Social-Emotional Learning is a hot topic right now. People have a lot of really strong opinions! Gaining community buy-in is more important than ever. The research shows the need for SEL in schools, but our community is scared. We have gone through a time that has made many people skeptical of the information we are receiving. As educators, we want the support of our community!
Develop an Advisory Council
Every counseling department should consider having an advisory council. This is an excellent way to gain community buy-in and support! An advisory council is a group of people that help you create goals for your counseling department. They look through the data with you and give you directions on where to go.
Who should be on your council?
School Employees
You will want to include a variety of members when you develop an advisory council. Seek to find representatives from your school to be on your council. These representatives would include your counseling department, a school-level administrator, and teachers that represent a variety of your grades and departments (don’t forget your special education department). It is also important to seek district-level support. Some members to consider would be the administrator over student services, special education, and community relations. It is also beneficial to include a counselor from the level above and below you. For example, if you are in a middle school, you will want to include a high school representative and an elementary representative. Counselors from other grade levels can share perspectives from their age level. Having input from other counselors helps you create a cohesive program across your entire district.
Community Members
Once you have your district employees look for community members. Invite parents from every grade level in your school. I like to have some of my most vocal and concerned parents on my advisory council. Doing this keeps me on my game. I also know that they will not hold back their opinion. They will tell me exactly what they think. Winning over difficult parents can be challenging but can gain community buy-in.
Other community members to consider for your advisory council would be mental health practitioners that work with your school, student resource officers in your building, members of the education foundation, the director of your town library, someone that represents your chamber of commerce, and a representative from your city council.
You might think, “Ummmm…this is a bit overkill, don’t you think!?” You are right, it is a lot of people! When you put it in perspective, though, you have people representing your entire community. What are the needs of your community? What are the needs and concerns of your teachers and parents? Having this variety will help you develop a program that meets the needs of those around you.
Students and an Advisory Council
Another facet of an advisory council would include your students. You can find out more on our post about Student Buy-in. I meet with my students before my adults. We have the same discussions as I will have with my adult advisory council, just made age-appropriate. Then I can take their input back to my adult advisory council.
When selecting students for your advisory council, I suggest you have around 6-12 students. Ensure that you select students that represent your school. You will want students from every grade, academic ability, and various interests. I would encourage you to select students that are comfortable sharing their opinion and students that can be respectful to listen to others’ opinions.
How to Run an Advisory Council?
In the beginning, your advisory council will meet monthly for several months. Once your council and program are going, you will just need maintenance meetings. I would suggest once to twice a year. When you and your council are on the same page, it is easier to gain community buy-in.
It is important that you have an agenda and structure your meetings. Know and share what you will be doing. The beginning of your meetings will include educating your audience on terminology and what you are currently doing. Remember that many of your members do not work in education and don’t know how your school operates.
You are the content expert and the guide for your meeting. Your team will need direction. Once you have your objectives for each meeting, you will need to brainstorm a way to gather your council’s input.
Tools to Gain Input
Mentimeter is a great way to do polls, quizzes, and word clouds that everyone can visualize.
Google Forms is a free way to gather data from your audience.
Post-it notes can be an excellent visual. Give each member some post-it notes to place up in the front with their ideas. You can easily move them around to group them into themes and common ideas.
Poster-size bar graph. Print out a large bar graph. I like to use Google sheets when I am having my group tell me what their most important goals are. The list is printed on poster-size paper. Then my group can come up to the chart and color in a square next to the goals that are most important to them. This is a great visual for the entire committee to see what we collectively view as most important.
Utilize small groups. Give each group guided questions to answer. Once each group has a chance to discuss the topics, allow each group to share.
Share your data to gain community buy-in.
We talk about it constantly. Share your data! Your council needs to know what is going on in your building to make informed decisions. For that matter, you need to know what is happening in your building.
What are your current concerns? What are you currently doing? Is it working?
Data should be your guide in developing your program. Each school and community has a unique set of needs. What works for one school may not work for another. Let your data guide you, and let your data support your decisions.
Create an SEL Framework
As a district or with your council, create an SEL framework. I strongly recommend you get your district involved in this step and create an SEL framework for your entire district. Community buy-in is more likely when they know exactly what you are doing.
SEL is extremely controversial right now. One of the reasons is that many things are getting lumped into SEL that is not necessarily part of a Social-Emotional Curriculum. An SEL framework will give you a clear outline of what you are actually doing.
Use your committee or a district-wide committee to create an SEL framework that supports your district. If you need help or don’t know where to start, you can use CASEL’s framework, or you can check out The Mind Trek’s SEL framework.
Share what you are doing!
Parents want to know what you are doing. When your community knows what you are doing, you can more easily gain community buy-in. Share your SEL framework on your school’s website. When you are transparent about what you teach, your parents are less concerned. With your framework, post your scope and sequence and when you teach your lessons.
Host a parent night. Bring parents in and go over your SEL framework. Share with parents how your district came up with your SEL framework. Explain to parents how you chose the SEL program you use. Don’t forget to highlight the work that your advisory council has been doing. Throughout the meeting, share with them when and how you will implement SEL. Show them a sample lesson, and be willing to answer any questions!
Use regular communication. Add what you are doing in your newsletter once a week. Try sending out visuals or handouts that you are using at school for parents to use at home. Give a brief description of your lesson over that week and how they can continue it at home. The Mind Trek Program offers these descriptions and a way to continue the conversation with you. You simply need to copy and paste it into your newsletter.
SEL Unfiltered
Do you want to hear more? Check out all of our Episodes on our SEL Unfiltered podcast, wherever you stream your podcasts.
You might also be interested in the rest of our series on buy-in. Check out our other episodes: Principal Buy-in, Teacher Buy-in, and Student Buy-in.
Game of the Week
Every week on SEL Unfiltered, we like to bring you a game or activity. You can use the game with your students, in the classroom, or in a small group. This week Kaitlin and I tried out Story Cubes. Story cubes is a game of 9 dice. There are different pictures/symbols on each side of the dice, and all of the dice are different.
The objective of the game is to roll the dice and create a story using all of the pictures. Each story starts, “Once upon a time. . .” Kaitlin and I played by splitting the dice and taking turns using a die to continue the story.
You could play Story Cubes with a small group. Give each student a die to roll and go around the group to continue the story. One way to play this game in the classroom is to pass out the dice. The students would work through them, creating a story. If you are short on time, divide the class into small groups of 9 and allow each group to play. You can also simply have nine students participate while the rest of the class observes. Another option would be to continue passing the dice until every student has a chance to participate. This could take a very long time!
Story cubes give students a chance to use their imagination and voice. It also is an opportunity for them to work together in a group to work towards a common goal. In this case, the common goal would be to create a story.
