Equity work can be deeply personal and may include unlearning and shifting individual biases, beliefs, and practices. This paper builds on the premise that ongoing self-reflection in equity work is critical, as failing to attend to this internal work may result in education leaders reinforcing the very systems they are seeking to disrupt. And yet,…

This guide aims to help education professionals reimagine and redefine school safety such that safety is not the absence of a negative but rather the existence of positive elements such as interconnection, belonging, voice, and agency. The guide is intended to support educators and education leaders to create systems of mutual care and shift the…

Despite long-standing efforts to address and eliminate disproportionality in special education, inequities remain and continue to negatively impact Black, Indigenous, and other students of color with Individualized Education Programs. This brief from the Western Educational Equity Assistance Center (WEEAC) supports state education agencies, local…

To support state education agency (SEA) leaders in establishing a statewide vision for serving the whole person, WestEd drafted and piloted the guide, "Serving the Whole Person: An Alignment and Coherence Guide for State Education Agencies," in collaboration with several SEAs. This case story describes Delaware Department of Education…

To advance equity, districts and schools must serve the whole person. Equitable outcomes are more likely to result when whole-person initiatives are implemented within an aligned and coherent system. If educators at every level of the K-12 system--from the state level to the classroom--work in aligned and coherent ways to sustain the conditions…

Education leaders have varying power to change inequitable structures and systems, but all need safety, support, skills, strategies, and practices to sustain change efforts--especially when doing this work in a stressful or oppressive context. Often overlooked, the health and wellbeing of staff (all types) is as important as the health and…

The California College Promise Policy brief outlines the policy landscape that helped fuel the growth of College Promise in California. It reflects on issues that have arisen as the state's College Promise legislation and reforms have been implemented, and offers recommendations for maximizing the equity and impact of the California model of…

The COVID-19 pandemic has had a huge impact on education. Science teaching, in particular, has faced specific challenges given the field's emphasis on high-quality instruction that has students "do" science collaboratively rather than just read about it or hear about it in a lecture. This brief provides: (1) a summary of data collected…

The COVID-19 pandemic exacerbated existing inequitable access to quality science education as teachers taught dramatically less science after school closures, particularly science that strongly fulfills the Next Generation Science Standards (NGSS). In particular, teachers struggled to implement key features of the NGSS related to investigations…

School systems are currently faced with critical recovery needs as a result of the COVID-19 pandemic. Leaders must decide how to allocate nearly $200 billion of federal funding, which has the potential to significantly impact efforts to accelerate learning and provide student well-being supports, especially for students who have been…