In the 2017-18 school year, the California State Board of Education rolled out a new statewide system of support for local education agencies, with the goal of moving away from punitive accountability policies toward working alongside schools and districts to respond directly to local needs and contexts. Distilling lessons from prior research, practice, and continuous improvement endeavors, this brief outlines key principles of effective support and presents state policymakers, county offices, districts, and support providers with suggestions on how to engage in this work productively to ensure that the system successfully serves the students of California. The brief also incorporates recent feedback from the field, which was collected and summarized in a memorandum from the California Department of Education (CDE) based on the first 6 months of direct support to the newly identified districts. It notes areas of alignment between the Collaborative's suggestions and the June 2018 CDE memorandum while also raising additional concerns for California's education community to consider.