you're back and we're placing you back into school. 00:02:52.800 --> 00:02:59.600 It's a constant dance between us, school districts, juvenile detention, all these other partners, 00:02:59.600 --> 00:03:05.680 as well as the student and families, to feel like everybody's working in unison. 00:03:06.120 --> 00:03:07.600 In the Student Support department, 00:03:07.600 --> 00:03:13.140 we believe firmly in the importance of ongoing learning in the areas of diversity, equity and inclusion. 00:03:13.820 --> 00:03:19.660 We want to recognize historical and ongoing injustice and hate targeted towards race, culture, religion, 00:03:19.920 --> 00:03:24.260 gender and gender identity, sexual orientation, disability, and nationality. 00:03:24.720 --> 00:03:26.920 If we look at our staff, 00:03:26.920 --> 00:03:35.600 and I think one of the goals that we had as a department, is how do we have someone who is bilingual as much as possible, bicultural. 00:03:35.600 --> 00:03:42.440 And what we do, is we really look at our teams in a lot of ways is that it really does lend to that. 00:03:42.920 --> 00:03:47.440 We have many, I say at this point maybe 50 percent of our staff, are bilingual. 00:03:47.480 --> 00:03:50.900 Of just the teams that I'm talking about, 00:03:50.900 --> 00:03:52.980 like 80 percent are bicultural. 00:03:53.460 --> 00:03:55.060 And it's something that's been intentional 00:03:55.060 --> 00:04:01.500 and it's been amazing what that has done and I think that increases engagement with our families 00:04:01.500 --> 00:04:07.380 and trust and then even as we're designing what interventions are going in, we take a look at that. 00:04:07.380 --> 00:04:11.460 What is something that's going to address this population the best? 00:04:12.140 --> 00:04:16.899 I did a Student Assistance Program and worked on interventions, direct services, 00:04:17.480 --> 00:04:23.580 and it was one of those things where they, living in Yakima, having that population, 00:04:23.580 --> 00:04:30.620 you see their eyes light up when they see somebody that looks like them and even speaks the language. 00:04:30.620 --> 00:04:33.320 Understand, some of those things, and it's just, kind of, 00:04:33.320 --> 00:04:39.880 they can relate, and it provides more connection. 00:04:40.640 --> 00:04:42.380 We stand with our communities of color 00:04:42.380 --> 00:04:44.920 and our other traditionally underrepresented communities 00:04:44.920 --> 00:04:51.640 and we'll continue to create opportunities for growth, learning, and understanding around what diversity, equity and inclusion 00:04:52.180 --> 00:04:54.420 truly look like in principle and practice. 00:04:54.860 --> 00:04:56.600 It's like this kid's gonna come back into our community, 00:04:56.600 --> 00:04:59.180 we want him to have a chance, you know? 00:04:59.600 --> 00:05:01.920 He's had tons of generations that didn't have that chance, 00:05:02.560 --> 00:05:04.520 and we could be that once just to give him a little push 00:05:04.520 --> 00:05:05.680 and he could do so much. 00:05:06.400 --> 00:05:10.740 He could make a huge butterfly effect for the rest of his generations, you know? 00:05:11.220 --> 00:05:15.300 Like that's the work that I want to part of. 00:05:16.5000 --> 00:05:34.420 [children playing]