Frequently Asked Questions
What is the CARE Network?
Who should be on our team?
All participating schools will identify an 8th Grade Student CARE Team made up of teachers and support staff that meets in weekly “huddles” to look at by-student data and develop plans of support for individual students, as well as a System Level Team of administrators, support staff, and teachers that meets monthly or quarterly to look at aggregated student data and manage schoolwide supports available for students. Each school will identify a CARE Team Lead who cuts across both teams and keeps the work moving forward.
In addition, schools interested in working on the third driver of culturally responsive instruction may identify an additional Instruction Team of math teachers who will participate in lesson study to test/refine culturally responsive approaches to math instruction, and build their own capacity to engage in and facilitate lesson study at their site.
How does my middle school apply?
We are currently accepting applications on a rolling basis until we reach our capacity of 27 teams. Follow these easy five steps to secure your spot!
1. Identify an 8th grade educator at your school who might be interested in being a Success Team Lead to support huddle work at your site. Talking points to share with colleagues about huddle work are below:
- A “huddle” is a quick 20-45 min weekly/biweekly routine focused on supporting those students who are on our minds as needing extra support of some kind. This structure would fit perfectly in a grade level meeting.
- Success team lead stipend $5000/year – (this could be split between two teachers who want to lead the huddles with their 8th grade/support staff colleagues and each would receive $2500/year, but no more than two people can share the team lead role)
2. (optional) Identify math teachers interested in participating in lesson study practices. Talking points to share with colleagues about lesson study work are below:
- Open to any math teacher from your site who would like to participate, provided at least one 8th grade math teacher joins (other math teachers may be 6th, 7th, or 8th grade math teachers). Ideal team is 3-5 math teachers.
- Lesson study teams meet weekly to engage in core practices related to lesson study: looking at student work, anticipating student thinking, planning lessons together, and tracking student understanding and progress towards class equity goals.
- $3000/year stipend for each participating math teacher (we budgeted for all teachers in the lesson study team to get a stipend since these meetings may occur outside of official school meetings – although it is our hope that these key student-centered practices become the norm in discipline meetings).
3. Let the district office know that you want to apply so that they can fill out the district office letter of support template. (Note – one district letter that lists all the schools from the district that would like to apply will suffice!)
4. Designate a member of the team to fill out the team acknowledgement letter with team names & contact info (5 minutes to fill out)
5. Designate a member of the team to fill out the application form (15 minutes to fill out – multiple choice questions with 4 open response questions – max 250 words each.)
How will the network achieve its aim?
As remote and hybrid learning becomes our new reality, it has become critical to set up structures to address the inherent challenges and inequities that inevitably occur with online education. The CARE Network is designed to support middle school educators in navigating these challenges together, in our current reality and in the future. Specifically, the network will focus on four critical drivers that support students in graduating middle school on track to succeed:
- Early warning systems for noticing when students are struggling, and working collaboratively to design and track interventions that help students succeed
- Strong student-teacher relationships where adults know students well, see them as whole people, and nurture their positive identity development
- Culturally responsive instruction that disrupts inequitable status dynamics and builds diverse students’ cognitive capacities, while affirming their identities as learners and sense of belonging
- Supportive 8th-9th grade transition so students are able to start strong and stay on-track in 9th grade
When do we start?
The first network convenings in 2021 will be virtual until health guidelines permit convenings to be held in person.
The 2021 convening dates include:
- January, 27th – 29th, CARE Network Launch
- March, 10th -12th, CARE Network Second Convening
- May, 19th-21st, CARE Network Third Convening
Where can I learn more?
You can learn more about the CARE network on our application page here, and our overview for school partners here.
