Repost from www.the74million.org

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Despite a stellar high school record with great grades, Advanced Placement classes and leadership positions on the debate team and in marching band, Jennifer Hernandez was completely unprepared during her senior year to choose a college or even comprehend the jargon that surrounds the application process.

“I did not know where to start,” she said. As a first-generation student living in the Chicago suburb of Rolling Meadows, Illinois, she didn’t have family who could decipher the terminology or take her to visit college campuses. Nor did she get that help from an adviser. Like many high schools around the country, hers did not have enough guidance counselors, she said. And the counselors the school did have were too busy to support students who needed extra help, like her…

Read the entire article on www.the74million.org here

Cajon Valley Union School District has been selected as one of six school districts in California  by the statewide Community Engagement Initiative (CEI). This groundbreaking initiative to build resources for more meaningful community engagements in California’s public schools is an integral part of California’s new accountability system called System of Support.

The districts selected will make up the CEI’s Peer Leading and Learning Network which will analyze research and practices involving community engagement to help implement best practices in California schools, districts, and communities. Jan Gustafson-Corea, CEO of the California Association of Bilingual Education, said,  “We are thrilled to learn with these districts what impactful community engagement looks like to bring about the ultimate goal of student success—particularly for communities of linguistically and culturally diverse backgrounds.”

Cajon Valley Union School District is heavily involved in the El Cajon community, striving to make El Cajon the best place to live, work, and play. Of the many ways CVUSD reaches the community is the support the district gives to refugee students and their families, programs for parents to learn skills to better their own future, and programs like the World of Work which focuses heavily on connecting students to jobs and professionals in their community and surrounding communities.

“The Cajon Valley Union School District is excited to share our success in authentically engaging all families in cultivating ‘Happy kids, engaged in healthy relationships, on a path to gainful employment’ with this network of leaders to advance family engagement across our great state,” said Dr. David Miyashiro, CVUSD Superintendent.

The other districts joining Cajon Valley Union School District in CEI’s Peer Leading and Learning Network are East Side Union High School District, Ontario-Montclair School District, Oxnard School District, Anaheim Union High School District, and Azusa Unified School District. Contact CVUSD’s CEI contact, Sandra Candler, at candlers@cajonvalley.net for more information.

 

About Cajon Valley Union School District

With roots dating back to 1870, Cajon Valley Union School District focuses on the positivity of each student’s unique strengths, interests, and values. Serving over 60 square miles of San Diego’s East County, Cajon Valley Union School District offers personalized education, with programs that develop students’ interests into goals for a career-minded approach. Visit the district at www.cajonvalley.net and don’t forget to follow CVUSD on Twitter, Facebook, and Instagram.

On May 21, 2019, Cajon Valley Union School District Chief Innovation and Engagement Officer Ed Hidalgo spoke at the Brookings Institution’s Building the Workforce of the Future symposium. At this event, the session Mr. Hidalgo was invited to speak at a session centered around how K-12 education systems can effectively support young people for the future world of work. On this panel, Hidalgo had the opportunity to highlight the specialized curriculum implemented in the Cajon Valley Union School District with the World of Work initiative.

Hidalgo used his time to explain that in his background at Qualcomm hiring more than 20,000 employees from all over the world and some of the finest institutions in the United States, he found many of those employees unable to manage their careers and tell their stories. He saw brilliant minds come to work after a “conveyor belt of education, but [that] cannot articulate who they are, what they want to become, and what [their] workplace strengths, interests, and values are.”

After witnessing this conundrum, Hidalgo had a dream to integrate career development for every child. Born from these experiences and the future-forward mind of CVUSD Superintendent David Miyashiro was the World of Work initiative. During the panel session, Hidalgo described how the World of Work helps educators see the talent every student from every background has in CVUSD. The World of Work helps students discover their talents with plenty of opportunities to build skills to succeed in a career.

With the World of Work initiative, Cajon Valley students are taught daily, throughout each lesson, about careers, job skills, and who they are. They learn to tell their story with the World of Work framework while exploring careers, simulating it with a hands on experience, meeting industry professionals, and then practicing it. A theme at the Workforce of the Future symposium centered around people being confined to the horizon that they see. The World of Work at Cajon Valley broadens the horizon for every student, where Kindergartners talk to engineers, first graders talk to zoologists from Utah, and third graders talk to Imagineers from Disney right in their own classroom!

Cajon Valley Union School District’s implementation of the World of Work was celebrated at the Brookings event, highlighting the efforts of the community to come together and give every child, in every grade, throughout every year an opportunity to see the possibilities of their future. To view the entire session featuring Ed Hidalgo, click here.

About Cajon Valley Union School District

With roots dating back to 1870, Cajon Valley Union School District focuses on the positivity of each student’s unique strengths, interests, and values. Serving over 60 square miles of San Diego’s East County, Cajon Valley Union School District offers personalized education, with programs that develop students’ interests into goals for a career-minded approach. Visit the district at www.cajonvalley.net and don’t forget to follow CVUSD on Twitter, Facebook, and Instagram.

**** REPOST FROM AMERICAN STUDENT ASSISTANCE****

Thirty-eight schools in Vista Unified, La Mesa-Spring Valley and Grossmont Union school districts to deliver career-focused research-based program

BOSTON – June 4, 2019 – American Student Assistance® (ASA), a national nonprofit, announced today a $1.2 million grant to fund 38 schools in three districts in the San Diego area to participate in the World of Work (WoW) program. WoW was developed in the Cajon Valley Union School District, in partnership with University of San Diego, to provide students in grades K-12 with opportunities to identify their individual strengths, interests and values to explore their career options.

Recipients of the three-year grants from ASA® :

• Grossmont Union High School: Grades 9-12 across 10 schools, reaching 16,532 students and 962 teachers
• La Mesa-Spring Valley Schools: Grades TK-8 across 23 schools, reaching 12,100 students and 500 teachers
• Vista Unified School District: Grades 6-8 across five schools, reaching 4,552 students and 229 teachers

These San Diego-area schools will use the grant funding to implement the WoW program, helping students learn about a variety of career options through hands-on experiences integrated into their regular classroom curriculum. Districts will train teachers to implement the comprehensive, evidenced-based curriculum that includes: virtual field trip opportunities, robust outcomes measurement, and complete online student and teacher resources.

“WoW is well-aligned with ASA’s commitment to helping students explore career options early in their education journey so they can find their paths and plan for their futures,” said Jean Eddy, President and CEO. “We’re delighted to help scale the World of Work initiative in southern California to prepare young people for the important choices they will make after high school.”

WoW has been implemented in 27 schools over the past two years. It has attracted attention worldwide from educators and workforce development professionals who embrace the program’s focus on early exposure and self-awareness aligned to career paths.

“ASA’s mission to help students know themselves, know their options, and make informed decisions to achieve their education and career goals is exactly what the World of Work is designed to do,” said David Miyashiro, Ed.D., Superintendent, Cajon Valley Union School District. “We’ve seen a significant increase in student self-awareness and articulation of possible future selves in relation to career aspirations. This scale-up and research partnership is how we can reverse the trends of $1.5 trillion in student loan debt and the more than 50 percent college dropout rate.” “Our partnership with ASA, and their financial support, will help our students expand understanding of their career strengths and interests,” said Tim Glover, Superintendent, Grossmont Union High School District. “For more than 50 years, Grossmont’s award-winning Career Technical Education programs have provided students valuable knowledge and skills through a variety of instructional and work-based learning activities. The addition of the World of Work curriculum will assist our students to make better informed decisions about their college and career pursuits.”

“We are very excited to partner with ASA and the WoW community in a commitment to more clearly aim the academic journey toward a fulfilling life and career,” said David Feliciano, Superintendent, La Mesa-Spring Valley Schools.

“It is truly an honor for Vista Unified to be included in a project that makes such a deliberate connection between students and career options, with a laser focus on the individual strengths, interests and values of each child,” said Matt Doyle, Ed.D., Assistant Superintendent, Vista Unified School District. “The WoW program is poised to directly take-on and eliminate the opportunity gap many of our students face as they prepare for an increasingly complex world of work.” About American Student Assistance® (ASA) American Student Assistance® (ASA) is a national nonprofit committed to helping kids know themselves, know their options, and make informed choices to achieve their education and career goals. ASA® has a 60-year legacy of working directly with students to increase their access to higher education through loans and financial education. ASA has turned its experience into impactful solutions for kids in middle, high school, and beyond to help them pursue their dreams. To learn more about ASA’s commitment, visit asa.org

**** END OF REPOST ****

About Cajon Valley Union School District

With roots dating back to 1870, Cajon Valley Union School District focuses on the positivity of each student’s unique strengths, interests, and values. Serving over 60 square miles of San Diego’s East County, Cajon Valley Union School District offers personalized education, with programs that develop students’ interests into goals for a career-minded approach. Visit the district at www.cajonvalley.net and don’t forget to follow CVUSD on Twitter, Facebook, and Instagram.

Click here for video of visit

For the second year in a row, Cajon Valley Union School District has been host to top leaders and innovators from around the world interested in bettering work environments and education at the ASU+GSV Summit. The ASU+GSV Summit, held this past April, is a yearly conference where CEOs, investors, school, district and university leaders, media, enterprise learning and talent leaders, politicians, foundation leaders and policy makers come together to share ideas.

Summit participants visited Cajon Valley’s Bostonia Language Academy in El Cajon, California, where students have the opportunity to acquire three languages: English, Spanish, and Coding. During the visit to Bostonia Language Academy, visitors took tours of classrooms, interacted with students and staff, and heard speakers from the school and district to gain insights on instruction and classroom community. Students were able to share with summit visitors what they have learned about themselves and their future selves through the modern curriculum Cajon Valley is working to implement.

“Coming to Cajon Valley, what our group is really interested in doing is trying to find the best ideas from around the world that can rapidly accelerate progress” said Dr. Rebecca Winthrop, Director of Center for Universal Education at the Brookings Institution, a non-profit that uses research to form better policies to better education globally. “We think there is a real advantage to learning from each other because good practice can be shared across borders…”

The CVUSD tour showed some of the leaders that problems in education are similar in all parts of the world. “A lot of the challenges education faces is the same all around the world.” said Brian Schreuder, Superintendent General of Education, Western Cape Province, South Africa “…the diversity challenges that we face here in San Diego for example are similar but not as deep as those we face at home. I think that never before have we lived in an era where global citizenship is so important.” Bostonia Language Academy is a shining example of teaching students to think about the world around them as a community that they can be apart of and improve.

The ASU+GSV Summit facilitates international collaboration among educators that are concerned about preparing children for the future job market. The challenge of providing the proper preparation for every individual student is a worldwide issue felt at different scales and depths. Cajon Valley Union School District is at the forefront of the radical changes being made in education that are vital to ensuring students realize they have a place in the world and a bright future. As Dr. Winthrop said and CVUSD agrees, “we’re…hoping to move education forward particularly for kids to make sure that they’re getting their full breadth of skills and suite of competencies they need to thrive in their life, work and citizenship.”

Because of the efforts made in at CVUSD towards advancing education, the tours at the Bostonia Language Academy led to the Brookings Institution representatives inviting Superintendent David Miyashiro and Chief of Innovation & Engagement Officer Ed Hidalgo to speak at their Building the Workforce of the Future Symposium event.

About Cajon Valley Union School District

With roots dating back to 1870, Cajon Valley Union School District focuses on the positivity of each student’s unique strengths, interests, and values. Serving over 60 square miles of San Diego’s East County, Cajon Valley Union School District offers personalized education, with programs that develop students’ interests into goals for a career-minded approach. Visit the district at www.cajonvalley.net and don’t forget to follow CVUSD on Twitter, Facebook, and Instagram.

On February 4 and 5, the National Conference on Digital Convergence (NCDC) gathered at their annual event in La Jolla, California for their Modern Teacher Conference . As part of the conference, attendees visited Cajon Valley Union School District schools to see how CVUSD is implementing modernization into the classroom and ensuring curriculum prepares students for the 21st Century.

The NCDC is a place where district administrators gather to learn about The Digital Convergence Framework and how it provides districts with a data-driven methodology to effectively move toward modern learning environments. Attendees of the conference learn how to integrate modern education ideals with existing infrastructure in their district for the best results and smooth transitions. The NCDC is designed to be an innovative yet practical way to advance K-12 education and improve student outcomes individually, at schools and districts, and within the country.

Those attending this year’s NCDC were able to experience Cajon Valley Union School District because CVUSD is a Digital Convergence Exemplar district. This distinction was given to CVUSD for the non-traditional approach the district is taking to measure and advance student success through their partnership with the World of Work program. This modern initiative was designed to prepare students to be happy, have healthy relationships, and become gainfully employed as proactive members of society after their school careers.

Students were able to showcase what they’ve learned through World of Work about themselves and their futures and also the skills they’ve gained in presentation literacy during the NCDC Tours. Watch a recap of the tours and some of the amazing students tour attendees were able to meet at https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ey6hfSt2Bbc&t=8s.

About Cajon Valley Union School District

With roots dating back to 1870, Cajon Valley Union School District focuses on the positivity of each student’s unique strengths, interests, and values. Serving over 60 square miles of San Diego’s East County, Cajon Valley Union School District offers personalized education, with programs that develop students’ interests into goals for a career-minded approach. Visit the district at www.cajonvalley.net and don’t forget to follow CVUSD on Twitter, Facebook, and Instagram.