Southwest Partnership Education Committee
November 2 2017
1138 Hollins St
7pm
Minutes
Present
Jane Buccheri
Elizabeth Weber
Lou Packett
Becky Newgren
Quincy Goldsmith
Camille Givens Patterson
Dotie Page
Jane Mayrer
Abigail Breseith
Patricia Nelson
Sheila Drummond Camm
Amanda Benjamin
Community School Planning Update
Been working with Vivien T Thomas, SBCS, and Steuart Hill, have done two focus groups with community partners and have another for Vivien T Thomas scheduled for next week. Volunteers are still needed let Elizabeth know if you are interested.
Ask questions what the groups find in their school, what they would like to see in the school–what the school has and what the school needs.  Ms Dotie will check out the next one on Tuesday to see if she’s interested.
The goals of the focus group are to collect information about the schools and to build relationships and support for the community school process.
Lou: asked someone to look into the DARE program to see if it’s effective. He heard on the radio a report that it wasn’t, and as the police are bringing it into area schools he would like to see if anyone is interested in doing research into alternatives. Abigail: thinks that the question of the effectiveness of the program would be a political football and that there are questions about how to measure effectiveness. Camille: could also be a different program now–different drugs and a different context. We are not sure what the current program would entail. Jane Mayrer will do some research online.
SWCOS (Social Work Community Outreach Service) has a funder who may be interested in funding the planning process for up to three schools–we will know by the end of the year whether or not they are interested in having a full proposal presented. SWCOS would only help coordinate the funding–it is too premature to talk about who would be a good implementing agency.
University of Maryland Letter
Lou sent a letter to the Presidents of UMB and UMMC asking them to consider expanding their investment to all schools in the Southwest Partnership area and to be more involved in the SWP’s education work. The Committee reviewed the letter sent in response by Ashley Valis, UMB’s representative on the SWP board. The response emphasized UMB’s ongoing work across schools in the city and W Baltimore as a whole. We have not gotten a response from UMMC. Lou would like neighbors to review the letter and contribute towards a response.
Camille: wanted to add other programs on the list–UMB has long experience working with Vivien T Thomas.
Abigail: basic response–thanks for laying all this out, good information, this is the transition point from an atomized effort and we’re trying to build coherence, equity, and consolidation. Thanks for Camille and other demonstrations of commitment.
Community School Vision Discussion
Lou shared the things that the he has been learning and thinking about in his time as Chair of the Committee.
He has had a number of aha moments, including Maslow’s hierarchy of needs, the 9 pillars for a quality of education system, and the concept of a mesh that connects services.
Many basic needs have not been met because the communities have been underserved for so long. The need to meet all the of the basic needs before advancing is something that should be kept in mind especially as many students need their basic needs met.
The 9 building blocks of a world class education system was put together by the National Center on Education and the Economy after 25 years of research on excellent international education systems and is something for the Committee to review.
There are currently no set of standards or accountability for determining whether current community schools are currently meeting the needs of students. There also needs to be a way to help the community thrive in order to have the schools and students thrive, and the schools are one place where people can agree there is a need and people can come together to meet that need.
Lou has health, education, housing, and employment as the four building blocks for a strong community. Having an impact on these four areas will have an impact on the community. Lou’s goal is that there will be a menu of options for partners and providers who can meet the needs of schools and communities as identified through the planning process so that the community school coordinators and school leadership can pick from a menu of options of previously interviewed programs and potential partners who can meet the needs as identified by the schools and the schools can choose the ones that meet their needs.
How will it be updated? And who will it be vetted? Lou’s vision is that there would be a full time SWP staff person who would be overseeing all the coordinators at the schools while at the same time interviewing new programs that could be good fits for the guide.
